I go through phases where I think I've done a good job bringing up my girls, and then periods where I think I'm making a bit of a hash of it. The main priority I've always given myself is to make sure that they don't grow up feeling as negative about themselves as I and many of my generation do. I'm sure this must be where my Impostor Syndrome began - it's taken us lot a long time to become comfortable in our own skins, and even now we're very unforgiving of ourselves.
My older daughter had her first period last month - and I quietly congratulated myself on the fact that she was confident, unfazed, laid back and there was a general absence of drama about the whole thing. I didn't want it to be the dirty, mysterious, somewhat shameful monthly occurence that it was when I was her age.
I remember I started on 14 November 1978. I had won the form prize the year before, and it was Speech Day that evening. I had to walk across the stage to collect my plaque, and remembered having agonies of self-consciousness and concerns that you can only begin to imagine. Thing 1, having been fully prepared and kitted out in advance, just casually mentioned at bed time "I started my periods today" and it was all a bit of a non-event.
Not for her the enormous towels the size of a mattress, attached by a system of belts and loops that was incredibly complicated yet totally failed to maintain the damn thing in anywhere near the right position. Not for her the monthly horror of the requirement to run the gauntlet of Michelle and Renetta and their sinister fiefdom of the toilets. Not for her the terror of the sanitary incinerator with its fiery roar and the big metal chute that we called the Jaws of Hell.
Still seems a shame though, growing up so quickly, to have started menstruating while you're still wearing Mickey Mouse pants. Girls these days have a different set of challenges.
Thing 2, on the other hand, makes that 18 months between them look like a million miles. She phoned me when I was on the train to complain that she couldn't finish her maths homework because she had a really bad neck ache. Like any mother, I immediately assumed she had meningitis, and started grilling her about whether she had a headache if she looked at the light.
"I can't look at the light, my neck hurts too much if I try to do that". Panic. I'm on my way, fast as I can.
When I arrived home, all however seemed fine, and the neck ache had gone. "It only hurts when I do my maths". Ah, that sort of neck ache: I think I know that. "But I haven't finished my maths yet, so now you're back, you can help me".
We went upstairs together to the computer. For the first time ever, the maths homework had been issued electronically, on the new school memory stick. How times change - I started doing maths with a slide rule and log book. The source of the neck ache became immediately obvious. Thing 2 was attempting to complete the homework from the memory stick whilst still wearing the memory stick on the nice blue school lanyard around her neck.
"We were told not to take it off the Lampard", she explained. "The lanyard", I corrected. "Yes, the Lampard". Her head was almost resting on the keyboard (our USB port is in the side of the screen) and so it was hard for her to type and look up at the sums from this angle. I could see it was indeed hurting her neck a lot. We decided to try it by leaving the memory stick on the Lampard as instructed, but removing the whole affair from around her neck so she could sit up properly. She smiled and gave me a hug. "Mummy you are so amazingly clever". Oh yes.
"Something exciting happened to me today", she said. "I have been chosen to put a wreath on the war memorial, from the school". That's nice. "In England, we have poppies for remembrance. In France they have a different flower, and it's our school flower so we're going to have a circle of those made up and I am going to march up and put it on". What is this school flower, then? "It's a cauliflower".
A wreath of cauliflowers for Remembrance Sunday? Really?????
She was insistent. Outraged at my questioning. In the end, I did the unthinkable and asked Thing 1. What's the school flower?
"The cornflower". Ah.
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