#proudmama

Can’t believe it’s been seven years…

 

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The phone rang at eight-thirty this morning:

Tilly: Hello?

Spud: [Scream] Mum!  AAB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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I think he was pleased.

 

I Cried Yesterday

Click on the photos to enlarge them

Actually, I cried the day before yesterday but I wrote this post yesterday so the title was correct for yesterday’s yesterday but not for today.  Anyway, me crying at all except at the end of Love Actually is such a rare event, I felt I had to blog about it.

As you must know, because I’ve bored you to death about it for months now, Spud is playing Judas in his school production of Godspell.  The first night is tomorrow tonight.  I can’t get the songs out of my head and as I was preparing his sandwiches for tonight’s tea between tweaking-rehearsal and performance, I sang Beautiful City to myself.  I suspected I might be allowing it to take over my life when I came to the line, We can build a city of man and sang, We can build a city of ham…

Yesterday (‘s yesterday) was the dress rehearsal.  The Hub is an excellent photographer and took some great pics of the last three school productions Spud starred in (no bias here, honest).  He gave them to Spud’s drama teacher and she loved them and asked if he would go along to yesterday’s yesterday’s dress rehearsal to take photos of this production.

The Hub has M.E. so of course he needed his loving and supportive wife along to hold the spare camera batteries.  The fact that I got a sneak preview of the show was purely coincidental.

We had front row seats and we needed them, because my heart swelled with so much pride it took up all of the space between the audience and the stage.

I know he’s my son and I’m biased and all that rubbish, but Spud was fantastic.  He began as a happy, hopeful man and changed over two hours to anger and betrayal via confusion and doubt.  

He sang, with music and without.

He cried in Jesus’ arms the moment before he left to betray him.  He sobbed on the floor after the crucifixion.  

He was totally believable.

Teachers made a point of coming up to tell me how good he was and how he should pursue acting as a career.  But better than that, the director told me that, for all of his talent, he is a lovely, lovely boy and she hopes her own son will grow up to be just like him.

Can you blame me for blubbing?

Proud! Proud! Proud!

A play in a week – wow!

From the Broadway production

The reason for today’s tenor-themed jokes is that Spud played the lead in Lend Me A Tenor this week.  It was his third play in six months but he rose to the challenge and then some.

His school has a tradition at the end of the year of Lower Sixth students rehearsing and performing a play in a week.  The students choose the director, the play, the cast, the crew; source the props; get a week off lessons to rehearse, which is much harder work than anything they’ll be taught once exams are done.

Because of licensing issues, the directors are chosen some weeks beforehand; they choose the play and begin auditions.  Spud was cast before his exams and spent his revision downtime learning lines.  The actual work started last Thursday, however.  They rehearsed Saturday, each school day and after school as well.  It was worth it.

One of the teachers told me that some years, the kids aren’t interested and it’s a shambles.  Not this year.  The girl playing Maria and the boy playing the bell-hop were particularly good, but each and every parent could feel proud of each and every child involved, front and backstage: it was clear they had worked their backsides off.  Yes, there were mistakes, but the actors ad-libbed and it all added to the fun, especially when Spud accidentally bashed the Tenor’s head against the bed and the Tenor – supposed to be dead – got the giggles.  They should have passed it off as rigor mortis.  

Hub and I went to see the play last night.  Did you ever burst with so much pride, you wanted to run onto a stage and scream at the audience, That’s my son!  That’s my son!?  He was sooooo good – he was nervous, edgy, wimpy, comical, sweaty and just so darn funny.  The drama teacher told him he had ‘a rare talent,’ to act in a Greek Classical play, a major Shakespearean role, and a farce; and to be convincing in each one.

Proud doesn’t begin to cover it.

Click on any picture to see the gallery enlarged

Max

Saunders, Max, Maggie

Max

Tito, Maria, Max

Here’s how I could have reacted

Max shakin’ his thang

The Reveal

Tito

Celebrate!

Max, Diana

Go here for more Six Word Saturdays.

101/1001 (Week 112)

Did something I’ve never done before

I meant to write this post yesterday but the P Diddy/Downton thing was more fun.  By the way, if you can’t see the video, just Google/You Tube it.  It’s worth a watch.

It has been three months since my last update of 101 tasks in 1001 days.  I haven’t done much, apart from the aforementioned thing I’ve never done before, though I did complete three tasks:

Make thirty submissions to competitions or publishers (31/30)

I was a runner-up in the last competition I entered, and the poem will be coming out with others in an e-book.  I’ll be sure to let you know when that happens.

Find 26 unfamiliar words, one for each letter of the alphabet. (Words: 26/26)

Then use them in a post a day for 26 days.

I did skip a day by accident (I forgot) but I used all 26 words, each of which I have already forgotten.  We had fun with that one, didn’t we?

Learn the names of all twelve disciples.

That was more complicated than I expected – thirteen are named, though there are only twelve.  Thaddeus/Judas may or may not be the same person.  Can’t believe I’ve been reading the Bible for 36 years and never noticed that before.  

Then came the something I’ve never done before – it’s a biggy!

Saarbrucken funny toilet 0124 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Expose myself to twenty new experiences (14/20)

I have already told you about twelve in earlier 101/1001 posts.

I also told you about number 13: I asked a stranger for a favour.  That was the whole email-an-author-to-talk-to-us-for-free thing.  Feeling pleased about that one: Stockport Writers were still raving about her at our last meeting.

14. I changed a toilet seat by myself!

How impressive am I??

I decorated the bathroom the other weekend.  Everything looked clean and fresh apart from the grotty toilet seat (never knew a bum could cause such wear and tear).  We bought a new toilet seat and it sat there and sat there and sat there, waiting for the Hub to feel well enough to change it.  Use me, it cried; Pee on me, please…well, not on me, of course, between me…through me…?

The toilet seat was obviously having some sort of existentialist crisis so I asked the Hub, If I remove the old seat and clean the loo in the parts where I normally can’t reach, do you feel well enough to put on the new one?

Urggh, he grunted from his sick bed, which I took to mean ‘Yes’.

I’ll be honest: taking off the old toilet seat was the yuckiest, grossest, most revolting job I’ve ever done; and I say that as a woman who fed prunes to her babies.  It was disgusting with a capital disgusting.  However, some rubber gloves helped, as did turning my face away so I couldn’t see what I was doing (though I had to explain to the Hub why I had unscrewed the pedestal from the floor).

Turns out it was my imagination: what I thought was +++ (fill in the blank; this is a family blog so I’m not going to be poo graphic), turned out to be rust from the old screws.  I know this because I had to snap them off when first Vaseline and then WD40 didn’t work enough to allow me to turn them.

Ahem…that’s not quite true: I did manage to turn them, but the wrong way, so I tightened the old screws.  I wasn’t strong enough to loosen them but there was nothing a good kick in the old cistern couldn’t fix.

Prize money check drawn on the underside of a toilet seat (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Having removed the old seat and cleaned the rusty holes, I had to see how the new seat would look.  It looked really easy to attach, so I tried attaching it.  And succeeded!  

Okay, the Hub had to remove it again to adjust it so we wouldn’t trap flesh and dangly bits between the seat and base but, hey!  I replaced a toilet seat!  I’m fifty this year and I replaced a toilet seat for the first time in my life.  Am I cool or what?

It was worth doing this 101/1001 thing for that alone.  I replaced a toilet seat!

A note of caution: if you intend to visit me in the next few weeks, be advised – upon arrival, all guests will immediately be taken on a tour of my new toilet seat, which I replaced, all by myself!

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Lost In The Details

Spud is sick again.  He’s had one bug after another since Christmas, but he hasn’t missed one day of school.  Fortunately, he had the worst bug during half term, when he barely got out of bed.

It’s his play this week.  You may remember he’s playing Prospero in The Tempest.  For those who don’t do Shakespeare, it’s the lead and he bears a huge responsibility.

He hasn’t missed one rehearsal.  With weekend rehearsals he hasn’t had one day off in over two weeks.  He is currently dosed up on anti-cold medicines and vitamin C, determined not to let anyone down.

We have always stressed to our children that if they take on a commitment, they must stick it out.  He’s doing that.

What gets lost in the details, however, is that he’s a seventeen-year old boy and he’s doing this for fun.  I wonder how much fun he’s having, taking his homework along to do in today’s dress rehearsal lunch break?

I am never embarrassed to boast about my children; and today, I even have reason.

I’m proud of you, Spud.  That will never get lost in the details.  It’s a brave new world that has people such as you in it.

The Hub Is Chuffed

I may have mentioned one or two thousand times that the Hub is a plane geek.  His idea of fun is to sit in a draughty field next door to an airport, with a flask and a camera.

I may also have mentioned that we don’t often have much money to spare.  His favourite Christmas stocking filler from me is always the latest issue of Airliner World [strapline: The Global Airline Scene, which has me in stitches], as he can’t usually afford to buy it.

You may remember we went to France for £9 with Ryanair – incidentally, a much-maligned airline which is actually really good value for money and the most punctual in Europe.  The Hub had great fun taking pictures on the way to the airport, in the airport, outside the plane, inside the plane and of the plane, inside and out. 

He treated himself to the November issue of Airliner World for the flight, which cost more than half the price of the plane ticket, and entered a photographic competition it was running that month.

I’d like to say he won, but he didn’t.  Never mind.  However, he likes the magazine so much that when he came across back issues going for 99p on eBay, he bought two – April and May’s of this year.

They arrived today and he got as far as the second page, when he suddenly looked puzzled – did that head scrolling up and down the page thing that says I’m looking and I don’t understand what’s going on here – then suddenly jumped up in glee.  The Hub hasn’t jumped in glee since I told him the best news he could ever have – he’s allowed to keep his seven thousand airline pin collection and me – so it was my turn to look puzzled.

His competition entry photo had been used on the second page, as the background to the editor’s article!  He didn’t know they were going to use it because they didn’t tell him, but entry to the competition implied consent.  It was cropped, but not to its detriment, and he was credited.

Here’s the picture:

He’s chuffed, and so am I.  I didn’t have a thing to write about today.

My Name Is Tilly And I Am A Mother

I have two sentences for Six Word Saturday

I’m always proud of my children.

I don’t understand parents who aren’t.

I am not indiscriminate in my pride; merely doting.  I don’t get those parents who don’t feel the need to share all the doings of their kids and how wonderful they are.  My kids are wonderful; let me tell you about them.

They are polite, decent, friendly young men.   They work hard; they are considerate and helpful.  They do their best.

This week’s inspiration came from Tory Boy’s aforementioned involvement in organising a big event (and it’s not his first); and the news that Spud has won a Headmaster’s Award for being an all-round good egg i.e. a nice human being (and it’s not his first).

So don’t mind me sharing this time (and it’s not my first) that I’m proud of my kids.  Because I am, and I don’t care who knows it.