And then there were two

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Baby Daughter Photo from the archives, used to demonstrate selective colour to Rich's camera club a couple of years back. It scared them.

The kids went back to school last week. All of them.

Their mother and father had been eagerly anticipating that first precious day for nearly five long years. Oh to be with each other again, just the two of them, no longer parents. Finally Father and Mother could once more be husband and wife, photographer and model, artist and muse. They were going to take the day off and spend it in the studio...er...makin' art together. Yes indeedy they had been planning that day for what seemed like forever. It was going to be glorious.

Child No. 1: Oldest Son’s first day at senior school, year 9.
Casualties so far:

One pair of shiny new sneakers, stolen.
One pair of spectacles, lost.
One padlock (for school locker) hacked, apparently due to the fact it was too complicated to open so only brute force would solve the conundrum.
One I.T. information technology lesson, missed, as Oldest Son went to D.T. lesson instead (they looked remarkably similar without aforesaid spectacles which were, of course, still missing.)
One soggy Oldest Son, drowned in river after first rowing lesson. They were practising capsizing. The Hogwarts professor declared that he had never seen a pupil demonstrate such a natural aptitude for falling overboard.


Child No. 2: Second Son’s first day in year 6.
Casualties so far:

Nil.

From this we conclude that Second Son is remarkably competent, self-assured and capable of locating and protecting his own possessions. An accurate assessment. He organises the rest of his family with super-slick efficiency and Oldest Son (who has a typically vague and ethereal artist-type personality) is totally lost without him now that they are on different campuses. Second Son is now spending large chunks of break-times texting his older brother, all messages beginning “hav U remMbRD…” This technique appears to be working so far (Mother crosses fingers hopefully.)

Child No 3: Daughter’s first day in Reception class.
Casualties so far:

Mother’s sanity.

Daughter’s first ever day of school didn’t start terribly well when she realised she couldn’t wear pink (Madam only ever wears pink, which is a VERY IMPORTANT principle of fashion, so she often tells her Mother.) An hour’s tantrum later and Mother finally managed to prise Daughter into an unattractive navy-blue shroud and deposit a weeping, pathetic clingy little girl into a big, scary classroom. Mother then spent the day maxing out on cappuccinos, consoling other weeping mothers (also parted from their little dears for the first time) in Tesco’s, having a nervous breakdown and worrying herself into an early grave about how her paralytically shy Daughter was going to cope with her first day in a class-full of total strangers.

By the time it came to pick her up, Mother was a gibbering wreck. Of course Daughter bounced out of class radiantly happy, having had the most incredible amount of fun EVER, so all of Mother’s biting her nails down to her elbows and caffeine-induced-paranoia were totally unnecessary.

Mother then went home, fielded several frantic phone calls from varying sons who couldn’t locate each other so they could rush to catch the imminent train home (how Mother was supposed to fix this from twenty miles away she really had no idea. She politely suggested they should try phoning each other, rather than her) and then placated Father who was ranting about a) a noxious customer who had tortured him for every second of the entire day, and b) how he couldn’t find a live mouse which the cat had brought in and let loose somewhere in the house. Mother then poured herself a large gin and tonic and passed out cold on the sofa for an hour.

And that was the story of Mother and Father’s first precious day alone together for five years.

Alas no steamy photographic art session.
Still, there’s always next week. Mother and Father are not holding their breath though.

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Live for the day. Manga your child.

Stop Press Update: Today there is a very bad smell emanating from Father’s computer. He strongly suspects that the aforesaid mouse crawled into the system base unit, promptly died of fright, and is now baking slowly. Father no longer wishes to spend any time today finishing Mother’s latest photographs, as apparently they stink. (Honestly, you couldn't make this stuff up.)