Notes on a Spoilt Child

On Grandparenting, Gardens and knowing when to let go.

These weren’t the Easter eggs in the hunt - I put them in ‘cos I think they’re gorgeous. (Betty’s Harrogate)

Sunday, 19th April

Yay! Easter egg hunt. After returning from Cornwall, I'd planned to drop the Northern grandchildren at my son's London house to hang out with their cousins, bus it home (two buses, one hour), hide eggs, then have the kids brought to me. Afterwards, write my Substack, repack, and bus back to son's place to prepare for taking the Northern kids home on Easter Monday.

BUT

Gentle reader, you'll be pleased to hear that after reading various Substack posts about self-care, I accepted my son’s offer to organize the Easter egg hunt in his garden while I went home, napped, packed, wrote my Substack, and returned for a dinner he prepared then going to bed - before the kids. I left him to do their bedtime.

I'm learning to let go - a bit.

Monday, 20th April

Traveled back to Hebden Bridge with two tired kids. I had prepped for the three and a half hour journey like – I was going to say ‘an army general’ – but given our times I’ll leave the army out of it. I had Connect 4, Lego, Happy Families, Snap, snacks, audio books, books, and a fully charged screen hidden for emergencies. Imagine my delight when all my granddaughter wanted was for us to alternate reading chapters of Tracy Beaker (thankfully she had a three-book jumbo edition). My grandson happily made videos of the countryside with my phone and engaged in 'small world play' with his Lego. Truly I have perfect grandchildren. And I discovered I love Tracy Beaker.

Tuesday, 21^st April

It’s back to school – so up at crack of sparrow and whilst Dad does lunches, I brush hair and teeth, tie shoelaces, check book bags, etc etc etc – kids putting a brave face on their Mum, Jess, not being home yet –she is a midwife and her night shift ends after school drop-off time. (Their father has an early commute to Leeds and can’t drop them off either.) I’m here a lot at half terms and holiday times. Jess and I sync calendars, so I plan my life three months ahead, whenever her Unit releases the schedule.

The holiday request system for midwives is bewilderingly complex—limited weekly hours for the entire Unit, restrictions on time off during school holidays, Christmas and New Year, plus accommodations for part-timers and family-friendly requests. If ever there was a case for AI intervention, this might be it.

Adam Kay's This is Going to Hurt brilliantly captures the challenges of maintaining a normal family life while working for the NHS. What he perhaps misses is the way in which the NHS – or at least the bit of it I know that Jess works in – is supported and shored up by friends, grandparents, aunts, uncles and extended family networks. Without this support system it would probably all grind to a halt.

BUT – full disclosure - babysitting in Hebden on this occasion is not entirely altruistic. Kids duly deposited I reunite with my car (left in Hebden pre-Cornwall) and head off for my assignation, planned three months ago when Jess’s rota came out. I am hot with anticipation. Driving over the ‘tops’ I drink in the open wildness of the windmill studded landscape that stretches forever – such a contrast to Cornwall’s winding, high-hedged lanes. Gradually descending, I reach civilisation, the outskirts of Burnley. Not long now - so nearly there. Just a left, a right, I park and walk into – Springwood Nurseries. Grabbing an oversized cart, I settle into bliss. Not just any bliss, but bliss at half the price of comparable bliss at my local, north London garden centre.

Springwood Nursery, Burnley

Three hours later, I set off for school pick up, car laden with the sweet-smelling promise of damp compost.

Wednesday, 23^rd April

Bid farewell to kids, kids’ father, Jess and Hebden. Always sad to say goodbye, but excited to start planting and return to .......you guessed it.....the bloody book. I don’t really mean ‘bloody’, but gosh it lurks in the background of everything I do, demanding my attention and sulking when ignored. However much I explain that I have commitments; a life; a garden, it nags relentlessly.

It’s like another grandchild. To be fair, it didn’t ask to be born. I dragged it into existence, carted it everywhere for four years –trains, planes, holidays, writing retreats, babysitting sojourns. All it wants is to be finished, sent off into the world to do its best yet I’m not letting go. I keep telling it to wait, to be patient, that it just needs a lick and a polish......honestly, this metaphor could go on and on and is, in fact, just another way of prevaricating.

Tomorrow I’m on it. After I’ve finished planting.

Thursday, 24^th April

Up at crack of sparrow to meditate, yoga and gym – all sadly neglected during babysitting duty. Then to plant, prune and water.

And then.

With a feeling of contentment, a sort of donning of my ‘comfies’, I settle in to write. Actually, the book itself is finished. What I simply can’t put off any longer is crafting query letters to agents, my one page synopsis and formatting the manuscript for submission. I have to face it - the thought terrifies me. But I can’t avoid it any longer. Although it feels as though I have neglected it for weeks, I realise I haven’t. In fact, I’ve been dipping in and out of drafting my letter, and wrestling with a synopsis for months, if not years. Every time someone asked me what the book is about, I would try to explain it succinctly and now, to my surprise, all those stumbling attempts to ‘pitch’ the story coalesce and transfer to the page almost fully formed.

And I have a real life deadline to work to. Tonight is Writers’ Bloc, my wonderful, supportive, incomparable group. I read them my synopsis, smugly confident I’ve brilliantly encapsulated all 90,000 words. They give me what I’m here for. Golden feedback. Candid, authentic – Painful.

“ Yes, the plot is there, but what happened to your ‘voice’?”

“ Where is the humour?” “You’ve lost all sense of irony?” “The honesty?”

Thanks guys.

Friday, 25^th April

Re-write my synopsis. All day. (Apart from sneaking out to water the garden.) I think it’s done.

Saturday, 26^th April

The book, like the spoilt child it is, is insisting I read it just one more time.

I’ll probably give in.