A brief History of time, 2012 to the present day.

I doubt it will be brief. It may well take a few posts to catch up.

Scratch that. I started but there's too much. Suffice to say all three offspring achieved fantastically well in their studies - a First, two Masters and a best in subject award. All of them settled, working, two married, one local, one down South and one on the other side of the world. Guess which one? They've not all had easy journeys to get here but such is life. There has been travel to far flung places, study abroad, each have had multiple house moves, new jobs, dogs, and recently lost dogs. We've also had semi retirement, unemployment, self employment.

We've had losses too, my mother in law and my dad. I miss my dad.

2018 deserves a special mention. It started badly, my dad died suddenly on the morning of the 3rd January. He was the King of Dads; a quiet, unassuming man, he would have been shocked at how many people loved and admired him. The messages to my mum were full of lovely words. He taught me a certain independence, gave me knowledge and life skills, love. He is irreplaceable in my life.

One of my dad's life lessons was the value of a 'sod it' fund. A small pot of cash that mean't you were free to act if things weren't going to plan. Thanks dad.

When he died I was working in a lovely school for a head that was, lets say, difficult. She was, is, a bully and a narcissist. Up to that point I wasn't on her radar and was fairly adept at grey-rocking any attention; don't feed it, don't engage. I loved my work so it was a compromise. But it changed after my dad. I couldn't ignore the bullying of a hardworking colleague, the lies, the gas-lighting. My emotional strength was on the wane, I was angry with everything, so I raised my head above the parapet and got shot at. I'm not going into detail. It wasn't pretty and to be honest unless you've worked for a person like that, secondhand explanations of the abuse, because that's what it is, just don't do it justice.

So I took my sod it fund, put it to good use and walked away, along with other colleagues, two of which remain firmly in my life and are the best, strongest women I'll probably ever meet.

For every negative, there is a positive.

Another strand to 2018 was a worry about the youngest. A routine echo combined with some dodgy blood results brought back some long buried concerns. Months passed before we got to the bottom of it and my initial fears were unsubstantiated but it was another reminder of the fragility of her health and added a further stress to my emotional and mental health.

I was glad to see the back of that year.

2019 brought the two aforementioned weddings, Eldest and The Prince  (seems I missed a trick here - this post should be entitled A Funeral and Two Weddings) Both were fabulous days, so memorable, so different to each other. Youngest, not to be outdone, had her own way of marking 2019 - by moving to the other side of the world! She's currently residing in Melbourne with her boyfriend who has a sponsored post until 2021. Covid-19 put a halt on our plans to visit and is continuing to keep us apart. I miss her so much; I'm reminded of one of my first ever blog posts about her when she was in hospital and the physical ache when you can't hold your sick child. It feels akin to that at the moment.

Bastard pandemic.

The 4th of July

This weekend marked the 4th of July. American Independence under normal circumstances - normal? will there ever be a 'normal'? There's been an attempt at it - this 4th of July was designated #SuperSaturday by our esteemed Prime Minister. The day the pubs reopened. Typical Brit mentality; you can't get a face-to-face appointment with a hospital consultant to discuss your chronic or even acute health condition but you can go sup a pint at your local. Priorities people!

Whether you think opening the pubs was a good idea or the equivalent of throwing typhoid Mary into the crowd at a Take That concert I can't help but baulk at the method. Why open on a Saturday, why not a wet Tuesday afternoon? Big on announcements, shy with the detail is the order of the day again. Schools will open in September, risk assessment to follow. And today, blaming care homes for the many, many deaths because they didn't follow the correct procedure; the one that was hastily written on the back of a beer mat by the health secretary two weeks after dispatching Covid positive patients home from hospital. Oh, those 'correct procedures'.

You don't have to look far to find other countries doing better; locked down sooner, harder, good supported the less well off, for business, for the arts, lifted restrictions more thoughtfully. 15 weeks and still we're lurching from impending doom to full on Armageddon.

Feeling very pissed off today.

I miss my kids, I miss my dad, just popping to the shop for a bloody cucumber is more anxiety inducing and requires more organisation than getting three under fives out of the door in a morning, and I'm sick of services using Covid as a reason to keep hold of cash that they have no right to.

Feel like staying in bed til it's all over.

13 weeks and counting

How naive we were to think it would be over. Every week seems to bring new revelations about the Government's response to Covid 19. I'm trying to think of a single word to describe it. I don't think there is one. It's been disastrous but that's not the word, someone will need to invent one.

There's been other stuff too, we're still attempting to Brexit (that's one of the things I'll come back to eventually) and more importantly  #BlackLivesMatter, which has, or should have, brought to the fore the systemic racism that exists in our so-called civilised society. The shocking murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis has made us look at ourselves and recognise that black and minority ethnic people continue to battle against racism every single moment of each day and remain largely unprotected by law enforcement in the US and indeed in many countries around the world, our own included. The backlash against protests that #BlackLivesMatter by white people who feel somehow demeaned by the suggestion that the majority of us are racist whether purposely, by ignorance or just by not speaking up, not standing up, has been depressing to see.

I will do better.

What Fresh Hell is This?

So it's been a while. Almost 8 years to be precise. Lots has happened but not much more important than the current global situation which has brought me back here to offload my thoughts. They're multitude and muddled.

It's the 75th Anniversary of VE day too, which shouldn't pass without comment. It's an odd state of affairs; a celebration of our freedom from war and the recognition of the heroes of the time juxtaposition-ed against the current fight, captivity and a celebration of a different kind of hero. #NHSHeroes. Not sure we were using hashtags when I was last here in 2012. A new language has evolved and with more recently added vocabulary; elbow-bump (that came and went within the space of about 2 weeks) replaced by social -distancing, track and trace, lockdown and acronyms now in everyday use; PPE, wfh. WtAF? (not new, seemed appropriate).

Life has settled into a routine of daily exercise (100 miles walked in March & April), food shopping, eating and otherwise trying to fill the hours. New pressures and anxieties; the weekly trip to the supermarket, being judged on whether your lockdown is productive enough or if your trip out of the house is deemed essential, or if you're risking your loved one's life handing over a pint of milk. And loo roll, flour, pasta are restricted purchases. Should we clap for the NHS or, preferably just not vote Tory next time?

Holidays have been cancelled - I'll get to that later, Mother's Day was a wave and a chat from the driveway, running with friends is a distant memory as is a drink at the pub or browsing the shops or going to the library.

Schools have been effectively closed for 7 weeks up to today, so I've been wfh mainly and only going in a couple of mornings a fortnight, to provide for the children of keyworkers. It's a risky business. The children haven't yet learned the meaning of the new vocab and can't reliably judge two metres. Attempting to social distance is like herding cats.

We've had it easy in our household, I've no doubt. We have a garden, I can still check on mum, I'm not trying to home-school three small children, I'm not shielding a medically vulnerable person, she's on the other side of the world. It's wearing though. It's boring and most of us have had enough. But it's the new normal and we have to put up with it. Stay Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives. and we're luckier than many countries from a lockdown point of view, it's less strict here, but we may pay the price for our freedom later. We're already paying to be fair with a death rate second only to the US globally and the elderly apparently deemed collateral damage to an ineffective government. At the outset, when Wuhan was in lockdown almost overnight and residents were arrested for being on the street it was happening in a distant city with an oppressive government and most of us thought; 'that won't happen here'.

How easily we gave up our freedoms.

Summer

Sorry. I've been neglectful of the blog. There is no excuse. I'm back now, having been inspired by The Coffee Lady to think about my summer.

It was a new type of summer, one which didn't have water fights, or trips to theme parks or calls of 'I'm bored mum'. It had A-level and driving test angst, (she passed and failed in that order) it had solo runs along the canal, afternoons in the garden with wine and The Child Free Holiday. I can hear your enthusiasm now. But don't be rushing on ahead of time. It was nice, I'm not complaining, but it will take some getting used to. I sort of missed the madness of it all  and realised that we've moved on to the next stage. A couple more years and I'll have to get a dog or something.

Easter week turned out nice again so it was time to dust off the walking boots and head for the hills.

The weather was so nice infact that shorts were donned as opposed to walking trousers and we remembered to take the sunblock. No burned faces this time around!

We headed for Castleton and Mam Tor. Castleton is often packed on a sunny day but as it was midweek and we got there early it wasn't so bad. After a quick detour for the loo we headed off up the hill (the female anatomy is so inconveniently designed when it comes to outdoor pursuits).

We did Mam Tor and along the ridge, down into Hope then back across the fields to Castleton where the obligatory Magner's was downed. About 8 miles by my reckoning. And no blisters!

Yes -those are my legs!



Mam Tor from the road.



Is it a bird?



The ridge path



The path from Edale

Cold Hot Cross Buns - good walking food.