Being Zen

Life has become unmanageable of late. In a bid to regain some control and peace I have decided to take up yoga. I intend to become bendy and Zen.
I find a class that is close to home, easy to find and attended by no one who knows me. That last point is extremely important as I know that I will look insane as I try to contort my body into positions it has never felt the need to adopt previously. And I don't want anyone laughing or pointing at me. That would not be conducive to Zenfulness.
I find the class, say hello to the smiley teacher who positively EXUDES peace and bendy Zenfulness, am shown to a mat, lie down and immediately think, "This is it, a lovely hour and a half of deep-breathing and calm."
The class quickly escalates from deep-breathing and calm into the toughest hour and a half of my life. The people in the room with me did not look as though they could walk down the road without suffering from a coronary, but it soon becomes obvious that they have been bending their legs around their heads for some years. I have to concentrate very hard as I am instructed in a calm-but-firm manner to "bring your right foot forward to the right of your hands which should be a shoulder-width apart and stretch your left leg back, keeping your head up, your arms strong and your back flat and remember to breathe into the belly - and re-laaaaaax".
By the end of the session I feel as though I have done ten rounds with Amir Khan and still managed to come out smiling. I float home and spend the rest of the day dreaming of my family bustling around me while I sit and watch serenely from the lotus position, clad head to toe in extremely becoming gear from Sweaty Betty.

The real world comes crashing in at school pick-up time. Small Boy greets me with a face like thunder and enough school bags to give the impression he's cleared out the changing rooms and is bringing home the whole year-group's kit to be washed. Daughter has a particularly intense scowl etched on her face.
Yipppee, it's the weekend, I think as I drive home through rush hour traffic to a mountain of laundry and an evening meal to prepare.
Husband at least has a smile on his face when he walks in. "Did you know that Apple are about to launch a new product?" he says, beaming.
"Well I hope it's an iCooker or an iLaundromat," I snap, shovelling pants into the washing machine with one hand, cat food into the cats with the other and kicking a tray of chips into the oven with a foot whilst narrowly avoiding kicking it into the dog by mistake. (The flexiblity yoga gives a woman is not totally without its uses in a domestic setting.)
"What about an iDad!" sniggers Daughter.
"Nah, they're useless," interrupts Small Boy. "iMums are much better - and more expensive."
"How's that?" says Husband, looking rather wounded.
"S'obvious," says Small Boy. "iMums do all the cooking, cleaning and tidying and washing, and iDads just come home, sit down, eat the food and make a mess."
I shoot Husband a triumphant grin.
Maybe I should sit and watch serenely from the lotus position after all. iDad and iKids might have to use a few of those neglected Domestic Apps, but I'm sure they would manage. And I would achieve my goal of being truly Zen.

Pancake Day

"I won't be here for Pancake Day," Husband announces. "I've got a work do."
"Oh." I feel my heart plummet into my boots. Husband always does the pancakes on Pancake Day.
"Never mind," I say, forcing a note of breeziness into my voice, "I'm sure we'll manage."
I had been looking forward to bingeing on a pile of butter-and-sugar-encrusted pancakes as I had rashly announced that I would be giving up butter for Lent, having gone a bit overboard on eating and drinking over the half-term break. I can't see this happening now that I am going to have to cook them myself. The last time I cooked pancakes they ended up looking more like scrambled eggs.

I think about it all day, check and double-check that I have the required ingredients (even though they are not exactly exactly exotic and are generally to be found in most store cupboards).
I make the batter nice and early to allow it to rest.
Then, at the alloted hour, I heat the oil in the pan according to the recipe. I take a deep breath, ladle some batter into the pan and . . .
"Bugger it. Scrambled eggs again."
"What's that, Mum?" asks Small Boy.
"It's, er, it's the first pancake. The first one always goes like that. You have to wait for the second pancake. That's the one I'll be giving you," I said. I do not meet his eye as I say this.
I put a little more oil in the pan, ladle in more batter (which is looking exactly as it should: "thin and runny" according to the appetising description in the recipe).
"Shit. Not even scrambled this time. Wrinkled."
"What?!" cries Small Boy.
"Listen, I have had a very - tiring day," I start, then turn blushing to the pan, muttering more curses under my breath.
Small Boy recognises the signs and says gamely, "It's OK. I'll have that one. I'm sure it will taste fine."
Bless his little heart. I scrape the crinkly mess on to his plate and he slathers it in Golden Syrup and Nutella.
"Yum!" he says with feeling.
The next ten pancakes are no better than the first two. Both children are too wary of the thunderous looks I am giving the frying pan to venture any comment other than "Yum!" as they scoff shrivelled, messed-up pancake after shrivelled messed-up pancake.
Eventually even they give up waiting for a miracle and leave the room as I, fuming, prepare a new batch of batter.

I sit down to a pile of pancakes at half past nine, having finally perfected the art long after the children have bathed and gone to bed.
"What on earth have you been doing?" Husband cries as he comes into a kitchen heaped with dirty frying pans, scraped plates, squeezed lemons and a wife with a greasy smear of butter and sugar around her mouth.
"I," I announce with some triumph. "Have been making pancakes. And it has been very hard work."
Husband splutters with barely concealed mirth. "Pancakes, hard work?" he scoffs. Then he catches a certain steeliness in my eyes. "I'll, er, just go and have a shower then," he murmurs, backing out of the room.
You do that, I think. And next time don't bloody go out anywhere on Pancake Day!

Mother's Selective Memory Loss

Mother rings. I can tell from the first word she utters that she is in One of Her Moods.
"Hello."
That's all it takes. One tight-lipped, two-syllable word and my hackles are already up.
"Hello," I say, forcing a bit of bright-and-breeziness into my voice.
"I hear you're going on holiday," she says. She says it as if what she actually means is: "I hear you've just murdered a small child and eaten its pet kitten for breakfast."
"Ye-ess," I say. "I told you at Christmas that we were going skiing at half term."
"No you didn't."
I breathe in deeply and let the air out slowly through inflated cheeks. "I did," I say. "I also told you last week when you told me you couldn't speak to me as you were watching University Challenge."
"Nonsense. And how am I supposed to know when half term is anyway? You never tell me anything about your life and I never speak to the grandchildren."
"O-kaaay," I say. "Well, it's half term this weekend and we are going skiing."
"Stupid idea. You'll only break something."
"Probably. How are you?"
"Y'father's leg's playing up but I've had a lovely time playing bridge and going to a birthday party and we are going to Cambridge this weekend. We wanted to go and spend half term with y'sister, but she--"
"I thought you didn't know when half term was?" I say.
"Er, well, how am I supposed to know that your half term is the same as their half term? Anyway, that's not the point. What should I get y'daughter for her birthday. That's over half term, isn't it?" she says in an almost-change-of-subject.
I bite the inside of my cheeks and punch a poor unsuspecting cushion very hard indeed. The dog scuttles to take refuge in her basket in case she is next in line. "Yes, but you've already got her something," I remind Mother. "You bought her a jacket for Christmas and said that it would have to do for her birthday as well."
"I did not."
"You did--"
"Well, I want to be a lovely grandma who my grandchildren think fondly of, so I want to get her another present. And by the way, I hope she thinks of me every time she wears that jacket."
"I'm sure she does, Mother," I say.
Even the dog is rolling her eyes.
I replace the receiver with quiet deliberation and then go into the larder.
Husband comes home minutes later to meet me coming out of the larder, red faced, fists clenched, eyes wild.
"What on earth's the matter?" he asks.
"I've been swearing in the larder," I say.
"Swearing in the larder is still swearing," he says, with a raise of the eyebrows.
"I know," I say. "And I'll be going back in there in a minute if you don't stop looking at me like that."
Husband sighs. "The holiday couldn't come a moment sooner," he says, shaking his head at me sorrowfully.

The Great Biscuit Bribe

Small Boy comes bounding out of school, his cheeks glowing.
"You'll never guess what happened today!" he says.
"No, I probably won't," I say.
"Well, I'm going to tell you anyway, so it doesn't matter if you can guess or not," he says with a shrug. Then, "It was soooooo ridiculous . . ." He pauses and raises one eyebrow.
"Mmm," I say.
"The teachers have said that Year Five are banned from going out!" he announces.
"What? Ever?" I ask.
"Well for the rest of Year Five anyway," he says.
"Hang on a minute," I say. "So no one in Year Five is allowed to go outside at lunchtime - not even when the weather gets better next term?"
Small Boy curls his lip and rolls his eyes. "NO! Duuuuuuuuh!" he says. "They are not allowed to Go Out - you know, as in Go Out with a boyfriend or girlfriend."
"Oh!" I say. "But - how old are the Year Fives anyway - nine or something? So surely they're not interested in going out with each other anyway?"
"Mu-um," says Small Boy. "You don't know ANYTHING. There are loads of people who are Going Out."
"So - what do they do?" I ask.
"Urgh. What do you mean?" he asks.
"I mean, do they actually go out - to the cinema or something?"
"No, obviously not. They just text each other and they don't look at each other or speak to each other and then they dump each other and then it's OK to speak to each other again. Obviously," he finishes, with another roll of the eyes.
"Obviously," I agree. "So, why is this a problem for the teachers, exactly?"
"Well," says Small Boy, with a quick, conspiratorial look round, "there's this boy, see, in Year Five, see, who was bet six biscuits to kiss a girl."
"Six biscuits?" I say.
"Yes. Six. And so he took the biscuits first, obviously, and then he went to go and kiss the girl. Only she wouldn't, and she told on him, see, and that's why no one in the whole of Year Five is allowed to Go Out."
"Right," I say.
"But what I want to know is," Small Boy continues, "why on earth did he say he would do it for six biscuits? If it was me, I would want to know the weight of the other person first and then I would say I might think about kissing them for their weight in biscuits." He crosses his arms and nods decisively.
I think about how much Husband weighs and consider putting in my own request for confectionary-based compensation.
I have to admit, it's quite an appealing idea.