New Gold Dream

I spent all of yesterday thinking it was Saturday and when i woke today to discover today was Saturday it was like winning the lotto.

I didn't get the cleaning i wanted to do done, simply because, unless i plan to throw away most of the toys in the house, it will never be clean. Although Oisin did clean his desk, which was astonishing. And he cooked breakfast today. Porridge. He is becoming a real man. Some day he will make a partner very happy.

Many of my friends report back from the front lines of motherhood. I am especially interested in the stories women tell about older boys. A friend told me about her well trained son.Oh that's excellent i said, i'm sure his girlfriend is thrilled with that. Flip, i'd say she is, especially since she can't do very much herself. 

This seems to be a prevailing trend. Girls who cannot do much around the house. This is a definite step backwards. Doing stuff for yourself in the house is a lifeskill. EVERYONE should be able to do something for themselves in the house, as i discovered to my detriment, when i began entering the big bad world. Having been told all my life that all i had to so was study, i never cleaned or did any housework, and until today i struggle to do the housework, as readers of this blog will know.

This year though, inspired by my idea of throwing away most of the toys, i am going to do precisely that. Most of our toys are rubbish. The most annoying type of rubbish is the rubbish you get from fastfood joints. Children are not able to discern between nonsense and proper handmade deals. So our house slowly fills up with these bright gaudily coloured trash. I include free give aways in this category. Stuff from cornflake boxes, airline flights, Santa's grottos and time fillers in restaurants. Somehow, what we can give kids is disposable, says the world. Give them rubbish and they won't know the difference.

Especially as adults. I think so much of the awfulness that we see today is because children have been pumped with shite. There is this belief that children love acidic colours. Like over the top lemon yellow, and pillar box red and cyan - most nurseries are decorated with these hideous colours, because it stimulates children, without much thought to the aesthetic. Does that blue go with that green? No, it doesn't, but it doesn't matter because the child psychologists have said it stimulates them.

I once inadvertantly did an experiment myself - i took Ghin as a baby to Indianaland which is this amusement park, indoors, for kids. It's mostly ropes and things, the usual hedious decoration and the most unsuitable gangsta rap over the PA system. It's either that or the shoot yourself in the head nursery rhymes. But it was LOUD. And instead of making the most terrible protest, Ghin began to fall asleep. 

Now, i could draw two conclusions. Like loud noises put babies to sleep. Which is not true. Or that his sense were so overstressed that he went into switch down mode. Or maybe he was sleepy anyway. But then I began feeling sleepy. And i thought, it has to be that this place is just too much for the human body and it just can't cope.

Many athletes talks about feeling sleepy before a race. In fact many of my track and field friends would fall asleep while waiting for their big races on the cold concrete of the Singapore stadium and we were told that this was a reaction to fear and nervousness. 

It is a beautiful frosty day. Yesterday we went to Strangford and saw the most amazing birds. Several lapwings, redwing and fieldfares, oystercathcers, golden plover...Strangford cannot be beaten for birdwatching really. Not just because of the birds, but because of the landscape - the drumlins and the monasteries and the ancient history that is all coddled in this soft rolling landscape of green and gold and blue and silver and all the lovely wee pubs you could stop at along the way. 

We ended up in a rocking Castle Espie where a wee boy was playing the bagpipes. Indoors.

Now bagpipes are tolerable at the best of times. But they are not meant to be played indoors. We went around with our faces screwed up, because we couldn't cover our ears, cos that would be rude, of course. However i really did appreciate how clever the engineers of the bagpipes were. Of you think of the scale of the Scottish Highlands and the noise you much rise over in battle when you're leading the army, you begin to understand how this level of loudness was thought of as necessary.

We are now going to take the bus to town, to take in the bright new year...happy new year all!!!