On Shopping And Being Rude...

Pen-y-Ghent, Yorkshire Dales

I am rubbish at shopping. Really, spectacularly rubbish. Although I dabble, I remain an unreconstructed lefty when faced with the opportunity to become a proper player at consumerism. I balk at the opportunity to hand over sums of cash in return for a fleeting glimpse of happiness. God knows I see enough ordinary human misery in my job to realise that consuming like there is no tomorrow brings little more than debt and a hollow feeling that you have just been had.

Obviously there are times when I have to go to a shop and buy things. My general rule of thumb is that if something comes in a brown paper bag I can manage it. Anything bigger, and it means that somebody is trying to sell me something and the rubbish shopping thing kicks in. I can just about handle the over stimulation of the senses that goes on in a large store. I can switch off to the ‘buy me,’ ‘no, buy me instead’ from every product. What I can’t handle is the fact that every single transaction with a sales assistant has a psychological ulterior. Nothing is as it seems in the world of shopping. These people are trained to take my money. I am trained to understand unspoken and psychological communications. It is a match made in hell and makes me a little unruly.

I survived Ikea this week, with barely a scratch. Well, just one minor hiccup:

Me: (very loudly) who in their right mind would buy a suite in such a dreadful colour?

Kooky hypnotherapist: perhaps that man sitting behind you?

His partner was clearly quite taken with the dreadfully coloured suite. He smiled at me conspiratorially, and so I rather suspect he wasn’t. I said sorry quite a few times. I think I just about got away with it.

I left Ikea empty handed, apart from a battery operated milk frother which cost £2.50 and I am really rather taken with. No need now for that hugely expensive cappuccino maker.

I was feeling quite pleased with myself that I had managed a full circuit of Ikea without falling out with my companion, ( although the kooky hypnotherapist is particularly difficult to fall out with), without stropping like a twelve year old and having only slightly offended one person. All in all a good shopping day. (I know we didn’t actually buy the chairs we went for, but that really is a minor detail. Not having a nervous breakdown is a good shopping day as far as I am concerned.)

I took a call from The Husband on the way home. I had to meet him at a local bathroom shop because, apparently, we have an urgent need to fit a new bathroom. I was bemused. We have lived in our Old-Lady-Style-House for 4 years, in the full knowledge that it needs redecorating and that neither of us can be arsed to do it. But suddenly WE NEED TO FIT THE BATHROOM THIS WEEKEND.

(Ouch, so sorry for shouting, but that is what the message said.)

So I met him at a major retail outlet and frankly it was a bridge too far. Sensory overload. Too many special offers - a veritable Woolworth’s pick ‘n’ mix of taps, fixtures, fittings and toilet seats with sweets embedded in them. (What's that all about then?) The background music was way too loud, and I maintain that 70's disco music is only appropriate for.....well, a 70's disco really and then only under sufferance. It was all too much for me.

I felt sorry for the twelve year old assistant who tried in vain to interest me in her lovely (?) bathrooms. She should have been sitting in a park drinking Diamond White with her friends. I should have been somewhere else sticking pins in my eyes. I ended up sitting on a toilet rocking gently whilst The Husband translated her sales speak to me, and I told him to tell her to speak up and stop mumbling, as if she were the one with the hearing problem and not me. I can’t imagine how rude she found me. Sorry little sales girl. It really wasn’t your fault. I think my Old-Lady-House has turned me into a grumpy old woman.

Operation Bathroom started yesterday. I shall be glad to have rid of my Old-Lady bathroom. I already have sciatica and greying hair, and was concerned that the shell-style bathroom suite and maroon patterned tiles would soon start looking quite attractive to me.

I escaped Operation Bathroom with my son. The two of us took a wonderful walk up Pen-y-Ghent and I began to feel human again.

The workings of capitalism are clever. They needle our inherent desire for satiation, knowing that when it is within our grasp they will needle once more. We sublimate our core relational needs into the need to consume, and neatly side step the issue of built in disillusionment that accompanies the built in obsolescence.

I would like to claim that this is why I hate shopping, but that would be just too pompous. Really, it’s because I am rubbish at it. Very, very rubbish.

On Meetings And Ruptures...

Have I ever told you that I live in sleepy little backwater? Maybe just the once or twice? I love where I live. I love being out in the Dales within a half hour’s car drive, walking my imaginary dog or cycling with the children. (I am allergic to proper dogs, but imaginary ones don’t make me sneeze or wheeze.) I love staring at the hills whilst I wash the dishes, and driving up through the mist in the valleys on winter mornings into the glorious sunshine which lights up the hues of green on the moors. I have spent the best part of twenty years living in cities around the country.

But I miss my friends. I miss having people to call on for a chat, or a coffee or a beer on a sunny evening. People who challenge and excite and stimulate me. I have some lovely colleagues who do all of the above, but none of them live near enough for a “let’s pop out for a beer” phone call.

I am astonished to find that blogging is replacing these kinds of friendships for me. Through blogging I have met the most stimulating people. People from all walks of life, who are a constant source of pleasure and surprise.

One of these people I have met in ‘real life’ and is fast becoming a dear friend (hey, BoBo!) Two of them I chat with daily via email or gchat and are fast becoming very dear friends (hey Stray and Caroline!) Many of them I email occasionally for stimulating and interesting discussions (too many to mention…..)

Sometimes it can be hard to make a relationship using only the written word. We rely so much on non verbals to aid our understanding of the other. A tone of voice, a slight look of shyness, a feeling of insecurity that silently passes between us, a teasing smile that indicates I was only joking really. With the written word we have only our words and our unconscious self to play clever tricks on our minds.

I am in my tenth year of working as a therapist. When I first began I wanted to soothe people, in the way that I had been soothed during my dark years by my therapist. But we cannot just soothe. That is not how relationships work. They are full of fractures and misunderstandings and our dear unconscious reminding us silently that people cannot be trusted, do not care for us, will never be there when we really need them. These ruptures form the very basis of the therapeutic process. It is through these fissures that meaning erupts, overwhelming us with its presence until our conscious mind can take a hold and truly make sense of them. I have learned, sometimes very painfully, that the rupture is the heart of the relationship. Whilst close, loving contact is beautiful, it is through the rupture that we really learn to be alongside each other in our painful existential aloneness. A carefully held rupture is an exquisite thing to behold.

We are all forging something new here, in this little blogging world we inhabit. We are learning a new way of making relationships. Friendships that can hold incredible value, but that need tender care at times because the rupture is so much more difficult to hold when we cannot be physically present.

And so to my lovely bloggy friends, and to those I am yet to meet, let’s hold the ruptures with tenderness. They are just as important as the times of meeting

Will Mrs Johnson Please Make Herself Known...

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

I have a proper confession. I suffer from a 'mail opening' disorder. It stems back to the days when money was seriously tight, and opening mail would invariably propel me into a panic as to how I was going to give this person the money they were asking for and that I didn’t have. (I have been a student of some kind for over half my adult life. Enough said.) And so I developed a habit of just, well….piling it very neatly in the corner and ignoring it until its presence became too much to bear.

Now the mail is much less scary but the habit persists and I still have a monthly opening ceremony. (All of my professional mail goes to my office, which I open immediately and sort out straight away. See, I do know how to do it. I am not completely stupid.)

Last Monday I had a ‘mail opening’ day. The euphoria of having beaten the pile into submission is short lived, as each opening session generates a list of things to do. Last Monday generated a list of 13 things that required my URGENT ATTENTION. Nothing life threatening, you realise. Just Things That Need Doing. I spent this Monday URGENTLY ATTENDING to the pile of Things That Need Doing.

Most of them were easy to deal with and very, very satisfying. Oh, the joy of filing a piece of paper that has been dealt with. Its almost too much to bear. A couple of them required me to part with money. I went on-line and checked my bank balance, peeping between my fingers with only one eye open. I cannot deal with the things that Require Me To Part With Money until I have some money. I calculated that this would be March 21 2008. Back on the To Deal With Later pile.

Final piece of paper. A solicitor’s letter from British Gas demanding that a woman that I have never heard of pay them money for gas that she has apparently used at my address. This woman does not live in my house, unless The Husband has her tucked away in the under stairs cupboard for his fickle amusement. The woman I don’t know of has surely not been using gas in the under stairs cupboard?

I rang British Gas. It took me 20 minutes to get through. Their goddamn ‘hold’ music was so quiet that I couldn’t hear it on speaker phone, and so had to carry on with my chores with the phone tucked under my ear. I happen to know that this is dangerous and can cause a stroke. I briefly drifted into a fantasy where British Gas had to compensate my son with millions of pounds, thus allowing him to grieve in a luxury home in Florida, because his devoted and adoring mother dropped dead whilst waiting for them to answer the f***ing phone.

Eventually I got through. Lots of talking. It took them 25 minutes to tell me that it was a mistake, a fact I was already aware of when I rang them up. I told her that I was already aware of said fact. She proceeded to explain how the mistake had been made. I drifted into oblivion for a while. She assured me it would be rectified, and we would not receive any more threatening letters for people who do not live with us.

This wouldn’t be quite so bloody annoying, were it not for the fact that this is the third time this has happened in the three years we have lived in this house. And each time the threatening letter has been addressed to a different person, at my address. Do British Gas think that I am running a safe house for people who don’t like paying their gas bills? Yes, that must be it. I am running a safe house and they are on to me. It can’t possibly be that privatisation has left them unable to run a piss up in a f***ing brewery, because we all know it is the public sector that is inefficient and poorly managed. Privatisation brings only milk and honey for shareholders and increased efficiency for the rest of us. Yes, that must be it. I must be running a safe house. Now, let’s just check that under stairs cupboard….

Not-So-Good Friday

You may think that Good Friday is the day on which we commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus at Calvary. Or perhaps you are more drawn to the Pagan celebration of Eostre, the fertility goddess whose symbol of a hare is thought to be the origin of the Easter Bunny? On both counts you would be wrong. Good Friday actually marks the official start of the ‘tourist season’ in the small Yorkshire market town in which I work.

It is an ancient and annual event. In the early hours of Good Friday morning, coaches travel far and wide across the vast county that is Yorkshire. If the driver remembers his passport they may even make it as far as Lancashire or Tyneside. These coaches gather a motley collection of people and deposit them at daybreak into the market place of our small town. Their sole purpose is to wander aimlessly for several hours, thus clogging up the narrow streets and ensuring that ‘popping out in your lunch break to buy a sandwich’ becomes a harrowing event of stroke-inducing proportions.

Today saw a particularly fine collection of such folk. I spotted:

• People who have never seen a market before.
• People who have never seen a cobbled street before.
• People who have never seen cheese before.
• People with several dogs, that they have trained specifically to walk on the opposite side of the pavement to themselves thus creating a ‘trip wire’ effect with the leads. (Why is one dog not enough? And why bring your sodding dog out on a day trip that consists entirely of shopping?)
• People with specific mobility problems. (Not normal mobility problems. That is manageable. People with mobility problems may walk slowly, but at least their pace is predictable. People with specific mobility problems are only able to walk for 20 yards before stopping suddenly to look around them, presumably because the view suddenly becomes utterly compelling. They stand stock still, look around, block your way and then start up again. And then they do the same bloody thing another 20 yards down the road.)
• People who can only walk 4 abreast on the pavement, despite its narrowness and the throng of people making this virtually impossible.
• People who eat pies from a paper bag whilst walking. (Please note: this is both bad for your digestion and bad for the people walking behind you, as it propels you into the ‘people with specific mobility problems’ category. Find a fucking bench and sit down to eat.)
• People – mostly men, it has to be said – who have been dragged along by somebody else and hang around outside shops/market stalls blocking the way and looking like piffey on a rock bun.

Good Friday is the day when these people return in packs. And I have to take a huge deep breath, because I know that this will last until at least late September. Thank god that today was dry, because when they all get their brollies out I turn apoplectic. So if you live in Rochdale and someone offers you a coach trip to a ‘quaint Yorkshire market town’, please think of me and just say no.

P.S. You may ignore me. I am a curmudgeonly old so-and-so sometimes. Most of the citizens of my small town will welcome you with open arms. Honest.

Sometimes I Wish I Wasn't A Therapist....(#1 of an occasional series)

We had an appointment with the building society to apply for a new mortgage. I decided to take the opportunity to book in for a smear and my ears syringing at the same time, as the GP practice is near enough the building society for it to be an efficient use of my time. My hearing has been a bit crap of late, and this is not good in a therapist. (“I’m sorry what did you say then?....No, just didn’t get the last bit….You feel….? Just that last word, again? You feel suicidal. Oh.”)

I was a bit nervous. The smear thing is fine. I have had 3 miscarriages and a baby so I am quite used to taking my knickers off for the doctor. It is almost a reflex action now when I walk into the surgery. I am worried that one day I will be introduced to a doctor at a party and I will automatically start to undress. The ear syringe is an entirely different matter though. I never put anything in my ears, and I hate doctors even looking in them through that thingy that they have. It just feels so intrusive. I know, it doesn’t quite make sense.

So I arrived for my smear and ear syringe. There are a number of jokes that can be made about this double booking, and the receptionist made several as she ticked me off on the computer. The funniest one involved me walking around for the rest of the day with wet knickers, which quite tickled her.

The practice nurse asked me in her best bedside manner which procedure I would like to ‘get over with first’, as she reached for her tray of speculums.

“The syringing” I said, and admitted to being a bit nervous. She looked at me like the numpty that I felt. I don’t know whether you have ever had your ears syringed. I can’t tell you what the instrument looks like, because I didn’t look, but I am guessing a turkey baster attached to a pumping machine. I focused hard on the tray of speculums in front of me to calm myself, and wondered why there were so many different sizes. We are not that different, surely?

“Are you okay, now?” she asked sweetly as she pumped warm water into my ear, me sitting with my head cocked on one side and slightly trembling.

“Just fine” I said bravely, although in actual fact I was feeling quite dizzy. Then I heard a thump, which was me landing on the consulting room floor. Like a delicate Victorian lady, I had fainted. How bloody embarrassing. She made me sit with my head between my legs, whilst she consoled me that I must have a very sensitive middle ear. She made soothing noises for a few minutes, which did nothing for my embarrassment, and suggested that I have the smear and come back for my ears on another occasion. I felt a bit silly, as well as nauseous, dizzy and shaky.

Knickers off. You know the procedure. Except she couldn’t find my cervix. Several insertions, change of speculum, internal examination. Still no cervix.

“I definitely have one” I said. “I’ve had a baby. He would still be in there if I didn’t have a cervix.”

More poking and prodding. This was getting uncomfortable.

“Perhaps you could try left lateral?” I suggested helpfully. (Blokes, ask a woman. I’m not explaining this one.) Left lateral worked a treat and I could finally get the hell out of there.

I rushed into the building society 20 minutes late. The Husband was in the advisors office, making small talk, and flashed me an irritated look as I was ushered in.

“I’m sorry I’m late”, I flustered, “but I had my ears syringed and I fainted – it was horrible - and then she couldn’t find my cervix!” and then I burst into tears in quite a dramatic fashion. I know it’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened, but I was feeling a bit delicate. The mortgage advisor looked mortified, and went rushing off to find tissues and a glass of water. The Husband looked bemused. He is used to me. I just don’t normally do it in public.

The application went fine, with The Husband answering all the questions and me snivelling into my tissue and sipping my water. He gave all his personal details. And then my turn. Name, date of birth, occupation.

Oh fuck.

“Psychotherapist” I said, ever so quietly.

“I’m sorry?” she said. At first I thought she had said “I’m sorry”, which would have been entirely appropriate under the circumstances. But it was definitely a question.

“Psychotherapist” I said, just a tiny bit louder.

“Oh!” she said, looking both surprised and amused. The Husband smiled wryly. I knew he thought it was very funny.

“Could you spell that?” she said.

Short Hair Days...

On the coldest day of the year so far I find myself with the shortest haircut I have had since I was in my early 20s. I have been going to the same hairdresser for four years and have had broadly the same haircut in all that time. Short, but never too short. I like my hairdresser. She knows my profession and we have wordlessly developed a LETS scheme: she tells me her problems and I get a wet cut for a fiver, which is ridiculously cheap even by arse-end-of-Yorkshire standards. I visited yesterday. She launched into a long and complex tale involving her frail, elderly mother, a curling rug, A&E, the officious Duty Social Worker and the Kafkaesque hoops one must jump through in order to qualify for a modicum of social care. I was in my ex-trouble-making-social-worker element. I gave her a lengthy piece of advice on how to ensure that her mother gets some actual support, which involved citing the National Assistance Act (1948), the Disabled Person’s Act (1980) and the Carers (Recognition and Services) Act (1995): advice designed to make any social work team leader sigh in despair that here is someone who appears to know that she might actually be entitled to something.

This was swiftly followed by “D, what the hell are you doing to my hair?”

“Oh,” she said, “you don’t normally have it that short do you?”

I don’t. I haven’t worn my hair this short since I was a radical young thing in the early 90s, wearing old-style DMs, charity shop clothes and with cheekbones to die for.

I left feeling that I had held up my side of the bargain rather better than usual, but that she had left me looking like a tired extra from Bad Girls. I went to bed feeling very grumpy indeed.

This morning, however, I have had a wave of nostalgia for my Short Hair Days. I had my first short haircut at university, where I hung around with the Women’s Group (or Wimmin’s Group, as we preferred. Oh, Lordy!) The Women’s Group consisted largely of women with names like sheepdogs (Rax, Joo, Kez etc) who looked like they had been sheep-sheared by the farmer. We thought we were sooo cool. I quickly took to cutting my hair myself, and thought I looked quite the radical. The Mother despaired. Job well done, then.

I moved to Stoke Newington after I graduated, way before Stokey had been gentrified and when the Vortex Jazz Bar was the best night out in London. I worked in Camden and would catch the North London Line to Camden Rd: on a haircut day I would queue with the boys at the little Turkish barbers and get a short back and sides for £2.50. I have always been fond of a cheap haircut. A slick of brylcreem and then the bus up Camden Rd to work. Matt Lucas was often on the same bus, and I vaguely recognised him from the TV. He always sat in the disabled seats at the front and would look embarrassed if anyone smiled at him. He looked shy. I liked him for it. My boyfriend at the time had long hair and looked like Feargal Sharkey. We looked quite the couple.

I looked like a boy for years, and I liked my androgyny. But now I am a middle-aged women, a stone heavier and with more than a smattering of grey (which, in a man would look ‘distinguished’ but in a woman looks like she can’t be bothered to dye it. The Wimmin’s Group failed in that respect.) I have wrinkles, which I really can’t call laughter lines because I just don’t laugh that much. I am not sure if women my age can really carry off the Very Short Hair look. I think it makes me look hard, not sexily androgynous. So I will grow it out to its normal level of shortness. But I would like to thank D for the memories.

John Humphrys Spoiled My Day...

I was driving over the moors last week on my usual trip to work. It was a clear, sunny day and I was pondering how bleak could also be beautiful when I spotted it: a Red Kite, hovering about 40 feet off the ground just ahead of me. I pulled over to savour the experience. I enjoyed a few moments of sweet melancholy (of the ‘I wish I was a Red Kite – life would be so simple’ variety) which then gave way to a feeling of contentment that I live where I live (because on a Bad Day it feels like the arse-end of nowhere.) I continued to work feeling happy with life.

I was driving the same road yesterday morning. The Today Programme was reporting how the reintroduction of the Red Kite in the UK has been an unprecedented success, given that it was nearing extinction 10 years ago.

“What a tender and heart-warming story” I thought to myself.

“I wonder if I will see my Kite today?”

John Humphrys continued. Apparently, we are in danger of gravely prohibiting their breeding by feeding them with kitchen scraps, as it inhibits their natural instinct to scavenge and expand their territory.

“We are, in fact, killing them with kindness” intoned Mr Humphrys (serious voice, grave concern conveyed.)

Why does John Humphrys always have to spoil things?