My brother-in-law MF invited me on a ski-ing trip. I hadn’t taken to the slopes for years so was interested in the new form of ski-ing on short stumpy blades that were held together across the front by a small black plastic token.
I turned down the invitation to join MF and the others in their accommodation. My hotel room was a lot cosier than an old-fashioned dirty white canvas tent pitched in the snow.
Creative KT spent the whole day in her narrow sloping garden, tidying it up in anticipation of the arrival of J’s grandchildren. She even pitched the huge embroidered tent that I had bought in the charity shop. TPR had told me that this was just an old tablecloth, but he was now proved wrong – and me right.
Meanwhile SC was also exercising her creativity. I found her cutting up white cardboard at a long table. She was making laminated name place cards for a meeting. I wondered why she was doing this herself. What had happened to her PA?
The head of Peebles public library service was furious with me. The CCTV footage revealed the reason why. When I had run out of the reading room and into the concourse to my unguarded Mac I had allowed the glass door to swing into the face of Jane Baker, the small dark-haired President of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, and distinguished guest of Peebles public library service.
She was now lying on a bench, nursing a big bruise on her head. It didn’t help that I was grinning like an ape in the stills captured by the CCTV.
Space was at such a premium on campus that they converted the ladies’ toilets into a staff office.
Then they split the tiny school office in two: one half housed desks, and the other a fully functional bathroom. All that divided these two areas was a low wall.
I couldn’t imagine anyone ever wanting to use the bathroom in full view of our colleagues. Nor could SC.
The first part of my birthday treat was an afternoon spent in the luxury top apartment of the block. We simply did a switch with our landladies (one of whom was friends with David Bowie) for the weekend. While we were upstairs enjoying the huge bedroom and the views over the garden, they were crammed into the basement flat below.
The second part of the treat was a surprise visit. When I went to the door and found A,C, N and S I finally understood why we needed all this extra space. I could now look forward to celebrating S’s PhD success as well as my advancing years.
A was the first to settle in. Within minutes he was unpacking his Moomin T shirts and putting them away in a chest of drawers.
We were relaxing with our French friends, including the M and D families, and PG. I asked about the red cardboard constructions on the grand piano. With their black and gold lettering they looked like Chinese New Year decorations or fortune cards.
‘Oh, they’re just future memorials for us for after we die’ said one of the party.
I picked one up to examine it closely. On the front it gave the dates of the deaths of the twins. When I turned it over I was shocked to see my own death date had also been identified. Apparently my name merited inclusion in this scheme because I was the children’s first au pair girl.
OC’s new charge was a tiny disabled Chinese ex-con with a miniscule human head and the plastic body of an Action Mall doll. He’d given up his life of crime after his gang leaders found he was more of a liability than an asset on the job. He could certainly get into the tiniest of places, but he couldn’t walk very quickly, and had no speed at all when pursued by the police.
I put the ex-con in my pocket and hoped that he would behave as we walked up through the valley to OC’s house. I paused along the route to watch the weavers making blankets and tea towels on the looms in their cottages. I was further delayed when I saw SY hurrying up the lane to A and C’s house. Now that she had completed her PhD she was in charge of catering for both her own family and for A and C.
Fortunately TPR and OC were willing to wait for me while I was distracted these diversions along the route.
Out on the moors we were horribly lost. TPR caught his feet in the heather, tripped, and Brian the dog fell out of his arms. That was it: the dog was gone forever.
The only creatures that came near us now were the vicious black and white sheep.
TPR came out of retirement to do one last rotation in the US. We lived ‘open plan’ in a gym-sized hall alongside many other people. This meant that we had to share furniture and dress in front of the others. I was often confused as to whether the clothes on the chair next to my shared dressing table were actually mine.
On this occasion I found a short red soft Tweed jacket and almost-matching skirt. My dressing table partner told me that DM had left them for me. This got me thinking about how TPR and I were spending our time in the US. Why had we not yet made a trip to the outlet stores?
It soon became clear that the demands of my new job meant that I was spending a lot more time in the company of X, especially after-hours. Indeed, I was beginning to feel that my role was more escort girl than academic.
Meanwhile TPR was becoming used to my early evening phone calls alerting him to the news that I would not be home for dinner – again.
Dreamaticus 