The sound of gunfire

I prefer not to blog about blogging. I feel it to be dull. I would rather blog about life. Sometimes, when you blog; the blogging spills over into your life. Bear with me for this one blog. It is going to be about blogging. It is going to be about life.

My child was hurt and bullied. Fact. Hurt in a variety of incidents. Hurt when other children turned their backs on him. Fact. Not the sort of facts you want around you. But real, damaging and out there. Fact. Fact. Fact.

When a child hurts; a mother feels the pain. More fact. She thinks: "What can I do? My child is hurting. I must make it stop." I am "the Mother who Blogged." Shame on me. Shame. Shame. Shame. A mother will, of course, defend her child but I could have been more British. Shut the door. Had a quiet word. It would have been sorted out. I thought about it. And, then I wrote about it.

I blogged again, and, once again. What can I say? It gets to be a habit. I "virtually" bent my blog over backwards to explain that staff acted swiftly and with consummate professionalism. As keen to turn things around, as they would be if my child was their child. In a way, my child is their child. They have introduced a friendship bench and buddies, more supervision in the classroom and directed play at break time. They are bringing in a behavioural expert and a new anti-bullying policy. I could not have asked for more. I am grateful for every moment of thought they have put into turning things around. I could weep over them with gratitude, each time I see a casual kindness to my child. A word. A sticker. A small hand taken and held.

As for whether it will work. I hope so. It seems to be. In the last little while, my son has not said, matter-of-factly, that nobody wants to work with him or that he spends his break time watching others play. I think "all being well", "fingers crossed" and "let's hope so", it should "come good."

My son is too small to ignore his feelings of hurt when children do not want to play with him, or when some child kicks out. Luckily, I am older. Old enough to enjoy certain ironies. To pretend I have not noticed snubs and coolness from women who would spend smiles on me quite happily before. That there are now women who do not pass the time of day as they might have done before. I am so old that I can choose to smile at someone whose face is tight with disapproval when she sees me. Someone who can scarcely bring herself to reply to an everyday question. And, I can take at face value, a sweet soul's concern for me because of the "upset" I have created. Luckily, I am a grown-up and not a child. If I were a child, I might think that I was bullied and tell my mother. Then, there would be trouble.

Blog to book in 60 seconds

Should I write about the book deal? I wasn't going to because there is such a sense of unreality about all of it. But people seem to want to know what happened so this is it...

I blogged. Someone read it. Someone else read it. Someone else passed it on. The political bloggers linked to me and the world went mad. I blogged some more. Someone read it. Someone liked it. Someone passed it on. A publisher e-mailed me. A book was mentioned. Money was mentioned. I tucked my skirt into my knickers, said "Ok then" and looked for hidden cameras.

The Sunday Times, my alma mater, decided to write about it. They decided to do a front page story, a leader, run excerpts and take my picture sitting on a rock.I got cold and the world went mad.

Blogger readers sent best wishes. Blogger readers hated me. Blogger writers wrote like me. Blogger writers wrote better than me.

What has a book got to do with my life? I am not going to mention it in future because I feel it is just something I will do at the computer in between reality. But for the record, thank you to everyone who said: "Well done. Good on you." Some have been immensely generous in their support. Some (like my mum) have been happy for the world to meet them when they weren't necessarily looking at their best.

Blogging is a strange and wonderful thing. I reached out into cyberspace because I needed to - not in any expectation of a book deal. What is a book deal after all? Better than a book deal, any book deal, have been the kindly comments, e-mails and messages from strangers who aren't strangers any more who said: "I read you and you made me laugh" and "I read you and you made me cry". My book deal isn't so much about money, it is more to do with the fact that blogging is a force to be reckoned with. Ultimately blogging is people willing to commit time, effort and emotion. How cool is that?

There will be haggis balls and pease pudding at the book launch. If I finish it.

A blog ate my life

It is conceivable that I have slipped into schizophrenia. Either that or the blog has taken an unholy grip on my subconscious. Then again, Jesus could be speaking to me, although I have always supposed that as a good Catholic girl, if anyone celestial wanted a word, it would be Mary, the Holy Mother of God.

Many sinister tales surround the one true faith and I am not talking the Da Vinci code. Catholic children know that English Protestants stole all the best churches, leaving the faithful with red brick sheds and quite a good legal case if we ever went to court with it. They know that there was a time when masses were said in fear behind locked wooden doors and that the Tudor air hung heavy with the smell of spilt papist blood. All this by the way, seems like yesterday to some catholics. They are also told of the many apparitions of the Blessed Virgin to good children. When, year after year, she does not come, you ask yourself "Why not?" I had the same questions when I was little and my favorite nun, with her severe habit and grandma face, told her pupils how God had looked around and found the best, purest, girl he could and chosen her to bear the Son of God. The other children at their wooden desks, murmured their freckled approval of divine good taste. I thought: "Pshaw. That Mary. What did she have that I don't."

Maybe Mary overheard that remark. Maybe that is why she never came knocking. But even if it is not her, I am definitely hearing voices and I cannot think that is ever a good thing. Look where it got Joan of Ark. Nowhere you would want to be. Apart from heaven I suppose but I am not convinced being burnt alive is a price worth paying, even for heaven.

A narrator has moved into my head. This morning we had breakfast with friends back at the city farm again ( did I mention how much I love life on the farm?) The voice said: "This morning I had breakfast with friends at the city farm..." and here I am writing it.

I picked up a magazine while I was there (as you do at the farm). It was full of suggestions of what you could do and where you could go if you had young children in London. In it, was an advertisement offering "life coaching for children". I nudged my husband's arm and pointed to it.
"Look. If we lived in London, the children could have life coaching," I said.
He looked at me. "Alternatively, we could just let them grow up."

He bent his head back over his breakfast and forked up some baked beans and a sliver of crisped bacon.
"The blog thing then. How's it going?"
I cut and buttered a finger of toast for the baby.
"Good, a nice lady in Syracuse has read it."
"Excellent," he said, chewing. "Syracuse, eh?"

Define "special"

I have my first official link from someone else's blogsite to mine and am absurdly pleased about it. On a scale of one to 10, about as pleased as Dorothy was when the Emerald City appeared on her technicolour horizon. Tom Watson, the definitive blogging MP, has listed me on his blogroll. Pausing for a quick sigh of happiness and a glance at my sparkling shoes, this means that someone has now read my blog who didn't go to school with me and doesn't share my gene pool. To hell with Iraq, I may even have to vote Labour at the next election to say thankyou.
Today has been rather a good day all-round. I spent the morning being a "special person" at school and was awarded a certificate with red felt-tipped hearts, a daffodil and a chocolate rice crispy cake by my sons. There was a slight vested interest at stake which worried me. If I came in to pick up my award (along with a cup of tea) , my boys also received a chocolate rice crispy cake. Sometimes though, it is best not to look too closely at the quid pro quo, as I am sure Lord Levy would tell you.
To continue the political theme of this blog, the children have apparently been learning about special people - like the Queen. This has involved drawing the Queen's jaggedy- toothed head on a stamp, making a corrugated cardboard crown and a consequent lecture from mummy explaining that the Queen is not actually a special person (apologies to the royalists out there). She is infact an ordinary person just like you and me who only got the job because she was born into a particular family and actually Helen Mirren could do it just as well.
If you cannot brainwash your own children, what is the point of having them?
By the way, for anyone who stopped by yesterday. She left the dog.