Not so much of the old

A couple of weeks ago, I took the plunge and bought a new mobile phone. I thought it would be easy peasy to switch over from my old one, but in spite of my children doing it all for me, it turned out I had the wrong sized sim card. After much huffing and puffing from me, finally, it started working. I’m still a bit hazy about what’s what, but am gradually getting there.

I found myself installing apps. Gosh it was fun. No nasty messages about running out of space or deleting unwanted files (no, Lenovo, I want them all!) However, the downside of all this technology is that my phone, rather cheekily, has started making extremely inappropriate suggestions.

Picture the scene. Pleasantly weary after a hard day of lock down activities, I settled down with a Pimm’s. I asked my phone to tell me about the weather. This it did, but then immediately decided to send me a picture of a pair of feet sporting frankly alarming looking footwear. The text read thus.

“New sock is helping millions of seniors turn back the clock on their ageing, aching feet.”

Next, it suggested that I might want to join my local weather community (whatever that might be) and then reassured me that there would be no precipitation for at least 120 minutes. Presumably in case I wanted to take my old feet outside for a quick totter down the lane.

Call me pedantic (you’re pedantic, Ruth) but I found a lot wrong with that sentence. Should it not be, “new socks are helping…” rather than, “new sock”? Also, why did my phone assume I am a senior? I may have started watching music documentaries on BBC Four and saying indignantly, “Surely that didn’t come out thirty years ago? It seems like yesterday!” but I am still relatively perky, all things considered. My feet do ache from time to time, but usually because I’ve been running up and down the stairs and working hard on various home-related activities.

My phone may be a bit too big for its boots. It supports lots of apps, effortlessly, and clearly wants to be my new best friend with its constant suggestions and updates. I leave it in the house when I go over to the veg patch as I don’t want it hearing my conversations with my husband. A sample from the last week includes rhapsodies over the new little courgettes forming on the plants (give it a fortnight and I’ll be begging strangers to take them away), genuine excitement at the appearance of a ridge cucumber in the greenhouse and mild hysteria at the discovery of the first crop of mange tout.

Twenty-five years ago, I would have smiled derisively if you’d suggested that one day, I would be getting all het up over vegetables. Mobile phones back then required a small trolley to wheel them around. Times have changed, I’ve changed and the things I used to care about don’t seem to matter that much any more.

So, after a hard day’s toil home schooling, washing, drying, cleaning, writing and reading, my aching, ageing feet can look after themselves, thank you very much. No special socks needed. And certainly no more apps.

Images by Pixabay

Ruth is a freelance writer, speaker and poet. She is married with three delightful children, runs a catering company and keeps chickens and quail. She has her first novel in the editing stage, another two on the go, writes poetry as the mood takes her, writes for a number of Christian charities and has her own business writing blogs for small Suffolk businesses. She is a recovering over-achiever who is now able to do the school run in her onesie most days. She blogs at @bigwordsandmadeupstories, covering topics as diverse as King Zog of Albania, a Christingle plagued by punch-ups and tummy upsets, and the inevitable decline of elderly parents. She has abnormally narrow sinuses and a morbid fear of raw tomatoes, but has decided not to let this get in the way of a meaningful life.

It's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon .........

 

…. was the way Garrison Keillor began each Lake Wobegon segment in his, “A Prairie Home Companion” radio show. Everyone knows everyone in Lake Wobegon and all the rules. Lutherans drive Fords bought from Bunsen Motors, Catholics purchase their Chevys from Krebsbach Chevrolet, everyone has lunch at the Sidetrack Tap and the Statue of the Unknown Norwegian (so called because he left before the sculptor got round to asking him his name) is the high point of Main Street.

Since lock down began, I could have started most of my blogs with the same phrase. “It’s been a quiet week in Loudham ….” On the whole, this has been true. The same things have happened in roughly the same order. Planting, watering, weeding, painting, re-potting, bread making, cooking, home schooling, feeding the chickens, mowing, maintaining the empire of compost bins, saying hello to delivery people, chatting to friends and neighbours at a safe distance etc.

Dear readers, be assured that what you read here every week is no exaggeration. I don’t make things up to entertain you and, it turns out, this is because I don’t have to. Recent excitements have included being joined by an enormous stag beetle as I drifted off to sleep (it was nesting in my hair), being bitten by a tortoise and losing tiny amounts of blood due to picking 13lb of gooseberries from a particularly thorny bush.

Last Thursday, however, something really unexpected and out of the usual run of things occurred. Friends and acquaintances know that I am not a cat person. I am scared of them, hate the thought of their claws being stuck into me and leap up into the air if one comes into the room. The children asked if they could have a kitten, once, years ago and have never asked again. Chickens, yes. Quails, absolutely fine. Cats, nope!

Opening our garage door, I was confronted by a tiny bundle of grey fur with huge blue eyes. My husband scooped it up and we gazed at it in wonder. Just at the moment, the three children cycled on to the drive after a long bike ride. What parents can resist three pairs of pleading eyes and three voices crying, “Can we keep it? Please, please, please?”

Not us, it turns out. We released the kitten who immediately ran to the back of the garage. We spent the rest of the day googling cat-related stuff and applying for advice to our feline-loving friends Jenny and Danni. Armed with two litter boxes and various cat accessories, Operation Kitten began. Parented by two feral farm cats, the little fur ball was not being very well looked after. It took my husband and daughter four long hours to extract her from the very corner of the garage.

That was a week ago. It has not been a quiet week in Loudham. We’ve discovered that tiny kittens need to have their bottoms gently rubbed with a wet flannel to encourage them to do a number two. This my daughter has happily done. We’ve found that Misty loves shoes and feet, and I’ve had to stay calm as she gently nibbles my toes. I’ve picked her up, cuddled and stroked her. I’m still a bit scared of her claws.

Friends have expressed disbelief at the news. “You? With a cat? You’re kidding!” I’ve surprised myself.

Just seven days ago, if you’d asked me if I would ever have a cat in the house, I’d have given you a firm negative. Things change so quickly, hearts expand to welcome in a new family member and even an old girl set in her ways like me is learning to love a cute, cuddly little kitten.

Will next week be a quiet week in Loudham? I doubt it. I’ll keep you posted.

From superhero to sadness and back again

Yesterday morning, I was driving up Chapel Lane towards the Hill. I was on the regular trek to buy food for my elderly parents, my elderly mother in law and husband and our family. I slowed down as I noticed a mother and a little boy walking along the road. He was stumping along in a determined fashion and as I went past, I noticed he was wearing a superhero mask. His stance, his gait and his age (around three) all screamed, “I am a superhero today! I have magical powers. There are no limits to my world.”

Do you remember feeling like that? We probably all went through that phase and then life slowly taught us that actually our world is limited and that pushing the boundaries and following our dreams is hard and sometimes painful.

Continuing on to the Hill, I started thinking how life goes from one phase to another and how sometimes, it overlaps so that you’re living in what feel like a number of different dimensions.

It wasn’t that long ago that I was trying to reason with my own three-year old son. I would gently wake him from his nap and try to get him out to the car to pick up his older brother from school. This never went well. Bribery didn’t do it, making it into a game was laughed off and even logic (which, eleven years on works a treat with him) was a no go. The only way I could ensure a relatively smooth transfer from house to car was by agreeing to supply him with the correct clothing. If it was cold and rainy outside, he would put together an outfit of shorts, a sun hat and wellies. If, however, we were experiencing a warmer spell, he would call for his winter coat and woolly hat. This made me the laughing stock of the mothers at school. I was prepared to go along with it, however, as it did what was needed, ie got us from A to B.

Back then, my parents were still living eighty-five miles away in their house, completely independent and in excellent health. I was devoting most of my attention to keeping three children and myself alive while trying to work from home. 

Last year, due to ill-health and increasing frailty with both parents, we moved them up here, five minutes away. Last March, they were still pretty perky. Yesterday, I walked in with the shopping to find Dad sitting on the sofa and Mum lying down on the bed. Of late, they’ve been sitting outside in the garden on their new garden furniture, reading their books and enjoying a cup of tea and a shortbread finger. It’s easy, with the sunlight streaming down and the doves cooing in the background, to forget how old they are and how frail.

It felt like a shock. From a little boy with a mask to an elderly man in a cardigan on the sofa telling me he’s not as strong as he used to be (he’s 94). I went to lots of trouble to sort them both out with hearing aids when they moved. They never wear them. I have to shout at the top of my voice to make myself understood, but according to Dad, his hearing is still very good.

“I’ve brought you some cake!” I bellowed. Dad cupped his ear with his hand.

“What’s that?”

“CAKE! I’VE BROUGHT SOME CAKE!”

His eyes lit up. He loves the cake. I went through each type and he beamed. It’s so easy to make him happy.

Just then, Mum shuffled through from the bedroom. I told her about the cake. Dad laughed and wagged his finger at me.

“You never told me we had cake!” His face was wreathed in smiles, delighted at catching me out. The Alzheimer’s is definitely getting worse. I’ve learned how to manage it now, just as I learned how to keep my toddler happy.

“Well, we have. Carrot with ginger and some lovely cheesecake for your pudding.”

Coffee made and cake served, I fed the tortoise, did the washing up and made sure they had something ready for dinner. Then it was back home to make everyone’s day by telling them about the cheesecake I’d bought (it was Wednesday, after all) and to don my own superhero mask and start writing.

Yesterday felt as though lots of my phases were coming together. The children dress themselves these days and it’s been a long, long time since one of them threw themselves on the ground and screamed. My parents have gone from independence to relatively contented dependence.

I’ve changed so much in the fourteen years since we moved to Suffolk. I look back at the optimistic girl who left everything behind to make a new life and smile wryly at her unquenchable belief that all would be well. Something I couldn’t have predicted is that one day I would put on my own superhero mask every day as I sat down at the computer to write.

I never did take the risk of having dreams or following them. That was far too dangerous. But for the last few months, I’ve been putting that mask on and whispering to myself, “I am a superhero today! I have magical powers. There are no limits to my world.”

Oh Schitt

I’ve always been drawn to a certain type of comedy. I like quirky characters, slow burn plot development and wit. One of my favourite sayings ever comes from one of the writers of “Seinfeld”. He said their credo on the show was “no hugging, no learning.” I liked that. Stuff happened (not much of it, admittedly) and no-one ever had a neat, end of show epiphany as a result.

The premise of the dysfunctional family has been at the heart of some of the most successful comedies ever. From Steptoe and Son to Fawlty Towers (I’m counting Polly and Manuel as part of the family), from The Simpsons to Arrested Development, from Spaced to Black Books, the idea of a group of people living together and their subsequent adventures has provided a rich seam of comedy for writers.

Laughter has been in fairly short supply in 2020. Fear, anxiety and apprehension have been bedfellows for most of us in the last few months. I came across this Jewish proverb recently: “As soap is to the body, so laughter is to the soul.” I like that. Watching the news has been a sobering experience, worse than usual if you watched “Newsnight” last night, but I’d have gone crazy if I hadn’t countered it all with a good dose of humour.

Which leads me rather neatly on to one of the best discoveries I’ve made all year. “Schitt’s Creek” is a Canadian sitcom about the Rose family. Paterfamilias Johnny made his fortune with a string of video stores, his wife Moira is a fading soap star and their grown-up children, David and Alexis are a pair of spoilt, entitled snobs. The story starts with a ring at the door of their gilded mansion and the discovery that their business manager has been defrauding them. They’ve got an hour to pack up and get out. Their sole remaining asset is a back of beyond town which they bought for their son as a joke years ago…..

As the Roses arrive in town on the bus, the full horror of their situation bursts upon them. They own the Schitt’s Creek Motel, so they can stay there free, but to a family used to palatial luxury and lots of servants, two shabby adjoining rooms in a provincial motel is a shocking come-down. Naturally, things don’t go too well in the first series, giving the writers the opportunity to introduce a small but impressive cast of characters and set the family up for absolutely no hugging, but a whole lot of learning.

“Schitt’s Creek” makes me laugh my head off while applauding the quality of the writing. As far as I’m concerned, it deserves every award going. By Series 6, Johnny is still the baffled straight man to ludicrous mayor Roland Schitt, but has got to know his family much better and discovered his kind and compassionate side. Moira is still an over-emoting drama queen with a wall of wigs, each with a name, but she shows the odd chink of humanity. David is still a posturing neat freak, but he’s learned that he might just be worthy of love. Alexis is still moderately self-obsessed, but she’s learned that in order to find real love, you need to be selfless.

“Schitt’s Creek” is a family affair. It’s written by father and son team Eugene and Dan Levy, who play Johnny and David. Twyla, the waitress at the café is Sarah Levy, Dan’s sister. Deb Devine, Dan and Sarah’s mother and Eugene’s wife, is the creative consultant on the show. Fans of Christopher Guest’s mockumentaries (Best in Show, A Mighty Wind etc) will recognise Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara as a well-established humorous double act.

When thinking about the show, Dan Levy asked himself the question, “Would the Kardashians still be the Kardashians without their money?” and “Schitt’s Creek” was the result. It’s lifted my spirits no end this year and I am rationing myself through Series 6, although the temptation to binge is huge.

Different things make us all laugh, but what we can probably all agree on at the moment is that humour, warm-heartedness and community spirit are more important than ever. You’ll find all of those things in, “Schitt’s Creek” if you decide to give it a go.

Let me know what you think.