Playgroups and Prosecco

by Jo Middleton

  Monday 15 January

  Jess’s key worker, Millie, handed me one of the plastic changing-room tags from M&S when I got to nursery this afternoon. It had a number three on it. Apparently they’d had a ‘what we did at the weekend’ session and Jess had got it out of her backpack to illustrate her story about me ‘taking my clothes off in the shops’.

  I questioned Jess about it on the way home. She said she’d wanted to tell everyone about it because she thought it was funny that my bottom was so hairy but that the lady in the other changing room didn’t have any hair at all.

  ‘She looked just like my Tiny Tears dolly, Mummy,’ she said.

  Drove the rest of the way home in silence, wondering how I will ever look Millie in the eye again.

  Tuesday 16 January

  FaceTimed Mum and Dad this evening. Jess started to tell them about the woman in the changing room but I managed to change the subject by suggesting she show them her Sylvanians. Jess ran off to get her beavers and Mum started to ask me about Ian.

  ‘Have you had any more thoughts about giving things another go?’ she asked.

  ‘Mum,’ I said, ‘it’s been nine months now, and we’re both much happier with how things are.’

  ‘Are you, though?’ she asked.

  Jess ran back in then and snatched the laptop away so I was spared having to think about it.

  Thursday 18 January

  Norwegian cruise fantasies – 7. Potential Daddy Saddle-based nightmares – tbc. Jaffa Cakes – 4. (Pre-empting trauma of Daddy Saddle dreams.)

  Cassie arrived at Busy Beavers today in a fur coat.

  Aside from the whole animal cruelty thing, obviously, can you imagine anything less suitable to wear while carrying around a small child? If I wore a fur coat on a day out with Jess I’m pretty sure it would look like roadkill within about half an hour. When I got into work on Monday, Angela, who does fundraising and sits next to me, had to pick an actual piece of cheese out of my hair.

  Sierra and I encouraged Jess and Fox towards the home corner so we could follow Cassie and the coat. We heard her tell Yvonne, who fawns around her like she’s the bloody Queen or something, that her husband bought it for her as a surprise Christmas gift and that she felt awful about it. She didn’t look like she felt awful.

  ‘We’d promised we were only getting each other token gifts,’ she told Yvonne, ‘because of the Norwegian Fjord cruise, and then he goes and gets me this! I felt terrible as I only got him a Daddy Saddle!’

  I was so busy thinking about the casualness of the cruise comment that for a second my brain didn’t process Daddy Saddle. Then I realised Sierra was choking on her rich tea finger. Cassie shot us a look as I escorted Sierra to the opposite side of the room, where she collapsed into mild hysterics.

  She wanted to google Daddy Saddle there and then but I pointed out that if it was some kind of sex aid then I didn’t want it showing up on the church hall Wi-Fi and God having another excuse to turn me away. Not that I believe in him, but you need to keep your options open.

  Looked up Daddy Saddle when I got home. I think I’d have had more respect for Cassie if it had been a sex aid. Ian and I have both given plenty of horsey rides to the girls when they were small, letting them ride on our backs, but we never felt the need to use an actual saddle. I wonder if Cassie’s husband is also made to wear a bit in his mouth?

  Friday 19 January

  Steve announced this morning that as I’ve been working at the museum for a year now, I’m due an appraisal and that he’s putting it in the diary for 9 a.m. next Friday. I asked if perhaps we could make it 9.30, just to give me chance to arrive and get sorted but he said he was going to be very busy with other meetings and it had to be 9. I checked his diary while he was in the toilet and the only other thing in it on Friday was ‘dental hygienist’ at 3. He does it on purpose – jealousy, I think, because of my part-time hours. He likes testing me.

  Maggie, my very favourite volunteer, came in to do her Friday afternoon exhibition tours and brought me a piece of home-made lemon drizzle cake. She told me not to mind Steve. She said she’s pretty sure he lives at home with his mother as she saw them in Sainsbury’s last week arguing over crunchy versus smooth peanut butter. She said Steve’s mother won.

  Sunday 21 January

  Weekend too tedious to write about.

  Monday 22 January

  Message from Sierra at lunchtime.

  ‘When do you work?’ she said. I gave her the schedule: Monday 9–3, Tuesday until midday, Wednesday 9–6 because Ian picks up the girls and has them to stay and Friday 9–3.

  ‘I have Thursdays off,’ I told her, ‘and Tuesday afternoons, and sometimes I work later on Fridays if it’s an Ian weekend.’

  ‘Blimey,’ she replied, ‘what a faff.’ It really is. It’s one of the main reasons I took the museum job when we moved down to Barnmouth, because the board of trustees agreed to be flexible around school hours so I can do nursery pick up three days a week.

  Sierra said that Fox had insisted on wearing a leotard all weekend and did I want to go to toddler gymnastics with them tomorrow afternoon. I could feel my shoulders tense at the thought of an echoey hall full of toddlers almost literally bouncing off the walls but couldn’t make an excuse about work as now she knew I was free – clever.

  ‘I know it sounds shit,’ she said, reading my mind, ‘but if Fox attempts another cartwheel near the open kitchen shelving then I’m going to have a breakdown. It’s only £2.50 a session and I will bring Jaffa Cakes.’

  I dug out a pair of shorts and a T-shirt with a ballerina on the front for Jess – my best approximation at a gymnastics kit.

  Tuesday 23 January

  Toddler gymnastics class was forty-five minutes long and I think Jess attempted two forward rolls in that whole time. There were only nine of them in the class, but they had to line up and take turns to do a move, supervised by a member of staff. Jess was so excited that she couldn’t quite manage to keep her place in the queue – she kept running over to tell me to watch her or running back in the line to talk to Fox.

  The obsessive leotard-wearing had clearly paid off for Fox – he nailed the cartwheeling in about twenty minutes. Sierra was playing it cool with the whole ‘Gawd, who are these parents forcing their kids into classes?’ thing but I could tell she was enjoying it as she only ate one Jaffa Cake.

  Wednesday 24 January

  Money saved on Coke/popcorn combo – £8. Time that could have been spent not in the cold if I had just stayed home in the first place – one hour.

  I decided to go to the cinema on my own this evening. I’ve never been by myself before, but it felt like the kind of thing that sassy, independent women approaching forty should be doing. Ian has the girls to stay every Wednesday night, plus Friday and Saturday night every other weekend – that’s four nights every fortnight that I have to myself. I can’t sit at home watching Netflix and eating crisps on all of them.

  I didn’t want to spend eight pounds on a handful of popcorn and can of Coke, so I thought I’d be clever and take in a cheeky gin and tonic from home. I didn’t actually have any tonic though, so it ended up being a gin and Asda Double Strength Lemon Squash, which I’m sure is considered some kind of retro delicacy in London. A bit like those cereal cafés where you pay £8.95 for a bowl of Lucky Charms and get to pretend for twenty minutes that everything is OK and that you live at home with your mum and dad and not in a mouldy cupboard in Bethnal Green that’s costing you two-thirds of your salary.

  I searched the cupboards, trying to find something to put my vintage, hipster cocktail in, but could only find the old Peppa Pig flask that Jess insists on taking to Busy Beavers every week because she says the juice there ‘tastes like rocks’.

  When I got to the cinema, though, I couldn’t go in. I couldn’t face going up to the counter and asking for one ticket. How pathetic is that?

  I should have gone to the big Odeon in Exeter where they have the self-service machines and no on
e need know you’re on your own until the lights are down and it’s too late. I sat for a little while on the bench opposite, drinking my gin and tonic and imagining how warm I would be in Cassie’s fur coat, then I walked home again.

  (Note to self: remember to rinse flask thoroughly.)

  Thursday 25 January

  Sympathy biscuits eaten in order to make new mum feel more comfortable around me – 4. Times I was grateful not to have twins – 5+.

  There was a new mum at Busy Beavers today. She had twin boys with her, who looked about Jess’s age. She was sitting in the sandpit corner and both boys were pawing at her, trying to get up on to her lap, while she half-heartedly waved a bucket and spade about a bit. She was smiling but seemed to be taking very deep breaths.

  I was all for just watching from a distance and using the new mum’s predicament as a way to feel better about my own life – which is surely the point of going to playgroup after all? – but Sierra is obviously a much nicer person that me and made us go over and say hello.

  New mum – Louise – looked pathetically grateful, to the point where I thought she might be about to cry. Sierra got Fox over to lure Louise’s boys away on the promise of having a go on the crane, and I went to get tea and biscuits. Louise asked for hot water and got out her own chamomile teabag. I didn’t say anything but I felt like it was going to take something a bit stronger than a chamomile tea.

  Louise chatted for a bit about the twins – Arthur and Edward – and their various food intolerances and how avoiding sugar is actually so easy for them as their favourite food is baby sweetcorn. While she was talking I saw one of the boys snatch a chocolate Hobnob from a small girl doing a Postman Pat jigsaw.

  Jess came over to get a drink, her fringe sweaty and pushed back off her head. I got out the Peppa Pig flask and held my breath in case she kicked up a fuss about the mild gin flavour. Despite a thorough scrub with very hot water, there was still a slight whiff of botanicals when she popped up the spout but I think I got away with it.

  Sierra invited Louise to toddler gym with us on Tuesday. I was a bit sceptical. ‘She seems a bit smug, don’t you think?’ I asked Sierra while Louise was in the toilet. ‘All that baby sweetcorn talk?’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Sierra, ‘but also she has her jumper on inside out and there were a lot of mascara-stained tissues in her bag.’

  Friday 26 January

  Appraisals attended – 0. Intricate plans hatched about leaving poisonous insects in Steve’s office while he is out for lunch – 1. (But very solid.)

  I remembered at 8.15 a.m. that I had my appraisal at 9 today, and before I could even say anything out loud Jess seemed to sense my need for speed and started eating her toast as slowly as possible. She was literally nibbling tiny corners like a goddamn mouse.

  ‘Last night you told me not to rush my jelly,’ she reminded me helpfully, ‘because you said I would get tummy ache.’ She smiled sweetly. I was sure she wasn’t doing it on purpose, and yet …

  ‘Yes, I did,’ I said, ‘but Mummy has something very important to do at work this morning, so we mustn’t be late.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Mummy,’ she said, ‘I will eat this and then I just need to choose a pony to take to nursery.’

  God, no!

  ‘Perhaps you don’t need to take one today?’ I suggested, immediately regretting it. She looked horrified, as if the very notion would mean that she’d now have to give a lot more thought to the choosing process than she had originally planned.

  Flo was ready to leave for school.

  ‘Can I have that £20?’ she asked me as she wrestled her shoes on, squashing down the backs in the process.

  ‘God, Flo, can’t you undo your laces?’ I asked. ‘Those shoes cost me £45 you know. And what £20?’

  ‘You know, for the wood for DT, so I can make you a box. You said to remind you. You should be grateful I’m making you a hand-crafted gift, you know.’

  ‘Did it occur to you to remind me perhaps more than thirty seconds before the time of actually needing it?’ I asked, rummaging in my bag for my purse.

  ‘I just remembered,’ she said. ‘You should have reminded me to remind you.’

  ‘Well, I don’t have cash,’ I said. ‘They can have a book token. Or my library card, although I owe £8.25 so they probably won’t want that. Why on earth do you have to pay for your own wood, anyway? Isn’t that up to school to provide? Like desks and teachers and stuff?’

  ‘It’s cuts, Mum,’ she said, shoving her sandwich into her bag in a way that implied she probably wasn’t going to be worrying about eating it. ‘Everyone knows about the cuts.’

  I sighed.

  ‘Well, I’m sorry, but I don’t have any cash on me, so you’ll have to apologise and say you’ll take it in next week.’

  ‘Oh, brilliant,’ she said. She practically threw her bag on to her back. ‘Can’t you bring it in later?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said again. ‘I’m working today. I can’t just leave work and run errands for you.’

  ‘No, right, of course, heaven forbid you want to do anything that might help me,’ she shouted as she stormed off down the path. ‘I’ll just be humiliated in front of my friends, don’t worry about me.’

  I felt awful about her leaving like that because Ian was picking her up from school and I wouldn’t see her again until Sunday afternoon. I knew I could have dealt with it better and that it wasn’t her fault that I was rushed and stressed. I pressed my palms into my eyes for a few seconds, took a deep breath and turned back to Jess. ‘Have you chosen a pony?’ I asked brightly.

  She hadn’t chosen a pony, so by the time that was done and packed lunches were finished and we were in the car it was 8.45. Fifteen minutes to get to nursery, drop off Jess, get to work and be in my appraisal. Unlikely, but not impossible, not unless you turn out of your street and straight up behind the recycling truck, anyway.

  It was 9.06 when I ran into Steve’s office, chucking my stuff at my desk as I flew past. Steve was staring at his computer screen. ‘Sorry, Frankie,’ he said, not even looking up at me, ‘I’ve had to reschedule as you were late. I have other things I need to do today and I didn’t have the availability for it to overrun.’

  What an utter bastard! I hope the dental hygienist slips and drills through his tongue, I thought. That happened to someone I know, once. They had to have eight stitches. Can you even imagine?

  It was 9.12 when I got back to my desk and I realised I had Jess’s lunch bag. Good luck, nursery, after she’s had my iced coffee and Twix.

  Saturday 27 January

  Woke up at 6.30 a.m., wide awake, as though someone had thrown a bucket of cold water over me. I tried to go back to sleep but it was pointless. Why is it that when you have the kids you long for a lie-in, but when you’re on a child-free weekend suddenly you’re awake at the crack of bloody dawn?

  Lay in bed in the dark and did a bit of Instagram stalking and discovered @simple_dorset_life had been busy in the kitchen yesterday, making raw brownies with coconut oil and Medjool dates.

  ‘When those sugar cravings hit, these sweet and sticky raw brownies are just what you need!’ the caption read. ‘Just one small square is enough to satisfy the sweetest tooth, so it’s a good job they keep!’

  One small square seems doubtful, tbh.

  (Question: what is a Medjool date?)

  Sunday 28 January

  Minibreaks taken – 0. Jars of ground coriander dusted – 3. Shaped chicken pieces eaten – more than advisable.

  I wish I had enough money to use my child-free weekends going on European city minibreaks or taking up exciting new hobbies like windsurfing. I went for a walk on the beach but it was decidedly bleak and also freezing cold, so I came home and spent three hours emptying out the kitchen cupboards, tutting at best before dates on mini jars of spices, and putting everything back in again. While I waited for the girls to come home I drew a little picture of a tree and wrote ‘FLO’ on the trunk. On each branch I drew a lea
f and inside each leaf I wrote a something that I love about her. Then I folded it up and hid it under her pillow.

  I’m waiting on payday so meals may get a little more creative over the next few days. Sunday dinner tonight was chicken fingers, potato waffles and cucumber for tea, followed by tinned mandarin segments and some rather frosty-looking toffee swirl ice cream. No one complained. In fact, Jess declared it ‘scrumptious’. I should make less effort more often.

  Also, chicken fingers are clearly just a ploy to try to make parents feel slightly less like they are giving their kids chicken nuggets, but why? Is it the word ‘nugget’? Is it that a finger shape somehow seems more natural? Not sure how, as chickens don’t have fingers, surely?

  Wednesday 31 January

  Payday, thank goodness. I was having one of those ‘just been paid so feeling flush’ moments this evening, so I signed Jess up for swimming lessons. There is something about her not being here in person that makes these ideas seem so much more manageable. She starts after half-term.

  Thursday 1 February

  Passive aggressive WhatsApp messages from Busy Beavers – 1. Hula Hoops picked up off the playgroup floor after Hula Hoop-gate – 23. Minutes of Peppa Pig watched by Jess – more than recommended by Mumsnet.

  I almost enjoyed Busy Beavers today. I hung out in the home corner with Sierra and Louise and it felt like I was back in school and in a gang with the cool girls. Or mid-range, at least. It would have been cooler if Louise hadn’t kept harping on about the versatility of quinoa and jumping up in a panicky way every time one of her boys so much as wobbled a lip, but I think she has potential. I reckon we just need to get her drunk a couple of times, loosen her up. Probably during an evening rather than at playgroup.