.............As I hung out the washing I looked forward...

Two pigeons on the damp bare table pecking furiously at the last specks of seed. Must feed them asap.
The sky, a washed out bleached blue. Not a trace of anything warm. No cauliflower clouds or swooping screeching starlings just faded silent lifeless space.
My hands looked daft wrapped in yellow washing up gloves.
And as I pegged jumpers to the line cold water dripped down from my wrists skirting its way to my uncovered elbows.... I was glad though..... Always feel satisfied after completing a full sinkload.
Inside.
Mum...... warm in the front room. Monty luxurious, on the shaggy burgundy hearth rug coiled like dead fox fur around the shoulders of a grand lady.

Mr Hairy Suit brows very furrowed figuring out glitches on his laptop.

All is still. Like a painting.

It was so cold as mum and me went from shop to shop that I'd have given anything to be anywhere else other than Spa Road on a January morning.
We, as usual, bought a few items of interest, my two fancies being a pink button through cardigan and a book, 'Lovely Bones'. Mum stuck with her favourites,crime novels and handbags.

As we looked we listened to the non-stop chatter of three old women. They spoke of animal cruelty, death and someone who recently lost someone.
They made me feel sick. Was it my imagination or were they getting off on suffering, I could almost see saliva running from the corners of their thin pale lips.
"I don't want to grow old like them" " I don't want to spend my days gossiping." " I don't want to brag about my second holiday or how well my petunias are doing" I thought............. as a rapidly thinning mother struggled to read the back covers, I want to live a simple lentil occasional chicken style life, with my hair short, looking forward to a day at the seaside or walk in a meadow or afternoon with a man. I don't want a caravan breakaway or two weeks in Spain. The women terrified me.
When I'm old and the doctor's pills aren't working I'll make my face up, have a cup of tea and go to sleep rattling with over the counter tablets.

We then went to Joan's shop where more witches huddled on settees by the doorway..... knitting. It was a devil of a job getting in. "Are we in your way?" One asked knowing damn well they were.
"We can manage" I said and we did. Whether or not it was just my bad mood I don't know but this morning I hated every old face and every cackling voice.
I felt suffocated.

Home to soup for mum and bread and cheese for me.
The postman didn't bring anything good either.

I feel I'm going to need all my good qualities to survive this winter. The good qualities being...Resilience, patience and er...humour. Not much in this post I admit but it''s there under my lovely skin...:)

Mum was disappointed.
Sad almost.
Shocked definitely.
Her flat was cold, dark, feeling not at all like home, not at all like two loving people had lived there for over 25 years, she was stunned.

And after making tea mum and me went through every drawer and cupboard heaving out handbags, books and mementoes. It was creepy.

Opening her wardrobe and seeing dad's white shirts and black jacket hanging in the back and her floral blouses and checked trousers right at the front made me wish I wasn't there. But this job had to be done. For some reason.

God it was cold, and mum complained continually about it. "The heat is on" I said but we could have burned dad's entire collection of horse racing books and still the place would have been as cold as Tory politician's heart. But we carried on.

Dragging out photos, purses, keys and dad's wedding ring. Mum was happily sad about finding it and within minutes I'd strung it around her neck.
I didn't like it though. Because, for the first time since he died I felt he'd really really gorn. No more was i going to look into his hazel eyes (so much like mine) no more would I hear his lovely voice. I missed him there and then and wondered when mum would finally let go of all these material things and accept that the life she had with the great man has run its course. Fin. Ended. Disappeared, bubble like.

It was all too depressing and with that depression came the inevitable silence, all of us, mum john and myself, each wondering who'll be the first to say "Lets' Go".

Endless mugs of tea were a poor substitute for the warmth of a loving beating male heart and I saw that much more of this nonsense and mum would deteriorate right in front of my eyes so I suggested we pack as many carrier bags with stuff and leave. I was nastily comparing the once welcoming home with its John Lewis armchairs and old raggedy carpets and brass ornaments with some kind of dreadful home of the dead and I wanted OUT.

Mum agreed immediately and within a few short minutes we were in the car coming back home.

We came back, rested, ate and resumed life and she's been ok ever since.

I'm waiting though for her decision. The decision as to whether she'll go 'home' or stay here.
The nightmare lives on.


I made a nice chicken korma tonight and my hair looks great and I have ambitions for my future...

Today In A Thimble...

Not a lot other than...

Mr Horsehound and Mr Hairy carted orf our 28 year old settee and one armchair to the recycling place. It was though Crushed on arrival. Felt sad on hearance of this because the old grey thing had served us well. AND back all those years ago, I was daft enough to name the pieces...Dumbo, Mumbo and Jumbo.
Having not matured one Jot I couldn't let go of the entire suite so kept Mumbo who now takes up too much place in the kitchen of love.

Baked a lof a tad too long. It'll taste great but could be used as either a Doorstop or Weapon.

Mother and myself had words again. Not insulting or capable of permanent emotional damage but nevertheless bloods were raised.

We made up by me making her laugh. I did that by bowing.

Mother, I along with Mr Hairy (who is now in the process of paying rent in the form of dark chocolate) sat excited as we watched the Darts on the telly. But. When it came to later on Mother tutted because she wanted to watch Man U beat up the Hammers. I don't often deny Mum anything but this time I stood my ground by telling her that I was watching the Darts to it's bitter end.(Bobby George's son Richie knocking out a bloke called Prins. It was then that I changed channels allowing her to gawp sideways at the footie. She's happy now/ Her hair though is still wet after it's quick wash and her eyes are damp from dropping tears. She's been looking at old photos.
But the Crusty Bean is doing ok, had some pie and mash a little while ago and is excited about going to her flat tomorrow. Mr Horsehound and I aren't excited at all. The journey is long and the outcome umknown. Whether being in her own front room with Dad 'everywhere' will feed her soul or do her wafer thin body any good is anyone's guess. But we'll go and arrive lunchtime with ham sandwiches, fruit cake and a bottle of milk.

Now I must fly. And if I could fly I'd whip my way around the rooftops dropping birdseed from the deep pockets of my red anorak.

Today's Business In A Nutshell

 Power walk around Sainsbury's with the ever so dawdling Hairy Suit. "All I ask is that you keep up with me" I cheeked as I waited and waited and took root by the spice rack.

Groceries packed and stacked then nearly knocked over by a hurrying old trout in silver car. I kept my new years resolution by Not spouting expletives.

Home to the business of a vegetarian pizza lunch, mum looking for lost shoes and Hairy keeping the garage roof up by foul means and fair. What a guy.

Then with Hairy and the pizza out of the way mum and me set orf for Hockley. It was there, in the lay-by on Spa Road that the wheelchair absolutely would not work. So after dismantling the entire battery contraption I wheeled mum manually around three shops.
The boys will need to check this out.

Lovely items bought: Gorgeous honey and caramel coloured elasticated beaded bracelet 50p. Red wok style fry pan. £1:50. Posy of artificial red pink and beige silk flowers. 50p. Two VHS videos. The Magnificent Seven and Donnie Brasco. Total price 50p.
And for mum? Murder books by the box load Where oh where to put them :(

Home late afternoon to tea and low sugar marmalade sandwich.

For tea tonight. For mum and myself. Pork chops, sweet parsnips, jacket pots and apple sauce. No pud. Because I'll be dipping into one of the sweetie jars on the coffee table.

Then after food we'll probably watch one of them videos, the western probably, and by we I mean Mother, Hairy and myself..Mr Horsehound is doing a late.

Now I must fly. If only. T'would feel good to shoot between stars.



......

Our first yelling-at-each-other took place last night at 10pm.
She had got it wrong......again........ so this time I let rip, full throttle, we've barely spoken since.

I think I'll go back to wearing red lipstick not only because it's the only real lipstick any woman should wear but because it concentrates people's attention on my lips rather than on my weary lost-in-some-other-place- eyes.

Today I'm waiting in for the nurse so no shopping trip and for that I am truly grateful. Which reminds me of something I'm almost ashamed to tell you and that is my shameful adolescent hands-behind-my-back posture when gently telling Mother about my plans for the next few days.
It's a feeling I'm truly embarrassed about but one which told me in no uncertain terms just how fraught the whole mother/daughter thing has become. A 56year old woman wary of doing anything which might incur the wrath of mummy. How awful is THAT!

Still, we're taking her to London on Sunday and she says she's looking forward to it. We're not of course. I'd very much prefer to wash my dinner dishes while listening to Etta James. But we're hoping that as she struggles to carry her kettle to her sink she'll realize that life on her own is not an option.
And so...Back to my place, my home, where she doesn't want to be. No win for her, no win for me.

I'm making a cider chicken casserole today and as it braises I'll write a shopping list.
Simple precious pleasures.

War Games, Outstanding Friendship And A Box Of Chocs

............Sums up 2012.

The War Games bit doesn't refer to the relationship I have with Mother but with the silly recorded movie I dipped into last night after seeing orf Mr Hairy roundabout 10pm.
Mr Hairy. What a lovely younger man he is, filled to the brim with kindness, spanners and off the wall ideas about residing on barges, baking and general life in general. Charmingly bonkers but just what an over worked girl needs. If I were single I'd run away to a remote meadow with him. Probably Norfolk. By the way he left a box of Black Magic under me pillow.

Ho hum. New Year's Eve. Mr Horsehound, unlike my good self, was out partying last night, whilst I did the over looking of one hell of a distraught Mother. The woman is in tatters. A mind so confused with all the jabber jabber coming from Doctors that she felt compelled to tell her GP... so late yesterday afternoon when a simple consultation regarding her blindness in one eye and fungal toe nail turned into a bitter battle over her reduced Doxepin. I wanted to throttle the Spanish GP not because he's Spanish, but because he had a serious attitude malfunction and that was something both Mum and myself could have well done without.
And so.........After stepping in when Mother failed to answer his questions succinctly we finally came to a resolution. She needs to see an Optician and take antibiotics for her toe. Well well well....And the Good doc will increase her happy pills. And a hooray for that. Mother has been in a bit down lately. "Wanting" she said "to jump in front of a bus"
Lifting her into the car in the dark wet and windy car park I'd just about had enough.

While on the subject of having enough...I made more than enough Home Made Beef Korma last night, also had heaps of home made Chappatis, Raita and shop bought bhajis.
Sometimes when I eat I feel like licking the plate. This inhuman uncivilised desire comes from being human and a need to get messy, unladylike. So much of my time is spent sober in tights and sensible shoes that oft times I want to rebel. But The Horsehound Rebellion will have to wait.
At least till after the funeral.

2012 was enlightening.
So bright were the revelations that most of the time I was blinded. Being totally responsible for someones cleanliness is tiring. My heart nearly stopping on many occasion when faced with bed baths and accidents. But she did it for me when I was small and weak and as she did for me I did for her. Mother though often crying with rage because she didn't want me to wet nurse her, it wasn't my place she spat. Well m'dear if it isn't my fairylike hands that cleanse your creases then whose hands would you prefer?
No answer.

During mother's tenure we've had many door-kicking arguments, many sulks and many making up moments. We are you see, very different kettles of fish.
She is a Barracuda, I, a Goldfish.
But by careful swimming and hiding behind the ornaments this Goldfish has survived. The Barracuda however is showing her age. And her two teeth. This once graceful killer fish now lies on the bottom of her bed all washed up. Every now and then though her tail lashes out leaving all manner of foodstuffs over the carpet. She's alright though because I glide by breathing sweetly scooping up her crumbs and then when the water is calm I swim away glassy eyed.

I did everything and more last year to make mum's stay her in the bungalow a real home from home experience. Good food, expensive warmth and a host of interesting activities. But the bungalow is a poor substitute for her flat. And I, a poor substitute for dad.
I couldn't reproduce or replace the relationship she had with dad. And I've worn myself out trying to do just that. So in 2013 I'm going to be the 56 year old daughter who has to find her tongue when faced with a torrent of 'advice' from a very enraged mother.
Should be fun!

Talking of fun Mr Horsehound and me good self are taking Mum to her flat next Sunday, just for the day, just so she can sit down on her old sofa and gaze around the room hopefully feeling happier for a while but hopefully realizing that being Home Alone is not an option.


I'm making Hot Dogs for tea.

I want to wish all my readers both old and new a wonderful 2013. I hope you all feel well in head and bod!