Conversation with a six year old

(I'll keep it anonymous so I don't get the other mums irate!)

Anna: Our teacher moved our seats today.

Me: Oh. Who is at your table now?

Anna: Well two of my best friends: Alice and Akshara, so I'm really happy about that, and two boys (let's call them X & Y). She's decided to make us sit boy, girl, boy, girl so I am between X & Y.

Me: And how do you feel about that?

(Hands on hips, sighing heavily) Anna: I suspect she's put me there to try and bring them under control! They are a right pair of nonsense bags! X was cheeky to the teacher and got on an amber light. Can you believe that? And as for Y - (long sigh) - I was asked to work with him as a partner today to write up some facts and while I was busy writing everything down neatly, do you know what he wrote? Do you know, mum? He wrote 'Poo pants!' How is anyone supposed to work with that? I am really going to have to give him a talking to... But I can definitely see why the teacher has put me in charge of the two of them... they need sorting out!

Owl facts

We took the kids to the Scottish Owl Centre for Léon's birthday last month. At the flying display, the owl handler explained that owls with black eyes tend to be nocturnal, whereas those with yellow or orange eyes tend to be crepuscular. He explained that meant they were active at dawn and dusk and to make sure Amaia had fully understood, I whispered that was what hamsters were like too.

A month on and Amaia was playing with Anna and Ursula at owls. She suddenly announced her baby owl didn't hunt at night because it had orange eyes. 'When does yours hunt?' I asked, to see how much she remembered from last month's lecture. She thought carefully for a minute and then replied 'Mine hunts at Rosie O'clock!' On the ball, and cute with it!

Turmeric teeth

Charlotte had the bottom bands on her braces changed ten days ago. Then the top ones snapped so she had them replaced yesterday with the same colour as the original. I am beginning to suspect there is too much turmeric in our family diet! (The dental assistant didn't even believe the bottom started out sky blue - I wonder why!)

Glow - I hate you!

If you have a child at school in Scotland, the word 'glow' probably no longer leaves you with the warm and cosy feeling it is meant to evoke... (or is my family its only victim?)

They've been trying to roll it out across East Ren at least since Lots was still in primary, if not longer. How difficult can it be to write an online system that kids can use to access their school and school work? Countless times we've been asked to access it, usually with minimal, if any, instructions on where to find the page pertaining to a specific project, homework, class or whatever. I'm not particularly computer-illiterate - I have worked on one daily since 1991 and can cope with writing small Unix scripts and similar but 'glow' fills me with fear and loathing and leaves me frustrated to the point of wanting to go back to papyrus scrolls.

The first issue is that every time we attempt to log on the child's password has been changed. Yes, they may have been given something simple to remember but they are using it at 5 or 6 years old so when you ask their password, you get told last week's or last month's or their username, or the password they thought about using but didn't, or the password the kid sitting next to them used. So problem number one is invariably trying for a whole evening to log on, unsuccessfully trying different combinations of surnames, pet's names, minecraft handles and similar, and believe me, when you have four school-age kids, you don't have time to devote a whole evening to hacking into the system for just one of them. Around midnight you write your first letter of the week to the teacher (knowing that by Friday, you'll be back on first name terms).

By day 2 you are one day behind on the homework (that you only had four days to do in the first place) so are already stressed. You finally get in, invariably using one of the combinations of username and password that didn't work the previous evening but now mysteriously does, but you have no idea where to go... (and the interface has always changed since your previous successful break-in). The kid takes the mouse and manoeuvres you through three screens till you finally see, not without some relief, the class teacher's name. You click on it, knowing you are finally just one screen away from finally discovering what this week's homework assignment is and as you click it laughs in your face and flashes the message 'You do not have the permissions to view this page!' You find yourself shouting 'Fuck off glow!!!' and shaking your fist at the laptop much to the surprise of junior, who wonders why 'glow' always provokes such anger in his parents.You reach for the pen to write the teacher your second penpal letter of the week, because you really have nothing better to do with your evenings with a job and five kids than play hide and seek with 'glow' every evening.

This week Léon announced his teacher has decided to save paper (or was it the planet?) by putting all homework from now on on 'glow'. FFS, just pass me a gun now...

At high school (after the initial period of three months having them reset Charlotte's password on a daily basis) 'glow' does work, though still takes longer than just opening a text book and actually doing an exercise, but at primary, many of the children just aren't clued up enough to use such a buggy system. I really don't see how they can consider using it as a default system if children cannot get it to work without hours of parental intervention. I'm so fed up with it that I am losing the will to live. Tonight we 'do not have permissions'. I am not writing another letter. I have told Léon to tell them he can't see his homework and I refuse to devote any more time to it. If we don't get in by Thursday I will write a single letter saying ' Léon cannot access his homework so we did not do it'. That will be a first as none of my kids has missed a homework assignment in the 12 years they have all been at school. Enough is enough!

Big family?

The last time I remember getting that look - the one of mixed pity and admiration - was back in 2010 in London. I got on the tube with all five of my kids (then aged 6 months, 2, 4, 10 and 13) and I actually noticed some people counting us on and off again!

Today I was alone in Silverburn with four of my kids and my two Danish nieces Ursula and Elisabeth - so I had a 14, 9, 7, 6, 4 and a one year old in a buggy. A number of people looked at me as if I was barking mad and of course given five of the six children were girls, I think Léon got even more looks of pity than I did! :-)

Through a child's eyes

We had one of those conversations this morning...

Anna: Do French people celebrate Xmas on the 24th of December like Danes?
Me: Yes, Anna.
Anna: Papa was French, wasn't he?
Me Yes, Anna.
Anna: So do you always marry foreign men so you get your presents a day earlier than if you'd married a Scottish one?

The things you prioritize in life aren't quite the same at six...

You can always rely on the kids

School does it at least once a year. Sometimes I think they are just being a bit nosy and condescending but it's always dressed-up as an 'educational exercise', and I'm generally too busy with real life to argue. 

It started last week. Léon was tasked with writing down everything he ate on a day of his choice that week. I suggested Thursday as I knew I had a load of vegetables I needed to use up and had time to cook something nice that day. He agreed, because he enjoys his food, and because he's a sweet (and easily-led child ;-) ). So we had a fairly bland cereal for breakfast, a few pieces of fruit mid-morning, some nice wholemeal bread and cheese with more fruit for lunch, building up to a dinner to be proud of: I made some boiled basmati, I made spicy potatoes in cumin seeds, ground coriander and garam masala, we had cucumber raita, I fried a tiny bit of chicken in onion, cumin, garlic, ginger and scotch bonnet chilis, slicing in mushrooms, patty pan squash, aubergine and tomatoes. I added in some baby potatoes. I felt well-smug. We often eat that kind of dinner but we also occasionally have burgers and chips or similar so it was definitely what I considered acceptable for class discussion... I left it at that.

Yesterday was open day for this term. I went in and the kids were making their meals out of felt and wool and gluing them onto plates they had designed themselves. Léon was carefully cutting out patty pan slices while the three other kids at his table cut out pizzas. Léon whispered to me that he'd even received a 'personal point' for having eaten the most unusual vegetable of everyone in the class! Tee hee. I seem to have retained my 'weirdo' status once again...

So I thought I had got away with it.

Presumably, though, they decided that since the exercise was such a hit in the upper school, the little ones would get to do it too. Anna chose today. Anna chose today because she was on the plan to cook today and wanted to be fully in control. It hadn't been the best start as she'd had coco pops and dunkers this morning, followed by a chorizo sandwich and crisps, albeit with a few grapes at  lunch time. She came in and worsened things with powdered chicken noodle soup - sigh! (At least today wasn't the day we let her take back the lemonade bottle to the corner shop and splash out the 30p on gummi sugar-snakes.) So, around 5, I turned to her and asked the fateful question: 'So, what do you fancy cooking tonight? Remember you have to write it up on your form, then talk about it in class?' Anna doesn't have a huge repertoire. She can do fish, some salads, pastas and pie with broccoli, but I was sure it'd be fine, she is only six after all... 'I think I'll make fried eggs and chips!' she replied, very pleased with herself! Stunned silence, while I thought to myself: Seriously? We have only had that about four times in your entire life! Why, tonight, you wee besom, why?

But, you know Anna: firstly, there would be no budging from that momentous decision, and secondly there would be no lying about it on the form either, because if I'd put down vegetable soup, little Miss Teacher's Pet would simply have announced 'We had egg and chips but mummy said to write down soup'.

So from tomorrow not only will I be waiting on the call from social services asking if I've never heard of the five-a-day policy, I'll also be skulking around for fear of Anna's teacher bumping into Léon's in the staffroom, comparing notes and concluding our family, which already doesn't quite fit in the boring East Renfrewshire bog-standard 2 kids and designer dog mould, is even odder than previously assumed!

Children: a part of yourself, you have very little control over!

More badness

I went outside yesterday morning and rubbish was strewn everywhere. It was bin day. Sitting amongst it were several crows picking at pieces of food, plastic containers and pieces of paper. Shaking her head Amaia exclaimed in a righteous manner - 'No wonder they call them 'badness of birds'! Léon, completely confused, started to explain they were actually 'crows' but unperturbed Amaia just waved him away in that slightly superior manner you do, when you know much more about a subject than the other party!

Un-thought-through specials

I was reading the newspaper at the weekend when  I came across a rather odd ad. I wish I had cut it out, but I can't track it down in the recycling for now. It was for an undertakers and read 'Unlimited words on your gravestone on all orders received before October 1st'. That seems fine until you think it through... what are you meant to do? Bump off Granda if he looks like he might croak it around October 4th, so you can have both birth and death date engraved on it? Thomas did consider pre-ordering his own and asking for his blog to be transcribed on it in its entirety, but it looks like he's now missed that boat!

It reminded me of my student days working in H Samuel Jewellers. In the run up to Xmas sales weren't as good as the big boss wanted so we held a brainstorming session to come up with new ideas to get the punters through the door. It was going fine until the assistant manager suggested 'Buy one, get a second one half price' on engagement rings! Quick as a flash all the wittier members of staff drew up mock ads that had us all in stitches, and the idea was instantly dropped!

Imperial arse

I'm supposed to be working, and you, Mr Cameron, are forcing me to take time out. That is because you, Mr Cameron, are one prize, antiquated arse who came out the ark.

Last time I looked, you were (approximately) the same age as me. I started school in 1972 and I have never been taught imperial measurements. By the time I had had my kids I had just about sussed that it was some sort of mental system where you had 16 ounces in a pound, but only 14 pounds in a stone, so theoretically you can weigh something like 9st10lb15oz - FFS! As for inches and feet - there seems to be 12 of those in the other. What is wrong with a sensible system that simply counts to ten and one hundred? He cites the issue that kids have to calculate between the two systems... No, they don't, no one under 47 has learnt the old system so you know what - if on say medical forms you simply put a wee box saying Height: ---cm or Weight --kg, then no one would ever need to use a pound or foot again. It has not disappeared because you and your likes do everything you can to keep it in use. Scales actually all have a kg setting underneath, I set mine to it when I bought it in 1993 and haven't swapped it back since - simples! I refuse to calculate between the two. I know my kids' heights in centimetres and their weights in kilos but I haven't the slightest inkling what their imperial measurements are and no one else would either if scales no longer had a stones setting. It is time the old imperial system went the same way as the Empire itself. (It's dead, have you not noticed? Even half of Scotland wants out - that's the half that got beyond the BBC and the tabloids!)

Or better still, maybe when we finally get our independence, we can keep the pound and England could re-introduce the old, non-decimal money we used when I was a small child. Then, everyone would be happy.

The Scottish Owl Centre

Yesterday was Léon's birthday. It was also a bank holiday so we decided to break our self-imposed no-spending rule and have a day out. Poor Marcel was working in the shop all afternoon so that freed up a space in the car for mum and we all set out for the Scottish Owl Centre. Léon has been owl-daft since Harry Potter first came out and Linda had recommended it to us a year ago.

We arrived and took in the 80 or 90 owls in aviaries before taking in two flying displays complete with owl facts. One owl in particular took a fancy to mum and tried a full-blown conversation with her every time she passed and I certainly came away surprised at how full-of-personality the little creatures seem to be.

We got to see big and small owls and we even got to meet the nearly-famous sister of Errol from the HP movies.

A baby owl (who was less than 6 months old) was also being taken around by the owl handler to get it used to people. It was a baby of the world's largest owl species and had the most beautiful eyes:

At the end of the day we came out and enjoyed the lovely play park in the owl centre's grounds. It was so good we might even stop off there again even if we aren't going owl-watching. 

This morning Amaia woke me up telling me which toy owl she intended to buy 'when we were next at the owl centre for her birthday' so I guess that means it was a great hit! She had even taken in the fact that one of the owls ate hedgehogs in the wild so drew this lovely picture of two eggs, two baby owls and a large hedgehog, or rather hebgehog, at nursery this morning!

It's a shame we can't drop by more often, but as with all things when you have such a big family, day trips unfortunately cost way too much. 

A strange perspective

I was looking through some old photos of Amaia today for a photo of a coat she had as a baby. We happened upon this one of her with dad. She looked at it sadly and said 'My Pumpa must miss cuddling me'.

Targeted ads

Targeted ads piss me off! You know that way you look at something on the Internet and I from that moment, every time you are on the Internet they are all over the page, down the side bar etc Take this for example:

Léon asked for a Pikachu 'dressing-up'costume for his birthday because he wants to go out as Pikachu for Halloween four weeks later. So now I am trying to hide from him constantly as this is dancing all over my bloody screen! 

Last Xmas I bought Thomas an engraved beer glass and it did the same, which isn't ideal when we're sitting side by side in bed in the run-up to Xmas.

But worse still, I was sitting in bed recently without my computer when I asked Thomas to check if anywhere cheaper than M&S sold teenage bras - I wanted something suitable for a child but Charlotte, despite being very narrow, takes a D in a bra, so now poor Thomas is subjected to constant streams of scantily-clad 14 year olds with push-up bras parading down his sidebar... It doesn't look good in a business meeting, I can tell you!

Don't they realize people don't necessarily want others to see what they've been looking to buy, even for the most innocent of reasons. Older people even often share accounts, which is worse.

Time for a couple of days off?

You know it is probably time you took a few days off campaigning when your four year old spontaneously bursts into 'BBC, walk the plank!' while you're wandering round Primark looking for a new cardie!

The first week

I've had good days and bad days over the last week. Well, that's not entirely true. It's been more like good and bad hours, to be honest. But mainly good, I have to say... For the  most part the positivity of my post written last Saturday has remained, but I have had moments of despair, as I look at the size of the mountain I need to climb and the obstacles that are being erected upon it, and I've had moments of frustration and anger.

On Saturday afternoon we took ourselves off to the coast to try to let the sea air blow away the cobwebs. It worked well.

At least it worked better than staying home moping...

It was clear from all social media that the Yes movement had had its one day of mourning on the 19th but that we had all woken up on the 20th with the sudden and joint realization that we may not have been on the winning side, but we were on the right side so we had no choice but to roll up our sleeves and carry on. Maybe we're just a little ahead of the curve... After all the SNP was never meant to get that majority that forced the Indyref this soon in the first place. After a few more years of cuts and austerity, a few more illegal wars, a few more years of rule by an elite group of millionaires who can't even begin to understand our day to day lives, it might have been easier.

Of course Day 1 had seen the 3 stoogies break their first promise but there was no surprise there.

By five days in the ever-so-efficient journalists at the BBC had finally managed to lay their hands on the positive report I tweeted and facebooked on August 22nd about the Clair oilfield.

Interestingly the BBC reported this negative story on the left hand side, on the very day I found the positive one. But how could BBC journalists be expected to find something like that on a big, complicated Internet when it takes a busy mum of five a few hours to track it down?!

Since this revelation we've had parliament recalled to voted on bombing Iraq. Of course last week there was no intention of starting any more illegal wars but today, all that seems to have changed. Last week we were too skint to pay for weapons, but now we, the people are getting to pay for the foodbanks, because they the politicians are busy spending our new oil money on our very own UK WMDs. We didn't see that coming, did we?

And good old fracking across the central belt has been rubber-stamped this week too. We did jump up and down for two years pointing out to people that if we took control over our own affairs, we would have the power to allow or outlaw fracking as we saw fit but hey, wasn't it all simply about Eck being a fat w@nk?! Today I had to bite my tongue long and hard when I saw several BT and no-leaning acquaintances on facebook and twitter sharing the 'Sign the petition to ban fracking in Scotland' URL. Give me strength! You voted for it a week ago and now you want me to sign a petition against it? I already signed against it with a wee cross in the YES BOX on the 18th!!!!!!

Oh and I hear we're rumoured to be upping the retirement age to 70 as well. That's a hoot in a city where some parts have a life expectancy of 59. And Labour are trying to get people to join up the their party by telling people it'll save the NHS... would that be the same NHS that was safe with a No this time last week?

We've had Scottish budget cuts, we've had let's get rid of the Barnett altogether, we've had right-wing nutters burning Saltires in George square. Need I go on?

Angry and facetious, me? Never!

But (as you can see this is one of my more cynical hours of despair at the moment...) taking several deep breaths and counting slowly to ten, I remind myself that in just a week all the pro-Indy parties have doubled or tripled in membership. Marcel and I both joined up this week too, without mentioning to each other! And I have never been a member of a political party in my life! People who have simply voted up to now have suddenly decided to become activists in their own right and the tidal wave is hard to stop. Marcel has also notice a distinct unease amongst his no-voting friends as each and every one of his predictions has come true, not over the year he had estimated but arrogantly within less than a week, accompanied by the monarch's happy purring. Sigh! He said by Wednesday they were looking decidedly sheepish and they were hurriedly trying to change the focus of any conversation he seemed to be steering in that direction.

Thomas has been to two Yes meetings already and there is some very positive stuff appearing around the idea of finally infiltrating the Scottish media so we don't need to put up with the BBC bias any more. Ordinary people have picked themselves up, dusted themselves down and decided this is worth fighting for. No one is for taking off the car stickers and when the Yes bar in Glasgow suggested reverting to its old names thousands had tweeted to disagree within hours. I think they are slowly realizing that they are the Yes bar and will be till Independence day. There are marches and meetings springing up all over facebook too and my kids are already asking when we can go on a nice flag-waving, face-painting day out in Edinburgh, so all-in-all it feels good. My main issue is that I am suffering from a lack of patience. I am already at the place another 5% of us need to get to and waiting for them to catch up is frustrating.

I've also seen a great number of different sources starting to question what will happen in 2017 if Scotland and England vote differently in the EU in/out referendum. Scotland needs its EU subsidies and knows it, England, for the most part, needs them too but given London doesn't, it and the tabloids together could force them out. I don't see us simply sitting back and watching England drag us out... but I'll be watching carefully how that develops.

Of course some things never change. The BBC is still trying to pretend we don't exist:

Notice how the news reader suddenly moves to her left during tonight's report when someone holds up a 45+ sign in blue behind her on live TV! But we are working on that, and we are stubbornly attached to our goal of a fairer, more equal Scotland, so long-term, I don't rate their chances. We're watching you BBC! (Well, not literally, I am deliberately no longer watching them at all, but we're watching what they're up to!)

The most amusing thing this week is the gutter press down south stirring up such a frenzy against us 'subsidy junkies' up here that the English are now starting to demand their own indyref! Hahaha, bring it on! 

Great view today

I was over at Whitelee again this morning taking a walk when I noticed it was much clearer than usual. It was so clear, in fact, that I could see not only the Ailsa Craig but also Arran and

Ben Lomond. . It's a shame I only had my phone with me and not my proper camera.

Civic nationalism

One of the things that angered me most was the media's attempt whenever possible to gloss over the difference between civic nationalism and that horrible right wing version down south that we see in Farage's party, and that we saw from the extreme unionists in George square on the night after the referendum.

I,  a Scottish woman with a Danish Yes campaigner for a husband; someone who has lived in France, Italy and Germany, who has studied foreign languages and culture, someone who has been married to a French person in the past and who currently has family in Denmark, France, Germany and Italy could be taken as a nationalist? I was asked on the day after the European elections this year if I had voted for those 'racist Scottish Nationalists?' by someone who should have been well enough educated to check facts of this basic type. If Farage has his way in a couple of years my husband isn't even eligible to live here with his Scottish-born children under his current European right to work arrangement. I also have Scottish friends living on UK passports in Germany, Spain and other places who are suddenly left at the mercy of EU governments letting them stay if England pulls us pro-EU Scottish inhabitants out of the EU. These are amongst my most prominent reasons for supporting Yes from the outset. Right wing nationalism and civic nationalism are at opposite ends of the tolerance spectrum. It is such a shame the two types haven't more diverse names. I am a civic nationalist and as we said all along in the Yes movement and will continue to say, for us 'A Scot is someone born here, and anyone who has paid us the compliment of settling here.' 

So when I came across this today and it made me smile because it showed me my Scotland.

Chuggy fun

It's just for fun, but Fiat have introduced a chuggy-patterning app. It's nice to do something mindless to ease the pain of the last few days...

So I started with covering the new one in old ones...

And then I tried some odd combos like Léon's eyes and Amaia's face!

Sweet little girl

So I'm lying in the bath this morning when Amaia appears in the doorway:

Amaia: What's your favourite animal, mum?

I think it through and assume she wants the answer 'hamster' given we have one. 

Me: Hamsters
Amaia: That's my favourite too... but I have two other favourite animals too!
Me: Yeah?
Amaia: I like chickens.
Me: Really?
Amaia: Yeah, chickens lay eggs and I like eggs, so I like chickens.
Me: Oh
Amaia: And I like pigs a lot too. Because pigs lay bacon!

Gathering strength, post Indyref #1

I've taken myself by surprise this morning...

I was asleep, or rather dozing at 5am when Thomas came in from counting votes in East Renfrewshire in the early hours of the 19th. He didn't waken me. I knew instantly we must have lost. I lay in bed dazed. I don't know why it surprised me given we'd been the subjects of much hate and lies in every part of the press every day for more than two years, but I am an optimist, and I had been in George Square the night before where optimism was buzzing.

I got up to do the school run. The little ones asked the result. Charlotte and Marcel had been following it through the night on social media, so knew already. Léon's face crumpled over his cereal bowl and he started to wail: How can people choose bombs over us kids? he sobbed. Anna, tears leaving her eyes in a perpendicular trajectory, shrieked: How can I be expected to pay for uni if they bring in tuition fees? Quite clued up for a six year old, really! I tried smiling optimism, kind of like you do if you're telling your kids someone died, or you're divorcing their father. They weren't fully convinced but went with it for the duration of breakfast, at least. Léon then claimed he felt too ill to go to school, but I felt too deflated to deal with him, so told him school was on.

I drove the biggies to high school and dropped them at the gate, no issue there. I drove the little ones to primary and dropped them at the gate too. I had to say hi to the janitor who was on the patrol. That was harder. I've known him 12 years. I barely nodded and legged it back to the car. I drove Amaia to nursery. I had to sit in the car and compose myself for a full five minutes before I went in. I live in a wealthy 'no-leaning' area so most parents were greeting each other in a happy enough manner. I was concentrating on getting in, walking to the correct room, getting Amaia's shoes and jacket changed and putting on her badge, signing her in and saying hello to her teacher and the head of her room without bursting into hysterical tears and falling to the ground in a heap. I walked through smiling little four year old faces and all I could think was how close they had got to a rosy future and how it had been stolen from them. I wanted to hug each individual child and apologize for the failings of the adults around them. I got back out and sat crying in the car, unable to move off because I couldn't see to drive.

On my way back the petrol light came on in the car. I would need petrol to go back to nursery for pickup. I considered it. I realized I could not physically bring myself to buy petrol because firstly I'd need to greet the garage till attendant without crying and secondly I would need to walk past the stand of thirty newspapers lying some more and gloating at me from the stand. I could not bear to watch TV or read newspapers to see their spin on the whole thing. I couldn't even look at facebook. I was actually physically incapable of doing so. I opted to drive my people carrier for the rest of the day despite its diesel-guzzling 2.7 litre engine. And at 3pm, I sent Charlotte to pick up the kids from primary because I knew I couldn't stand there at the gate without sobbing my heart out and quite honestly making a spectacle of myself.

I went home after nursery at 9. I went back under my duvet and I wept like a baby. Fortunately I had no work that day - the advantages of freelancing! I didn't eat. I didn't drink. I lay in bed and cried all day. And I tried to work out how to move away. I went through all the problems of where I could go that all my kids speak the language (the biggies are French-speaking, the littlies Danish.) Marcel is applying to uni here - I didn't want to live in a different country from him. I didn't see how I could go anywhere till after Lots finishes school as she's already in third year at high school but by then I would have two here and potentially children as old as twelve having to pick up schooling in another language... and that's without even considering my poor mum who lives alone, round the corner. I felt utterly trapped.

 The last time I felt like that was nine years ago. Thomas and I were best friends and had been for many years. I had begun to realize I was in love with him but I was married, albeit very unhappily, to someone else. I wasn't sure if he was aware of my feelings towards him and he had never told me either if he saw me as anything more than his best friend. Somehow we got into a conversation about the state of my marriage and his lack of partner and it all came out. His reaction towards me was fine that day but the next he popped up on MSN and told me that he would never find a partner if I continued to be his best friend because he couldn't see past me and he told me I should try to fix my marriage. He said he had decided he could no longer be my friend and that he intended never to speak to me again. It was a revealing conversation as it gave me the jolt I needed to realize I had to leave my husband but from the day he told me we could no longer be friends to the day we decided to talk about an alternative to his proposed plan (this was a period of nearly a month) I felt the way I did yesterday. My life had been snatched away from me. It had become meaningless. So having felt this way once before I fully expected to wake up feeling the same today. I even optimistically remembered I'd lost 10kg in the month Thomas had stopped being my friend and was already mentally clothes shopping two sizes smaller for the end of October!

So I woke up this morning and I was no longer crying. My eyes were dry and I jumped out of bed. Today I woke up with a 'let me at them' attitude that took me completely by surprise. Instead of giving up, I'm already angry enough now to ask myself what more I can do next time round. It was too good a movement to die. And my kids deserve the future I'd got close enough to touch. Too many lies and broken promises marred it this time round and we now know we need to find a road into the media. So I sat on Facebook and Twitter regrouping with the people who had inspired me. I sought out friends of friends I had met and been inspired by and I decided I didn't need heavy baggage so I also decided to unfriend those who bring me down and stress me out and one or two others who I actually enjoy talking to but who had mentioned they no longer wanted to see indyref posts. I knew I couldn't adhere to that and the cause was more important to me! I was amazed to see National Collective, Wings, Ginger Dug, the Common Weal people and all the others had woken up in the same state. We had managed to galvanize 45% of the national vote despite being demonized and marginalized, despite being lied about and vilified. In a single day the SNP, the Greens and the SSP have added a third new members. Despite never having been a member of a political party, I suddenly find myself googling join-up pages. If that's what it takes, I'll work on it from the inside! With a media presence we'll manage it next time round.

As I watched the Orange Order and the BNPites fill George (Independence) Square with hatred just 24 hours after the photo above, full of hope for our babies' futures was taken, I vowed that I will fight this cause until my dying breath or until we achieve it. 54% of those under 65 voted for this. The over 65s are the ones who had no real access to the truth as they read only newspapers and watched the TV news. They were lied to about pensions and threatened about benefits so we can hardly blame them. We need to find a way to adapt to their needs so they get the same information as we did. Failing that it should be possible in my lifetime and if it isn't at least no one will say I didn't try.