friends, a baby and tasks

If you haven’t realised it by now, mum liked putting bows in my hair

Where should I start this week? First of all I didn’t get the South Cambs job. I got my thanks, but no thanks letter yesterday. Even though I did like the house in Graveley this is probably not such a bad thing as I can’t really move for another year till J1 leaves. Having said that, A* got rejected from York, so she only has 2 places, Durham on AAB and East Anglia on ABB so has informed me that if she doesn’t get the grades she will be taking a gap year – funded by what I wonder!

Tracey had her baby on Friday so instead of having the day off to do Scarman work as I intended, I got a phone call at 6am and spent 12 hours plus at the hospital (did I tell you she had asked me to be her birth partner?). The baby was born at 10.05pm – a girl, to be called Elizabeth. It was all very un how I remembered it as Tracey had an epidural, which you can walk about with now, had 3 top ups and just sat there normally in no overt pain until it was time to push. I had my 3 without drugs and just remember being totally contorted by these contractions that overwhelmed your whole body. I really noticed how shabby the hospital is, wallpaper peeling, furniture very worn etc. – poor old NHS.

Where was the husband you ask? Well, M produces very pretty babies, but isn’t around much otherwise. He was an illegal immigrant who took the very dangerous sea crossing in a little boat from Morocco to Spain, then migrated to Ibiza and met Tracey who brought him back to Luton and married him.

I have had a couple of nice meals out this week-end, pork on Saturday at a lovely pub restaurant in a South Beds village and a turkey cassoulet today at the pub opposite from the field where I keep the horse. J1 who has worked his way remorselessly through a number of paid employments had a row with his last employer, the school cleaner and is now sans anything. This means I ended up paying him to paint the bathroom this week-end so he could go out and spend it all getting a hangover Saturday. I also got a new hose on the shower, several light switches fixed and the plumber didn’t charge me anything for fixing the central heating (the lid had dislodged on the valve box and was blocking the flow) so all in all it has been quite a productive week. I now have two evenings to do the housework and pack for New York.

My friend Iris, whose son lives there and who just came back last week-end says it is very cold. Iris is 62. She and I met at Wall Hall College when we were both doing our Advanced Diplomas in History Teaching about 20 years ago. She was on her second marriage to a Turk, but he left her and she now lives alone, runs a giant B&B in a beautiful old house in Luton (she like you has superb interior design abilities), has therapy 3 times a week and gives counselling to disturbed teenagers. I love her to bits because she is just so growing and searching, mad and interesting and I love hearing all her stories about her relationships with her grown up sons and their wives. I see it as great preparation for me!