Tuesday 26.5.09

The house seemed quiet today after a busy family weekend. I didn't mind, but also, didn't get a lot done. I've been reading Bloomsbury Grammar Guide by Gordon Jarvie. All to see if I can polish up my writing, especially when dealing with passages of speech. It is tedious and therefore slow going for me as even at the best of times I have the concentration of a goldfish. The point of good grammar is to make for better communication, 'better' ought to mean 'more interesting' and yet this grammar book is written in a hectoring style. I'm wondering if it was in fact written by my former deputy head teacher, one of those straight-backed, strict types with a voice that stung the listener behind the eyes. On reflection, it's easier to be reading the stuff than sitting in a classroom trying to learn it. Having been to school in the 1970's, I spent a lot of lessons making collages. I was never very good at it and therefore didn't enjoy it, but I can cut and stick with the best of 'em now. I just can't do quotation marks and that.

As the evening wore on, I started to worry about the content of this blog. Nina said that she had spoken to Malc who runs Ditch the TV (http://www.ditchthetv.co.uk/). He had come across the blog and inevitably wasn't too happy about my comments (if you want to read the diary for that day, it's here http://girlundertrees.blogspot.com/2009/05/friday-8509.html ). I think Nina was embarrassed. She said to me, "Be careful or you'll really hurt someone". Once I got over my bit of glee that Malc had found the blog, and failed to work out how he found it, I had a good think.

The thing about a diary is that it's not journalism. I don't aim for balance, and whilst I aim for the truth, it has to be subjective truth. As more people have come to read the blog, I've edited myself slightly and eliminated some of my worst excesses. I name only family members and people in the public eye, avoid anything too intimate, and keep it polite. Also, I don't say anything here that I wouldn't say to the person's face. Everything else is fair game though, otherwise this diary is going to become a work of fiction and won't be worth bothering with. Almost every entry is intended to be a commentary on myself and my attitudes, rather than a heavyweight criticism about somebody else. As far as the Ditch the TV entry goes, I think this is especially true. The main thread is my judgemental snobbery. Just because I'm not likely to go again doesn't mean I don't recommend it. There were plenty of people there who were enjoying it, and for £3 its worth giving a try. I admire Malc (who I've never met) for his dedication to the project and I genuinely wish him success.

I am conscious that keeping the blog has caused hurt. A problem for me is that I haven't been able to predict it. For instance, Nick was (and still is) hurt by an entry where I wrote about my disappointment at his buying the 'wrong' chocolates http://girlundertrees.blogspot.com/2009/02/saturday-14209.html . I had thought that what I had written was a bit humorous and a reflection of my being incredibly spoilt - wrong chocolates is an oxymoron in my dictionary. However, my wrestling with multicultural Coventry which I wasn't comfortable with and thought I would get shot down for got me praise from several quarters http://girlundertrees.blogspot.com/2009/04/tuesday-7409.html . The only way forward is, well, forward. I plan to carry on as I have done, carefully, but not too cautiously. That's bound to bite me on the arse.

Thursday 26.3.09

A sleepy, but lovely day with Nick was thrown off course by Some news from Nina's friend A. He has been having some problems with his A'levels and has decided to spend an extra year on them. I found out through a jaunty, but cryptic message on Twitter. I offered commiserations and support although A is unlikely to accept any help I could give. I like A very much. He shines with energy, creativity and individual spirit, just as he did when I first met him, aged about 8. Before his voice broke, this was called 'silly' by the adults and a lot of his contemporaries. He was funny, but irritating. This last couple of years, his humour and writing style has blasted ahead, and is often dazzlingly sophisticated. It seems trite to say that, like thousands of sons of working class single parents living in inner cities, he faces challenges. He does have a lot to deal with though, and the most difficult is in the area of self confidence which comes easier to kids who have a middle-income-middle-England background.

I'm surprised at how concerned I am for him. I think I had been depending on his progress as I still regret not being able to help Nina to achieve what I still feel she could have done at A'level. I see her taking what seems to me to be the harder, longer road through less than minimum wage apprenticeship, and un-challenging training, working for people with whom she has little in common. In spite of my feelings, Nina is happier now, and I am proud she has stuck with it. I sort of hoped that A would hit the bases she missed and that I could celebrate with him, although I know that I have no claim on him at all. I also know that there are lots of ways to achieve, and I am being a qualifications snob. Considering my own paucity of academic achievement I ought to be ashamed. I redeem myself, perhaps, in that I know in my bones that A will achieve something very special with his life because that is his spirit. I have tried to tell him this, just a little less effusively because I don't want to scare him.

Yesterday, I found out that of the teachers who taught me O and A'levels at the foetid institution that was Truro High School, only Mr Fee remains. According to my Mum, he does remember me. When he taught me, he was a young teacher of in his mid 20's. He was the object of many schoolgirl crushes, being affable and not bad looking. In common with all independent schools, most of the teachers at THS did national service (or their brothers did), so Mr Fee had the almost unique attraction of having his own teeth. I never fancied him though, my heart being already given to Mr Tinson, a teacher at my former Comprehensive where my loyalties lay.

I woke this morning remembering some of the things that Mr Fee taught me. Passages from the Merchant of Venice, Jane Eyre, Ernest Hemmingway, critical thinking around films, to watch the technical aspects of my written work. I was thrilled when he once said that I had an enviable writing style, and was less than thrilled when on another occasion he said that my observations were adequate for O'level. Seeing his face on the THS website, I have been reminded that my creative writing was very strong, and of how much I enjoyed it. I am tempted to email him, just to say.. what exactly?.. 'Thanks to you I remember all this stuff, and in spite of the encouragement I didn't fulfil my potential to write anything except reports, and I never did improve my spelling. Oh, and by the way, Mr Fee, what were you doing with your left hand moving deep in your trouser pocket while you read us Anthony and Cleopatra?'