I solemnly swear that I am up to no good (or at least I was)!!

Smarty pants brought home a lovely laminated certificate from school yesterday. At first I assumed it was an award of some sort. It turned out to be a promise, there laminated in black and white, that she would never use drugs and would not drink alcohol until she is 18. I asked was she given a choice about this, she said no, they were told to sign them and hand them back up.

As a parent I'm torn about how I should feel about this. On one hand I should be delighted that my daughter is promising things like this and that the school are pressing such issues. On the other hand it's complete bulls*#t, it means nothing, it's not a real promise. To the kids it's just writing your name on a piece of paper because you were told to.

I know this and the kids know it too. The problem with how we deal with these things is that the education system so often fails to see kids as human beings who deserve respect, honesty and not to be patronised. If they just got someone in to talk to them to say look, I know you'll be presented with drugs and alcohol before you're 18. I know a lot of you will probably drink before then and some of you may experiment with drugs. So just don't be an idiot. Don't get yourself an addiction that will take over your life and destroy it and those of everyone around you. Don't get yourself into situations where you're drunk in an unsafe environment where someone could take advantage of you etc. If they got people who have fallen foul of these things to come and talk to them it would probably help too. At the very least they should be honest with them and not just get them to sign pieces of paper against their will that they know mean nothing.

They had a talk on smoking yesterday as well. The guy appears to have been a bit of an idiot. He went way way over the top with the effects of smoking. Exaggerating them so far beyond the truth that my daughter who despises smoking found him ridiculous. The thing is the kids see through this crap. They all know someone who smokes, they see people smoking every day so to tell them that a 40 year old person who's smoked all their adult life will definitely look 60 or 70 is just insulting their intelligence and breeding a mistrust of the type of people who give these talks.

I suppose the issue itself and the dealing with it scares me too. We're heading, swift as a bullet for teenage-dom. I was not a good little girl, in fact I was very very very naughty indeed!! If it was taboo or forbidden I did it, if it made you high, low, laugh, cry, hallucinate penguins growing out of postboxes I sniffed it, drank it, smoked it, ate it. Loathe as I am to admit it, most of it never did me any harm what-so-ever!! I became addicted to almost nothing because I never did many of them more than once or twice. Yes, I smoked, became addicted and still am addicted to nicotine, but of all the other things I did, to have that be the only lasting consequence is a bit of a feat I think. Especially since some of the most well behaved people I know are as hooked on the fags as I am!!

So where the school and the education system fails I am supposed to pick up the slack. I am supposed to talk to my daughter frankly and openly about smoking, drink and drugs and their effects. Fecked if I'm going to be honest with her about drink and drugs. The smoking she knows all about, she knows I smoke like a bleedin chimney. She hates it, but it wouldn't surprise me if she did it at some point. I just hope she never ends up as completely hopelessly hooked as I am.

As for drink, I can see it now. Well Smarty Pants, I once drank so much vodka that I blacked out while still upright and walking, screaming my loaf off wandering some of the dodgyest streets in Dublin (and that was the least embarrassing, most blog-worthy example I could find) So eh, never drink that much vodka, ok!! And drugs. Well, my little girl, I remember doing mushies in Rembrant Square in Amsterdam once and losing about 3/4 of a day, in which I'm sure we wandered about and did things but to this day none of us can remember what they were (most definitely the tamest example I could think of and least likely to get me in any large amount of trouble, I didn't inhale and all that) So eh yeah, don't do drugs, drugs are bad m'kay!!

Obviously I can hardly tell her these things and the stance, if not the approach of the education system is one I agree with. Life is precious and interesting and exciting, it is not worth risking it all for one cheap high. The real highs in life are much more valuable and sustained than anything you can get from the grimy jacket of a dodgy looking bloke on O'Connell St. Drugs are bad, but in fairness, you can't beat an ice cold pint on a hot day!! Oh my!!

Melancholy And The Infinite Blog Post

It's odd when you haven't done something for a long time it feels like doing it for the first time. It should be fresh and new then shouldn't it. Or stagnant and old with a new mask on. 

There's no excuse, so I won't try to make one. I haven't written anything in ages. No, that's a lie! I've written a lot of things, too long, too short, too boring, too personal, too...me! Me is quiet, reflective, drab and dreary. Me is silently, slowly drifting off somewhere. Domestic bliss remains, cleaning, dusting, cooking, slowly disappearing. There have been breaks in the monotony, but few, and disappointing, not living up to what a break from the banal should be. 

 

I discovered this post yesterday http://theantiroom.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/being-depressed-just-means-youre-not-a-moron/ Winner of the 2011 Irish Blog Awards best post accolade, gong, or whatever you'd like to call it. The post and it's author deserve it a million fold. It is the single most perfect description of what it feels like to suffer severe depression that I have ever read. I have been almost exactly where she describes, months worth of laundry and old pasta included. That was many many moons ago and I have since escaped the clutches of my bed. I should feel good about sharing this, about being open and honest and talking about the disease that has shaped my life. I should feel proud to have come through the worst of it, ready to show others the path through, to display the light at the end of the tunnel. I don't. I feel awkward, long legged, plaster on glasses bumping into furniture awkward. 

This post has sat unfinished for the last week. I've popped in and had a look at it, you know, to make sure it was doing alright, but I just couldn't finish it, until now. Yesterday evening I was telling Rock God about the above post. How the author so terrifyingly accurately describes my life in my early 20's. "Remember I used to call over" he said, "and there you'd be sitting in the bed, surrounded by, stuff, a half finished sliced pan, a jar of miracle whip, bottles of coke, books, all sorts of everything". "Yeah", I replied, "I remember, mad really to think where we've come from." "I suppose", says he, "you were much happier then though" and he walked away casually, not a bother on him, leaving me holding my sense of self in my hands. 

Surely that couldn't be true. Surely I'm much happier now. I get up every morning, I wear proper clothes, I shower, I use my bed for sleeping and folding laundry, occasionally for bouncing Monkey boy on but never for living in. I clean, I cook, I chat to friends, I do "normal" things. So I must be happier than I was then, I'm a lot better than I was then. Aren't I? Or is it that even at my most depressed, even at the lowest depths of my misery, I had a grasp on who I really am, I knew who I was and I was who I was. Now I seem to have lost that, I'm beige, I'm transparent, I'm not really me, therefore I'm not really here. Maybe that's why I seemed happier then, I hadn't lost whatever it was I had. 

Pretty Little Things

I love the internet!! I've been enraptured by it since the days of running down to the local net cafe to download a game on to a floppy disk to bring home and play on my 486. I love how it's grown, I am delighted it has been adopted by almost everyone, for almost everything. It makes the world feel smaller, more cosy. The opportunities are endless. I thought every now and then I'd share my personal favourite bits of it, for your perusal. So here are a lot of links:

My theme of the day is pretty things, in no particular order of brilliance:

Baglady Designs

I love the way this girl draws, her characters seem to come alive with her pencil strokes. Her whimsical antique theme is so attractive to me. I have met her and she is just as lovely as her art suggests. Find her on Facebook and give her a "like"

Orisinal games

I discovered this site years ago. The games are great fun and rather addictive but that's not what sets it apart from any other game site. It's the beauty of it all, the art, the music, the sweetness. When you play the games you find yourself relaxing, sinking into the chair, it's lovely.

Lisa Lectura Creations

I only discovered this last week. I love the innocence of it, the art is just so, well, pretty, which makes it fit perfectly in this list.

Laura Nagle Photography

I may be slightly biased here but if I was doing these in any order this would be number 1. Laura has been taking photos since before she could say her R's properly. So much care goes into every picture. She really pours her soul into it and brings out the soul of her subject. I am her biggest fan in every way possible. Find her on Facebook I know you'll "like" her!! She promises she's working on sorting out a website too.

Etsy

No shop in particular, just the whole thing. A whole collection of pasta pictures and bowls made of lollipop sticks, well maybe not but it's all hand made and that's what makes it special.

Deviantart

Again just in general, I love having a nose about on it. The level of talent just astounds me sometimes.

Cakes Unlimited

The most amazing and very beautiful cakes you'll ever see. They're also incredibly delicious, I can attest to this because I got my wedding cake here. Even if you don't need a cake for anything in particular it's fun looking through the pictures, and inspiring in a making you want cake kind of way.The yummy Facebook page can be found here

National Botanic Gardens of Ireland

This my haven, my absolute favourite place in Dublin. We go there a lot while Smarty Pants is at her DCU courses. It is the most peaceful place. Very much worth a visit for anyone who likes a nice stroll.

Daily Squeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!

I have a net nanny on the pc for Smarty Pants, otherwise who knows what she'd be looking at. It doesn't allow Google image searches for obvious boobie related reasons. She loves cute things of all kinds but especially animals. I email her pictures from here all the time. Great for a proper squeeeee!!

Precious Art Effects

I don't know how Marc would feel about his site being added to a list of pretty things. It may not be pretty in the conventional sense but his art has its own beauty, albeit a sort of nerdy beauty!!

Recave

A fantastic blog with loads of unusual art, design utilities, inspiring ideas. Another one for having a wander about.

Stuff no one told me

Hilarious and very wise, the illustrations are fantastic, always worth a look. You never know, you might learn something.

James Hance - Relentlessly cheerful art

As the name suggests this really is a whole heap of relentlessly cheerful art, I defy anyone not to at least break a little grin. Fantastic stuff. 

I'm sure there are plenty more but I think that's enough for today. If you have any to suggest please leave a comment, I love discovering new sites. I hope this fills your afternoon with pretty things, just how it should be on a lovely springy day.

Back in time...

It's been a week for reminiscing. Not exactly the fluffy romantic sort, more a dip into a murkier part of my past. I look on it with a fondness all the same, like the affection you have for an old book, no matter how painful its story may be to read.

My beautiful daughter turned 12 last week, lets take a moment for that to sink in. 12. In half that again plus 1 she'll be the age I was when I had her. Stupid and scared, full of unfounded confidence, "knowing" everything already. Waiting for this little creature to come along and change my life forever. She was tiny, but her impact was enormous. I'd like to say I became the model responsible parent overnight, but I didn't. I decided it was fairest to move out and make it on my own, possibly the least selfish decision I've ever made regarding my parents, even if it was made more for my freedom than for theirs. I moved out when I was pregnant, into a shoebox, one room divided in 4. You could touch both walls from the centre of the room. Obviously this wouldn't do for fitting tiny babies and their huge amount of paraphernalia. I moved again 2 weeks before she was born. This was to become my home for the next 4 years. The paint peeling away, water trickling down the walls, a petri dish of mould and fluff.

I came across this poem this week, the author is a friend of my cousins, it feels familiar somehow so I thought I should share it. The collection is called The View From Here and it's by Sara Berkeley:

Dark Summer Days

I have written my daughter to sleep.

She lies in the other bed among her books and toys,

the bowed and weathered instruments of her navigation.

In fragile possession of her course

and her own short set of ship's orders

she steps bravely out with me onto the burning waters.

We travel in this single room

where the nails are growing out of the wood

and the paint flakes off the window ledge.

On dark summer days when rising is difficult

this is my Parisian garret, my narrow turret,

my writers attic with its high beams and precious dust;

it is here I hunker down and shout into the dark,

some nights nothing, some nights

starbursts of language, jubilant at their release.

Across the fearless moon

hastens what little sky we can see; what few trees

stand in the mornings with their arms out;

through every time zone their same song

fills the loudness of being alone,

together, in the gentle rocking of our sea-glass room.

In her sleep my girl is made of sand,

but at first light she's a young redwood

driving up like a mast through the sea foam;

and as for me, even if no words come,

I'll be here waiting by the window in the pre-dawn

before the birds.

Here we existed, here we slept, here we ate. The park was our garden, the city our living room. Raised on the go you could say. My little companion, my sidekick. She may have been small but her mind had to grow, she had to talk, she had to excite and entertain, survival depends on these things. To be seen, to be noticed, to break through the chatter of 20-somethings in coffee shops, she sang her heart out, she amazed and intrigued with her ever widening vocabulary. My shadow, ever at my feet, I carried on regardless, living much the same life as I would have, minus the college part I had planned. Weekends saw her shipped off to adoring relatives, otherwise she was with me, with friends, hanging out, having party after party, she sang or slept through it all. Her resilience astounds me now, it meant nothing to me then.

You may notice I've been a bit singular in my description of the whole experience. It takes two to tango you might say, where does mister sperm donor extrordinaire feature in all of this?? Not exactly the immaculate conception then. He lasted the first year, there he existed too, and slept, but little else. Our lives and our hearts separated when she came along. He disappeared in a puff of smoke before she was out of nappies, never to be seen again. But his story, that story is another post, perhaps, or perhaps not.

Hubby, or Rock God (I felt he deserved his own name by now, hardly fair him being only described by his relationship to me) was there always, he always had been. My lovely friend, who I was very fond of, but I'd never go out with him, eeew, would be like kissing your brother, I mean he is cute, and I do love him, but not like that....ah youth, how stupidly blind it can be.

It is my belief that you can't exist without family, they brought you here, they make up who you are, for some they are responsible for it. They are every bit of what makes you, You. There to be loved and admired or hated and feared. For spending time with or remembering, good or bad they have to feature somewhere. Mine were everything I could ever have asked for and more besides. She never would be who she is today without them. All of them hold a huge importance but none so much as magical Grandad. He made the world sparkle for her, he showed her everything there was to see and taught her everything there was to learn. He made her laugh, but never cry. His stories became her stories, his effect on her continues to this day, despite the inevitable I know he'll always be there, in her mind, and her heart. He has more to show her yet before he's done, although she fast approaches her time for knowing everything already.

He wrote her this beautiful poem for her birthday. I cried when I read it, huge wet dollops of tears. I cried for the past, for jampot jaws and pudgy legs, for incy wincy spiders and whispy curls. I cried for relief too, for being on the other side of that seemingly insurmountable hill, or for digging myself out of the pit, or whatever metaphor you're having yourself. But I too will never forget her that very first day. He'd rather hide his light under a bushel so I won't post his name, and he never gave it a name either, so this is Beautiful Poem for Smarty Pants, by My Dad:

Twelve years since we met, you were small for your size

They were counting your fingers, your toes (and your eyes)

You melted my insides (we grandads are tough)

I knew you were made out of my kind of stuff.

We crept on the floor, and we hid, and we ran.

And I made a good horse for a nearly old man.

We bounced on the beds (when your Nana was out)

Then we opened the presses and took the stuff out.

I took out my marker and drew little men,

You took out your marker and drew them again

We counted the numbers, the letters made words

We made a nest box and we watched the young birds.

The ice-cream in Teddies, the chips out in Howth.

The barely susceptible signs of your growth.

To Hamleys at Christmas - the bigger kids stuff

No longer the bears and the "Billy Goats Gruff"

Well you're growing up at a fair rate of knots

You've come a long way from wet nappies and sn...ts

You'll soon be a woman, too soon some might say.

But I'll never forget you that very first day.

I'm typing through the tears again as I read over it. Her path has veered off a little from mine. We don't do everything together any more, she doesn't follow me about quite as much. She still likes to ask me the usual difficult questions, although why is the sky blue has moved on to more adult subjects. She makes more decisions than I do about her life these days, as is perfectly right.

It's different for Monkey Boy, he travels with me through my 30's, a much smoother journey all told. The Concrete Box is equipped with all the comforts you might expect, including a tank that holds enough water for a whole shower and a front door you can't open with a well placed elbow, there's posh!! He'll have his mum and dad, his big sister, he'll be warm and comfortable and fussed over. He'll most likely never have to change his name, or wonder where exactly he comes from. His journey will still be exciting, and it will be his own. I feel more like I'm following him along, but I think that's the way it's supposed to be....

Welcome to fast Eddies, get yer quality mobile phones, 5 for 50.....

 I appear to have developed an unnatural emotional connection to my blog. I know it's nothing special, it's just me rambling, but I love it I do!! So you can imagine my horror when I discovered that when you Google it you get some horrible spammy mobile phone ad site. Someone has taken my little name, and the name of one of my high quality blog posts and plonked it on their smelly site!! The nerve!! I feel violated so I do!! I wouldn't mind but my poor blog doesn't so much as get a look in. Where are all my lovely quality blog posts?? They were there, happy as Larry last time I checked sitting pretty in a Google search. I am aware no one is actually going to search for it, but it's the principle of the thing.

So off I trotted to blogger help, to find out how we send mister mobile phone packing and why my blog has gone poof. It's here we meet Nigel dear readers. Obviously no one is actually called Nigel but names have to be changed to protect the guilty. Let's just say he cruises the night fighting n00b crime everywhere!! You know when you end up having two entirely different conversations with someone. They're busy having their own little chat with themselves, paying you no heed what so ever. I'm pretty sure this guy actually thinks in zeros and ones, the patronisation, patronisingness, ah you know what I mean!! I imagine he envisaged me sitting here with a fat string of drool hanging out the side of my mouth. He failed to see the emotional turmoil I was going through at all. 

It turns out it's all about popularity me dears, that's what it all hinges on. If you're not in the cool gang your blog goes poof off google never to be seen again. The mobile phone site thing is an entire coincidence. A bot of some sort miraculously came up with the exact name of my blog, and the exact name of one of my posts, put them together and turned them into a page of highly reliable mobile merchandise. Seems likely right?? Yes, I thought so too, honestly I did!!

Who am I to argue with the wisdom of Nigel?? For now it looks as though the concrete box has become a perfectly respectable communication retailer, at least in the eyes of Google, you know, until I get in with the popular kids, pass cheerleader tryouts, throw out all my pocket protectors and bag the captain of the football team....

To sleep, perchance to dream...

I hate the sound of heavy rain at night, more so when it's mixed with voices on the wind and traffic. As a little girl it scared me, a branch hitting the window became a witches broom, monsters scratching to get in at me.

These days I find it depressing, mostly because if I'm lying in bed listening to the wind I'm having trouble sleeping. There's no lonelier time than sleeplessness. There's nothing quite like the symphony of wind and rain to accentuate that feeling.

I don't suffer from insomnia often, in fact I'm more likely to suffer the opposite and have been known on occasion to fall asleep sitting up mid sentence. I feel the deepest sympathy for anyone who regularly fails to enter dreamland at the appropriate time.

There is no judge, jury and executioner like your own mind, alone, in the middle of the night.

 (pic yoinked from deviantart, at some point in the distant past)

Perfection....

Well Readers (or reader) I've been a very naughty blogger. I've left you all waiting there with baited breath, I know you could hardly sleep for wondering what I've been up to!! I do apologise. In my defence the concrete box has been a busy place recently, I don't do the multi-tasking thing as well as my gender is expected to. Writing quality blog posts such as this one requires quiet reflection you know!!

I've been sick!! Properly almost dead sick, with the plague!! The black death to be exact. It forced me to adjust my expectations for the festive season. We do that though, don't we? Elevate our expectations to levels where disappointment is the only probable outcome. All the preparation, the cleaning, decorating, cooking, and shopping, oh the shopping!! All that hard work means we expect it all to go perfectly, we always neglect to factor in the human element. The thing about it is, even though all the things I thought were important never got done, even if some of the many decorations stayed in their boxes, the floors never got washed, the dinner was missing some veg and an adventurous experiment of a starter as is tradition. Even if all those things seemed like Everests too high for me to climb with a head full of snot, the Christmas bit, the eating, laughing, watching the kids open pressies, pulling crackers, falling down full on the couch to watch rubbish TV, all carried on regardless.

I may have watched Christmas from behind the haze of plague-fuelled fever, but it was grand like, and sure what more would you want??

Anyway I have far more pressing things to discuss with you all so I imagine a further post may present itself tomorrow, or the next day, you know, to make up for it all!!