Haus Frau

I don’t remember signing up for this. Before I launch into my almost-at-the-end-of-another-week-of-drudgery grumble, let me preface my moan by saying that I think there’s nothing wrong with being a house wife, if that’s what you choose. Allegedly, all Julian’s mother ever wanted to be was a wife and mother. I say allegedly because I don’t really believe it. She told me herself that she studied at the London College of Fashion and spent a brief stint working in the costume department of the Royal Opera House where she watched Rudolph Nureyev rehearse during her lunch break. That foundation hardly fits the legend of a woman whose greatest ambitions were lifted from chapter two of Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management. And while it is true that Jane spent many merry hours in the kitchen, bottling plum jam and stewing worm infested guavas (allegedly, she claimed the worms, having lived inside the guavas, were just guava in another form), she also ran her own business designing and making wedding dresses – she whipped mine up when she was ill with cancer, which goes to show just how adept she was in her craft. Sadly, Julian’s mother is not here to set the record straight, so you, like me, will have to draw your own conclusions based on hearsay.

Back to me. I am not someone that spent every day from the moment her first ovary ripened at thirteen wistfully dreaming of converting said ovary into a screaming, pooping miniature version of myself. Throughout my teens, twenties and early thirties, I vehemently swore I would never have a child. I had all the usual arguments against – overpopulated planet, awful money-grubbing society, crime infested cities etc etc – and thought the other side were just a bunch of selfish narcissists for wanting to make another human being in their own image. If, by some wicked twist of uncondomised fate, I ever did fall pregnant, I believed I would drive myself down to the nearest Marie Stopes Clinic without a twinge of conscience. How wrong I was. I realise now that, although on a intellectual level I think its every women’s right to choose, its something I could never choose for myself. And to be totally honest, the fact that the law allows abortion up until 20 weeks if a woman is of the personal opinion that her economic or social situation is sufficient reason for the termination of pregnancy, gives me the horrors.

Another thing that gives me the horrors is waking up every morning to a world of chores.  Having not made it into the bestseller lists due to the Dan Brown monopoly, I cannot afford that South African institution, the full time domestic nanny. Even if I could, I doubt I’d want one. So my days are filled with laundry (including nappies as I couldn’t see my way past my environmental guilt), dishes, picking up and folding the clothes Julian keeps stashed on the floor next to his side of the bed, thinking up and making meals for Amber-Jane that contain the right amount of nutrients and hanging wee socks and XL boxers on the line. And, before I know it, another day has passed and there has been no time to do any me stuff like paint my toe nails or write the novel that knocks Mr Brown off his throne. I don’t mind not having ruby red toenails, though I do miss them, but I do mind that I have no time to pursue my dreams. I mind very much, not only for myself, but for my daughter.  If Amber-Jane spends the next 18 years watching me disintegrate into nothing more than a slave to her (and her dad’s) needs, what will she believe her role in the world is?

Perhaps I am setting myself an impossible task, wanting to be a hands-on-mom who grows her own organic vegetables as well as a bestselling novelist, award-winning screenwriter and blogger extraordinaire. Perhaps I am deluded because I still foster ambitions to be an active member of Green Peace (if only for one mission), see Antarctica before the polar caps melt and have a bikini-fit body to take on holiday in two weeks time, but I can’t help but think that if I don’t hold onto these dreams, I may as well lay down and die.