Performance

This is a guest post for WhiteWallYellowDoor, an artist run initiative set up by Ashley Amery and Sophy Rickett to provide museums, galleries, theatres and other cultural establishments with resources for families and children. They specialise in creating fun, creative and educational worksheets to help younger visitors engage with what is on show, be it an artificial artifact, a performance, temporary exhibition, or some other type of permanent display.

Their most recent project is a series of activity sheets for the newly refurbished Anna Freud Room at the Freud Museum in London. 

In a dusty room, in the basement corridor of Summerhall in Edinburgh, my son and I are playing a game of table tennis. Ten minutes before, I had been cajoling him to come to the centre at all, as he didn't want to see 'art you like' which, he said, was 'boring'. But here we are now engrossed in a game, not even sure if we were supposed to be using this room at all.

By all accounts, it was a storage space: empty plinths, stacked chairs covered with dust, a glass of red wine abandoned on the floor. We had paused and peered into the darkness of the room, seen the table tennis table and cheekily flicked on the switch, bathing the room in fluorescent light. Accompanied by Donna Summer on an infernal loop blasting from a film installation next door, our performance had begun. Members of the public walked past, peered in for an instant, then moved on. All that we lacked was a title for our show.

Nothing happened much in our performance, my son's school uniform got covered in dust as he wriggled under the chairs to retrieve a ping-pong ball. No, nothing really happened, just a victory on both sides and a lot of fun. No lasting impressions from our under-the-radar performance then, just a permanent synesthetic association between table tennis and Donna Summer for the performers themselves.

After this discovery, it was not hard anymore to persuade my son to come to the arts centre.

When we returned at a later date for a rematch, we found the room had been cleared. But just beyond the corridor in an exhibition space there was, luckily for us, a new table tennis table. This time it was not near collapse like the other one, but brand new and covered with an intriguing laminated design. Three brand new bats sat in their holder and there was a bowl full of new ping-pong balls.

This table tennis table, however, formed the basis of a sound piece, and it had a title, Noisy Table, a collaboration between artist Will Nash and the Build Brighton Hack Space. When the ball hits the table the vibrations creates sounds that are broadcast back into the game. In one of its soundscapes, the ball's touch on the table filled the room with words spoken by Ivor Cutler: 'Creamy Pumpkins', 'Kiss', 'How do I get out of here?' My younger son aged 4, not yet old enough to play, but able to operate the buttons switching soundscapes, was heaped over the corner of the table in fits of giggles, connecting as children naturally do, with the absurd.

The artist has said of the piece: 'People can feel intimidated when they are asked to join in by an artist but they don't even think about that with table tennis. They just pick up the bat and start playing'.

When it was first exhibited, the ping-pong table simply amplified the sound of the ping-pong hitting the table, a nice idea in itself. Now it has apparently endless possibilities as it can work with open patch software for customisation.

May I suggest for its next incarnation, a soundscape of top volume disco hits of Donna Summer, filtered through a dusty room and an eight-year old boy shouting, 'best out of 10, no 11, no 12!' 'Just one more game!' and 'Stop taking pictures Mum, just play!'
 

A Beat Apart

The Monarch Butterfly's migration path from Canada to New York 

As adults, it is easy to laugh at the way children reproduce knowledge. Facts may become fictionalised with whatever else is going on in the child’s head at the time. We are in the process of relocating to a different country at the moment, for example, which is rather present in all our minds. But how many of us adults take something as fact, only to realise that our proof is rather vague? Through the drip down effect from my son’s primary school education I realise how little I know about the natural world, for example, but also how much I enjoy believing in the world that he has created in his imagination. The above drawing prompted this conversation:

Eric (8): Monarch butterflies fly all the way from Canada to New York.

Me: Why New York?

E: Because New York is their nature reserve so they have to go there.  

Me: Why don’t they just stay in Canada?”

E: Yeah, because their area is not there, it is in New York. And if they mated before hand then they could never manage the distance, because they die after they have mated. It takes about 2 hours. Understand? ”

Me: Yeah. I see now.

E: And when they get near to New York then they wait at an area where there is land to the left and sea to the right and lots of islands.

Then they wait on a tree until a really strong wind comes along that doesn’t allow them to land so they can cross the water.

But it is so difficult to land in New York.

Me: Why is it hard to land there if it is their area?

E: Yeah, because there is no landscape there of course. In the city there aren’t many trees or parks. But there are some men who are working on that, to preserve it.”

Me: So, do they get back to Canada then?

E: They grow up in Canada. They die in New York.

Me: So, they don’t go back to Canada, then?

E: What do you mean?!  Would you like to just live in the one place and never visit your real home?

This conversation with my son got me thinking about a new chapter, which needs to be written on the Monarch butterfly and its migratory habits:

Why is it that animals instinctively know where their habitat is and humans don’t? Let’s take the Monarch butterfly. Every year it makes it way down to its nature reserve in New York. In the summer, after a brief stopover on Ellis Island, the Monarchs take over Greenwich Village. Originally a rural hamlet, the Monarchs seem to be attracted to the Village because of its organic street plan, quite unlike the orderly grid layout of the rest of the city, which was developed later in the 19^th century. 

Having few permanent ties, living essentially frugal but colourful lives and practicing what some in society might view as unorthodox sexual practices also lends weight to the theory that the Monarch was drawn to the once thriving Bohemian centre of Greenwich Village. Some scientists believe that due to a lack of cultural stimulation in their native Canada, a natural urge overcomes the Monarch to be “creative” and go to where “the action is”. Propagating an alternative culture, the Monarch formed artist colonies, took part in theatre projects as well as influencing generations of artists.  It is said that the paint splatter technique developed by the Monarch, a natural expressive extension of their anatomy, was later appropriated by the artist Jackson Pollock, who is supposed to have come under their influence whilst staying at that cultural icon, The Albert Hotel. 

The Monarch also found allegiance with Greenwich Village Beat writers William S. Burroughs, Alan Ginsbourg and Jack Karuouac, with their shared belief that drug taking could enhance the creative process. The Monarchs imported their own choice of drug, Milkweed, into the US. On the streets the drug became known as “Milky Juice”.  Indeed, even to this day the Monarch seeks legalisation of this drug, professing its medicinal properties. The authorities, however, argue that Milkweed is highly toxic. Ingesting more that ten percent of body weight causes certain death and only the Monarch seems to be able to judge this ratio.  Perhaps the most famous victim of the “Milky Juice” is the poet and writer, Dylan Thomas. Finally succumbing to the drug in 1953 in the White Horse Tavern in the Village, he had given tribute to the drug in his play “Under Milk Weed” which had only just premiered that year in New York.  His editor, rather controversially, changed the title of the play posthumously to “Under Milk Wood”, to dissociate Dylan Thomas from the drug that had consumed him.

Sadly, because of today’s absurdly high housing costs and the inevitable gentrification that goes along with it, some experts are worried that the Monarch’s natural habitat may be in the process of erosion. It is a testament to the seriousness of the situation that the Monarch has agreed to take part in a tagging scheme to track their movements, despite their usual political wariness of any forms of state enforced control. The aim of this scheme is to see in what numbers the Monarch may have left the boundaries of the Village to find cheaper rents and establish their artist practices there. Efforts have been made to preserve the integrity of the Village by holding on to the values of the Monarch such as tolerance and a liberal live and let live attitude, as well as protecting the architectural heritage that serves as the Monarch natural habitat to ensure that it doesn’t lose its most attractive visitor.

Quiet please! We're moving.

Quiet please! But I find this sign too loud!

Waiting books

Vertiginous reading

Imparting knowledge

Low profile

Background reading

These photos were taken at the University of Bielefeld Library in Germany. We moved to Bielefeld, a small town in the North of Germany, over four years ago because my partner got a job at the university. Academic contracts tend to be limited so a great deal of flexibility is called on the family. Having moved once from Berlin to Bielefeld, now that my partner's contract is up we are facing the challenge of relocation again.

In academia, you are expected to move around at the drop of a hat, indeed it is a requirement of a good CV in today's academic market. This is not something that goes together with having a stable family life. As a trailing spouse of an academic you may have to make sacrifices in your career, or build your career around a highly mobile lifestyle. For children, it means sacrificing long term friendships, and a familiarity brought about by putting down roots . Sometimes families in these situation face very hard decisions. Should the family be temporarily separated, while the academic partner takes up 1 year contracts abroad which have no guarantee of extension? Or should the family move and ride the course of uncertainty together. There is no way of knowing quite when a permanent contract or a professorship will finally arrive. Should the child's environmental/cultural stability take precedence over daily contact with the academic parent?

"Pendeln" in Germany is not uncommon, and describes the act travelling  back and forth from your family home to your place of work, usually over long distances. I know of an academic family in Germany where one partner is an professor and works during the week in Berlin and the other partner, also a professor, is based in Munich with the children. This involves "Pendeln" every weekend, a journey of around 6 hours each way by train. As Germany is a more federal country than the UK, i.e. centres of industries, media, banks are more evenly distributed amongst its cities, it means that people here are more used to the idea of "Pendeln". In Frankfurt, for example, there is the banking industry, in Hamburg the media industry. Everyone wants to live in Berlin, but there are not so many jobs available there. I know of many other examples of people living this lifestyle of "Pendeln".

Of course these are personal decisions and also depend on the individual child. Financially though, these short term contracts, like the one we have just been offered, are not automatically offered relocation support from the universities. These, rather, are awarded to Professorial or longer term posts, which doesn't mean that there isn't a spouse and children to consider and all the costs involved as in any other major move.

At the moment, I am negotiating this situation our family is facing step by step. We still haven't reached a decision. I found a moment of peace in the university library, despite the very loud "Quiet Please" sign. There are 2.2 million books in this library but I am afraid none of them can help with the decisions academic families like us are facing at the moment.

I am indebted to The Trailing Spouses Art group that Piia Rossi founded here in Bielefeld a few years ago. These meetings continue to inspire me in dealing with the ongoing challenges of being a trailing spouse in questions such as identity, language and career,  but in a supportive and creative environment.

Here you can see on youtube a Pechakucha presentation of the Trailing Spouses Art group by Piia and myself in English and German.

The Arachno Files

On Plastic Spiders: An illuminating discourse on the anatomy, feeding and behavioural habits of spiders in three parts by Henry (3) and Catherine (43)-

H: Has he got fingers?

C: No, he’s got legs, eight legs. See? One, two, three, four, five six, seven, eight…….

H: Are those his eyes?

C: Yes, er…., let me see. I think so…those pointy stalk things could be his eyes, I think..

H: The spider says,  “Goodbye!”

C: Goodbye, spider!

H: Don’t say goodbye!

C: What shall I say then?

H: Say nothing.

H: I cuddle the spider.

C: That’s nice. You cuddle the spider

H: Does the spider walk?

C: I think a spider crawls more than walks

H: The spider jumps!

C: Yes, the spider jumps, but he crawls, mostly

H: He’s stuck on the hair

C: I don’t want it in my hair!!

H: The spider flies!

C: Henry. Do you know what he eats?

H: Grapes!

C: The spider eats grapes, does he?

H: He eats me up. He eats you up.

C: Oh, he eats us up, does he?

H: He eats the eyes. He eats you the hair and the nose and the mouth.

C: Henry. Did you know that spiders eat flies? They work very hard and spin a web. They are very clever, spiders. Then they catch the flies in the web and eat the flies.

H: Hello!  He flies. 

(throws spider)

We were never being boring

The side effects of parenthood are well known. From nausea in early pregnancy, swollen ankles to sleepness nights and mummy brain (when you walk into a room and can’t remember what for).  But I have yet to read anything about how being a parent can turn you into a bore overnight, especially to those friends of yours who have no children.

It starts when you give up the alcohol in pregnancy. This is already potentially the start of being a huge bore. When your friends are ordering beer you are nursing your herbal tea, hoping that the honey will make you a bit tipsy. It doesn’t.

When the baby is there, you notice that some friends just don't call you anymore. When you meet up, it is often at home, conversations snatched between scooping up baby food and nappy changing. Piled up laundry it is. Fancy free and fun it ain't. It isn't sipping cocktails in a cool bar, or checking out the latest exhibition or shopping. It's apologising as you have to put the baby to bed and might not emerge for another hour, if at all. 

Whereas you may be able to talk to other mothers for hours on end about baby food, breastfeeding and childbirth stories, this won’t wash with many of your other friends.  Why should it? You are literally cocooned in your own little baby world and by the time you emerge your friendships may have reshuffled and changed.

You don’t (in their eyes) do anything anymore. You are boring. This is a tough one to deal with, on top of the above mentioned side affects of parenting. It is creeping, underlying and often not said out loud.

In Berlin I would literally take my baby with me everywhere, to loud street parties, to open air film screenings, I didn’t think anything of riding home on the U-Bahn at 3.00 in the morning.

When you have two kids (and you move to a less cosmopolitan place like we had to), this becomes impossible. A three or four year old will not put up with this, and then you find yourself getting into their routine. Having two kids is like two to the power of four, it is just weird maths, which mean that the efforts of parenting have quadrupled rather than doubled.

In order to survive the year you have to dig in and get downright boring. Celebrate your boringness. Don’t get any hobbies, or if you must, try Suduko.

‘Get a babysitter’, come the cries from the outside of your nest, trying to rake you out of your babybore phase.

But my kids don’t get to sleep until 10pm, and I usually am asleep before them, you reply. And so it goes on. It is funny, but you can blame yourself when friendships drift apart. You don't think, heck, they could come round and chat about formula milk. You think, I have got to get out there, otherwise I am in danger of falling off the face of the earth. 

I say, give yourself a break. 

I am advocating raising the boring stakes a notch. Baby birth bore talkathons, baby poo talkalongs and baby food shaggy dog stories.

So, when you have young kids, forget upping the interest stakes by trying to be like your former all night partying former drink bingeing self or feeling you have to get a cool career to boot.  Play fire with fire by celebrating motherhood in all its glorious bore-potential.  Get down right boring. 

One day you may wake up feeling bored yourself. Then you can think about what actually interests you. Maybe your old friends are right. You have changed. You may be surprised yourself that  the things you found important before you had kids no longer interest you. In fact, you find them rather boring.

creative quandary

dining table with printmaking equipment

It feels slightly ironic that I have come here to the Mumsnet Blogfest when my two kids and my husband are back in Germany! Still, it is the first time I have been away by myself for ages and I get precious time to spend with my friends and family back in London. But the question remains: How do you balance your creative ambitions with family life.

I am staying at my mum's who is a printmaker. Her studio is in the house. When I was growing up it didn't strike me as odd that there were trays of acid in the bathroom (for etching ), for example. There were plus and minuses from our perspective that her work space was in the home. Us kids were encouraged to make lino cuts and etchings, which was fun. On the other hand, I felt it was hard for my mum to switch off from the work, especially if a print wasn't going her way. That is the problem of having your work space at home. It is hard to create a divide between your home and work life.

If your job involves being creative like an artist, where the measure of your success is not so easily defined and the output is more personal then this can be even harder. You may also have to justify to yourself and to others that what you are doing is valid, especially if you are not earning much money through your art. If you can manage that, then you may need to find the headspace in order to be creative. I have read with admiration about authors who have written books during their babies naps, for example. (I was napping through my babies naps, though!)

litho press and bookshelf

I would like to do a survey amongst people who are artists and who have families. How do they strike a balance with their art and family life? Can they involve their kids in the process, or do they need for "a room of ones own", like Virginia Woolf. Also, how do they manage between creative thinking, where you really need the luxury of time to develop ideas and the hectic schedule of family life. A female friend of mine organises family life as well as teaching at a University and developing her own art work. Her husband, who is also self employed, is away with work a lot. She said she doesn't touch the housework until the kids come back from school. It is the only way she can get things done.

Another artist friend of mine has recently taken a self imposed sabbatical. When she originally told me this I said, rather insensitively I think, I"ll believe it when I see it. I meant it in a positive way, because she is one of the most dynamic and energetic people I know. She came to Bielefeld and in less that two years embarked on a PHD, attended conferences and formed an art group. This kind of drive is often what helps you to survive as an artist, even when you have two young kids and are a trailing spouse with an uncertain future. I can imagine that it may be difficult to put aside this drive to focus on other priorities. You can read about her sabbatical here.

It is very hard to strike the balance between work and family as a freelancer or an artist.

I  discovered this when I was working from home as a translator. If you don't respond to requests and opportunities from the outside then you may kick yourself for missing out. But if you take everything on then it can easily get too much, and your health suffers and this effects your family.

printmaking table arial view

I question myself on a regular basis. How much is too much? Will I overstretch myself if I take on this job.  I also love writing my blog, which I see as being a creative outlet for me. I also question the time taken to write it, as I now question the time I have taken to come to London on my own. 

At the same time I am glad that I have a mum who has followed her artistic career, despite being a divorced mother bringing up four children singlehandedly  and can see if you fulfil your own creative ambitions then you can still be a good mum or precisely because of that you are a good mum. 

prints in progress

Old bag with school bag

Last Thursday I took part in a self-portrait workshop run by Grace at the 'Trailing Spouses' Art Group. I had brought along my own props: a medium format camera and my son’s schoolbag, as I had an idea about how I wanted to portray myself. The camera represented my college days, and the dreams aspired to since that time towards some sort of career in photography. The school bag sums up my life as a mum, especially as I now carry it everyday for my son. Called a “Tornister”, nearly all German school kids have one. They are squarish, large and robust enough to sit on and you can choose from various themed designs. The thing is, it is so heavy, I end up carrying it for him. I always feel slightly preposterous walking down the road sporting a magenta striped rucksack emblazoned with footballers in mid-action, the straps squeezing my shoulders.

  

I merged the two portraits, to show that I find it hard to draw the line between these two images that reflect myself. Also, this lack of separation often leaves me feeling that I fall short in both respects, firstly as a mother and secondly as a creative and /or professional person.

 I read on the ‘used to be somebody’ by the journalist, Gaby Hinsliff, that she felt a kind of lifting of guilt associated with being a working mum when her child started primary school. She says “…. it is the first time the choice - that terrible, double-edged choice - about whether to be home or not has been completely taken away from me.” In Germany, or at least where I live, there is still very much a choice about how long you leave your child in school. In the school where my son goes to, for example, the lessons start at 8:05 and sometimes finish as early as 11.50am. Then, some of the children are picked up for the day before lunch by their mums(or Dads perhaps), whilst others stay on in the after school care centre, which was founded just seven years ago, until 4.30pm at the latest. So that feeling of guilt is still in the air, when there are still two systems for the stay at home and working mums. This school system is changing in Germany, but there still isn’t one school here in Bielefeld offering the same school hours to all children, starting and finishing at the same time.

On occasion, I have picked up Eric before lunch and we have both really enjoyed the extra time together with my younger son Henry for the rest of the day. I am not actually supposed to pick him up before 2pm. Most of the time I pick him up between 3:00 and 4:00pm, like in the British system. Being self-employed, my workload is fragmented and I need to be able to work through to the afternoon on some days.

I do feel though it is strange, that in Germany you have to book a minimum of 45 hours a week of childcare for the under 3s in a kindergarten (9hrs a day!), which seems a lot, whereas when they go to school at the age of six, you may find the same child only being entitled to attend school for 4 hours a day. After school care is not free. It costs me 130 Euros a month including lunch, although if you have two or more children in a nursery or school, you just pay for the one child with the highest fees, which is good. 

Nevertheless, I do think it would be nice for the atmosphere of the school and the children if they could all be at school at the same time, and all enjoy the Karate, football or cooking clubs etc that are on offer  in the after school care centre. Socially, the school is also divided, for the parents and the children. Children who finish school before lunch are not allowed to use the playground in the afternoon because of insurance reasons. I obviously have more contact with parents whose children are in the after school care because I see them when I pick up my son. 

My experience is that many parents here don’t like the idea of comprehensive education, where lessons take place in the afternoon, because they believe it would be too inflexible and strenuous for the children. They prefer the model of lessons in the morning and an option of after school care in the afternoon, perhaps because of their own educational experience. My husband, for example, was at school from Mondays to Saturdays in the morning, but then he could run around unsupervised with siblings and friends for the rest of the day. I can’t imagine that happening these days. 

So I suppose I will have to get used to that portrait of myself for a while, and the choices associated with it.  In the meantime,  here is a picture of the "Tonni" in its full glory.  

The Kids have Bad Taste

 Recently, I sat through “Chipwrecked” with my six-year-old son. I had played him a selection of trailers and left the choice of film up to him. When he chose this film, though, I found myself in a dilemma.  In my opinion, he had chosen the worst film on offer. Does a parent’s duty include having to sit though naff films? And how far can you go to impose your “good taste” on your childs “bad taste”.

I realised that this dilemma isn’t an uncommon one for me.

Whether it is the plinky plonky children’s CD, some saccharine stuffed TV character or some thinly veiled advertising ploy of a children’s magazine, I waver. I should be stronger, put my foot down, say no, shouldn’t I?

A real eye opener was a friend of mine. “How can you put yourself through this”, he said. The “This” is a television series featuring an effeminate pink dinosaur that surrounds itself with sycophantic child actors, its mission being to infiltrate your mind with offensively banal songs.

Before my friend's comment, it had never really occurred to me that I had a choice in the matter. It sparked something off in me. It was like a kind of liberation. Hey! Parents have rights, too. Just say no to your children’s “bad taste”.

But even as I tried to picture my new sensory emancipation, I saw the smile on my son's little face and felt bad. How could I deprive him of something he so obviously enjoys? Can it really be that bad, I mean it's not turning him into some kind of zombie or anything, is it?

The TV programme was, thankfully, reaching its conclusion, prompting the pink dinosaur to sing its closing mantra, whilst bobbing mesmerizingly on the screen.

“I love you, You love me, We’re a happy family”, the eyelids fluttered,

“With a great big kiss and A hug from me to you”, the pink hands clasping together,

“Won’t you say you love me, too?” blow kiss with hands.

Ah, the little love, I thought, looking at my son. He is happy. We are happy.

Yes, I thought, wistfully - I love you, you love me. We’re a happy family...

Rude Health

Sometimes, when I am least expecting it, a phrase pops into my head. As I was hauling the buggy up the front steps this morning, I suddenly thought of the expression, 'to be in rude health'.  These words conjure up images of ruddy cheeks and boundless energy, and a smug feeling that while others around are felled by coughs and colds, I remain in a magic bubble of 'rude health'.  Unfortunately, it is usually just at that moment of feeling invincible that I get a sore throat and within a day I am floored by a nasty bug.

When you have children the chances for remaining in “rude health” remain slim. In December last year, my children and I took part in a kind of relay race of illness. When one was getting over a cough, it would be passed gaily onto the next contestant, who would add a stomach bug to it. Then, in the next lap a high temperature and general feeling of nausea would be handed to the next participant for good measure. It was a marathon, lasting over a month. Like all worthy sporting events, it wasn’t about the winning, it was about the taking part, but in the end Eric was awarded a mighty dose of antibiotics, which did us all a lot of good.

Before I had children, I didn’t realise how much of my time would be devoted to feeling under the weather. When Eric started Kindergarten, I had more bugs in the first year than I had ever had in my whole life. The nursery teachers had developed super-human immune systems, after years of exposure to this unique breeding ground.  Unfortunately, it takes at least five years to build up this kind of immunity, so by the time you have some sort of protection your child has left. Then something comes along which even the most robust immunity cannot fend off.

That something or some things, rather, come along in the form of little six-legged parasites otherwise known as head lice. Come on, it is nothing to be embarrassed about! Everyone has had it, even if you can’t remember it. I remember it, as I had them about six months ago.  Again, I was feeling in “rude health” and invincible, so I was probably asking for it. Nits had been going around the school for weeks, but that my child could have them let alone me was unthinkable. When I discovered to my horror that I had them it was a weird feeling, like 40 going on 8 years old again. I was transported back in time, sitting in school assembly where the head teacher was talking about a nits outbreak and I was trying desperately not to scratch my head, although, in fact, I actually had them. The smell of disinfectant dripping off a metal comb came back to me, used by the school nurse to inspect our hair. It just couldn’t be true that I had nits.

Sadly it was, and as I showed the wiggling proof, isolated in a glass, to my husband he still didn’t believe it, saying that it was probably just an insect that rather resembled a head louse that had wandered into my hair. I found this quite an absurd idea that there were insects that were in the habit of impersonating head lice but I had other worries. Suddenly, I was aware of the other people I could have passed them on to, and weighed up whether I was going to tell them or not. After all, you say to yourself, it is nothing to be ashamed of. Remember what it said on the pamphlet that came with the nit-lotion: it is a myth that nits prefer dirty hair.  But still, you feel ashamed. The next few days the world around me shrank to the task of nit extermination and prevention. I spent literally hours every evening picking out nits from my son’s hair, washing bedclothes at 60 degrees and putting garments in the freezer and trawling through the internet for any tips or hints that I could glean. I began to get quite interested in the subject discovering, for example, on a webpage entitled a Brief History of Lice Combs that nit combs had been discovered in Egyptian tombs and that there is an 11th Century ivory example  held in the British museum. I subsequently spent one hour on the phone getting down to the nitty gritty with one of my best friends in England, who told me that since the British government had stopped providing free nit lotion, the head lice situation had become an epidemic. I wondered if there was a hairdresser equivalent of Jamie Oliver who could convince the government to turn this problem around, say, for example, Trevor Sorbie MBE.

At the moment, touch wood (or our trusty black plastic lice comb) we are nit free, and we are not suffering from coughs or colds or being attacked by any kind of bug. In short, we are in ruder health than we have been for a while. Hopefully we will remain in the rudest of health to the point of offensiveness for the foreseeable future.  And there is nothing more to say on the subject, apart from that I hope that you all remain ruddy healthy throughout the rest of the winter.

Why have a blog?

 I just did a quiz to see if I had what it takes to embark on a blog, and, to be honest I didn’t tick many of the boxes. For a start, I am not one to espouse my views in public, very sensitive about negative comments and I am not interested in the technology of it at all or making it a great success. In fact, I don’t read much online myself either.  Doesn’t seem like a good start, does it? Also, one of the main problems is that I don’t have a theme, like darts or gardening or books, about which I can in anyway intelligently write about.  However, I am a fan of the written word, and enjoy writing myself, so maybe there is a glimmer of hope!

The blog is named after a Hopper painting “Compartment C, car 293”, found while perusing a book by Allain de Botton called The Art of Travel, in a desperate attempt to find a name. It was painted in 1938 and is apparently owned by IBM. If you are not familiar with the painting, it depicts a woman sitting in a train carriage, her face half obscured beneath her hat, reading, alone and travelling at dusk. The ruggedness of the landscape outside the window suggests a long journey, where hours can go by without seeing a living soul in the landscape.

I couldn’t be further than this figure sitting in this carriage. I could count the hours, or rather the minutes spend in tranquil solitude on one hand. My landscape does not passively roll by. They, my children, require my attention and rightly so.  My carriage is usually swinging to the tones of Old MacDonald, and the manuscript or whatever the woman is reading has either been lost, the pages torn out or it is covered in oil, milk or juice or all three.

Perhaps though, this blog could be my Compartment C? Maybe you would like to take a seat opposite me. Any suggestions for themes welcome.