My Mess Is a Bit of a Life Read online

  Dedication

  To all the hamsters I’ve loved and lost

  For The Speck, The Scrap, The Moose, The Witch, and The Patriarchy

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  We’re all doomed

  Who am I?

  In the event of my death . . .

  Bad news

  Good news

  The Patriarchy

  Love and marriage

  Monsters under the bed

  Words

  Tooth Fairy

  Different pillows

  Jimmy

  Baby bird

  Fluffy

  Fame

  Finding my voice

  Happy endings

  Giants

  Action Man

  The weather report

  Haiku

  Mr. Benn

  Zoo

  Robot

  Cake

  Staying on the pavement

  Anxious Bear

  Hammy

  Spam

  Sweet

  Teeth

  Emergency

  Cupboards

  Spelling

  The lady on the bus

  Scam

  Underground

  Men

  Secrets

  Hymns

  Roots

  More secrets

  Chimpy

  Dusty legs

  Imaginary friend

  Old Lady

  Mrs. Grumpy

  The Voice of God

  Sealink

  Nine

  Blankets

  Custody battle

  Fearless

  Messiah

  There is nothing to fear but fear itself. And also Daddy Long Legs

  Memories

  Chestnuts

  Asking for it

  The Queen

  Wales

  Trophies

  Don’t relax

  Grandpa

  Living the dream

  Texas

  The Witch

  Robertson’s Giant Limb

  Sheep

  Jell-O

  Woodwork

  Adding up

  Crime and punishment

  Ian

  Woman

  The surprise

  The house

  Names

  Growing pains

  Port

  Rite of passage

  Smiling

  ABC

  The Word of God

  Bump

  Exuding

  A cockroach in my gusset

  My calling

  Scandinavia

  Fizzy pâté

  Making a living

  George

  Lassie

  Snails

  Cup of sugar

  Ferret

  Spitting Image

  Spirit Muppet

  Flirting vs squirting

  Da diddly qua qua

  Impressions

  Breaking up is hard to do

  Antichrist

  Peeping

  Etc.

  Danger Mouse

  Ronnie

  Debbie

  Mincing around the bush

  Fatty

  Open-and-shut case

  Lenny

  Hashtag

  Closure

  Not closure

  Express yourself

  Shambles

  Newts

  Zig-a-zig-ah

  The One

  Drag

  Expecting

  The Circle of Life

  My mantra

  Ain’t no Party

  Constant craving

  Thin

  Names

  Weather front

  POC

  Split personality

  Battle of the sexes

  The Michaels

  Handbag

  Making history

  X-rated

  Hiccups

  Labor

  Polite

  Motherhood

  Headbutt

  Chromosomes

  Gardening with body parts

  Not up to the job

  Supreme Leader

  Kissing trains

  Second word

  Quack quack

  Mumbling

  Sing!

  Hat

  New shoes

  Breakthrough

  Steak and kidney

  Bins

  Rare

  Sausage

  Glamour

  Llamas

  The test

  Gravel

  Not a guinea pig

  Annoying

  A miracle

  Weirdo

  Heartburn

  Black cloud

  Bad dreams

  Operation

  Muffle

  Ticket office

  Giraffe

  Bums

  Words

  Chicken

  Inhale

  Bugs Bunny

  Help

  Godzilla

  Ouch

  Emergency cord

  I’m fine, thanks, how are you?

  Boooooooooo!

  The woodpecker

  Scruffling

  Stones

  Gravy

  Legume

  The Day

  Lemming

  Evil Beaver

  The death of the Tooth Fairy

  Rainbows

  School

  Half Hulk

  Tiny spiders

  Glasses

  The bath

  Plaudits

  Surprises

  Joy

  Om nom nom

  I’ll hold your coat

  Hands up

  Paaaaartay

  Wearing a bloody frock

  Special

  Winning

  Matching

  Lump

  Shatter

  Body snatcher

  Being an alien

  Being an alien, part 2

  Marbles

  The last resort

  The not-talking cure

  An idea

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  As a very last resort, before I chose how to make my exit from the world, I decided to see a doctor.

  “My mess is a bit of a life right now,” I mumbled. “Wait, that came out wrong . . .”

  She indicated that I should elaborate. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t speak. The words wouldn’t come. They were there but they were out of my reach. She referred me to a therapist.

  I went and I said nothing. I didn’t know what to say; I didn’t want to say anything, and even if I did want to say something, the alien and the moths and Godzilla and the Dark Overlord Beaver made it impossible.

  After weeks of silence, I was losing hope.

  Her: How are you?

  Me:

  I tried to speak, but the moths were flapping furiously in my brain, the alien was pounding on my chest, Godzilla was stomping all over my inner Tokyo, and the Dark Overlord Beaver was tucking into my intestines.

  Her: Can you tell me what’s going on?

  Me:

  The moths began bombarding and ricocheting inside my skull, the alien had acquired some kind of enormous mallet, Godzilla was roaring and obliterating my inner Tokyo, and the Dark Overlord Beaver was now gorging on my innards.

  Her: Can you tell me how you’re feeling?

  Me:

  I summoned all my strength to reply and took a deep breath in. The moths suddenly stopped flapping; the alien stopped mid-pound; Godzilla stood, helicopter drumstick i
n hand and foot hovering over a building; the Dark Overlord Beaver put down my lower intestine. They all cocked their heads and listened to what I was going to say next.

  I swallowed. I breathed. I swallowed and breathed. Simultaneously. Triggering a coughing fit. Godzilla rolled his eyes. The Dark Overlord Beaver and the alien exchanged a weary look. A moth tutted. And they all resumed what they were doing.

  Her: Are you anxious about anything?

  I nodded.

  Her: Can you tell me some of the things that worry you?

  I shook my head.

  Her: Maybe you could write them down . . . ?

  And so I did.

  We’re all doomed

  My earliest memory is of sitting in my stroller in the snow. I was three. My mum said to my brother, “Don’t fall over in the snow.” Then my brother fell over in the snow.

  This made me realize:

  Bad Things happen.

  Bad Things happen even if you tell the Bad Thing not to happen.

  We’re all doomed.

  Who am I?

  One day when I was at nursery school, my dad came to collect me. I remember looking up from my crayoning and seeing him at the door. I waited to be called but nobody called me. Finally, when all the other children had gone, I was allowed to leave.

  As we walked home, Dad explained that when the teacher asked him who he had come for, he couldn’t remember my name.

  So instead he described me.

  “She’s small.”

  The teacher said he’d have to narrow it down.

  “She’s small with curly hair.”

  The teacher said he’d have to narrow it down some more.

  In the end, the best he could come up with was “Emily’s friend.”

  After that I worried that I wasn’t really me. I worried that I was a different friend of Emily’s and nobody had noticed.

  In the event of my death . . .

  When I was little, I used to worry that I would die in the night and that my family would not be able to manage.

  So I would write notes with useful information like:

  The peanut butter is in the cupboard that has the broken handle.

  Hammy likes to have sunflower seeds for breakfast.

  We need more tiddlywinks because I ate them to see if they tasted like Smarties.

  Tiddlywinks do not taste like Smarties.

  Bad news

  One day I arrived at nursery late. All the other children were there. My favorite place on the rug was taken—the one where you could hold a crayon against the radiator and watch while it melted.

  As I unzipped my anorak, I realized that everyone in the room was singing “We’re Going to the Zoo.”

  This sent me into total panic. I absolutely on no account wanted to go to the zoo with other children. Not now. I’d had no warning. I wasn’t prepared. I had the wrong socks on. Also, since when did people deliver horrific news in the form of a song? It seemed inappropriate.

  Could I run? Could I hide? I zipped my anorak back up and considered barricading myself in the playhouse. As I crawled, sniper style, towards the plastic door, the children started singing “Jack and Jill Went Up the Hill.” Now there’s a song. Short, succinct, and with a clear health and safety message. Why on earth were these people in favor of going to the zoo, when a mere trip up a hill caused one child to break his head and another to suffer from numerous undisclosed injuries? Luckily, after a quick burst of “Humpty Dumpty” (who, let’s remember, died from sitting on a wall), they wandered outside to play in the sandpit. They must have changed their minds about going to the zoo. Disaster averted.

  Good news

  I hated milk. One morning at nursery, the teacher told me I couldn’t play with the other children until I had drunk my milk. Sometimes everything goes right. I didn’t want to play with the other children AND I didn’t want to drink my milk. I sat inside on the floor the whole day.

  That was a good day.

  The Patriarchy

  We had a goldfish, a cat, a hamster, and a tortoise—who hibernated all year round (so on reflection was probably dead)—but none of them would let me dress them up in my Snoopy’s outfits or have tea parties with me. What we needed was a dog.

  I really, really wanted a dog. My brother wanted a dog so he could train her to do tricks. My mum wanted a dog because she prefers them to humans. But my dad said NO. We were watching Nationwide at the time. The theme tune was like a dirge to my hopes. We pleaded but he declared he was going to have to Put His Foot Down.

  The next day we got a dog. Flo lived for eighteen years. Dad said every time he looked at Flo, it reminded him of the Day He Put His Foot Down. This is why we have referred to Dad as The Patriarchy ever since. And this is why I have never Put My Foot Down about anything. Ever.

  Love and marriage

  Mum always claimed she’d married Dad for his money and was just biding her time until she found out where he’d hidden it. (Fifty-eight years later, he remains tight-lipped.) Sometimes, when I was walking Flo with my mum, a wedding car would pass and my mum would wave her arms and shout, “Don’t do it, you fools!” as it went by.

  My mum never wore her wedding ring. But that might have been because I put it where the bulb goes in the lamp in the living room and when she switched the lamp on, it blew up.

  Monsters under the bed

  I used to worry about the monsters under my bed a lot. Were they comfy enough? How could they sleep on a hard floor surrounded by crumbs and dust? Sometimes I slept under the bed so that they could have a turn on top.

  Words

  School was a hideous shock. For one thing, it was full of children and children are idiots. Loud idiots. It made me incredibly anxious. As I stepped into school, it was like being winded. I couldn’t speak, I could barely breathe.

  People would say I was shy. Teachers would demand that I speak. But the words just wouldn’t come. They were there but they were out of my reach.

  Tooth Fairy

  I lost my first tooth biting into a toffee apple. I was alarmed but my mum tried to cheer me up by telling me about the Tooth Fairy. This was unwise. I was troubled by the concept of some weird old fairy breaking into my house while I was asleep and then taking body parts in exchange for money. It was the slippery slope. Where would it end? Was there an Ear Fairy? Was there a Toe Fairy? If I tucked my hand under my pillow while I was sleeping, would she take that? Sometimes at night, my head would end up under my pillow. And my head had teeth in it. Would she just take the whole thing? What was a fairy’s load-lifting capacity? And why did nobody have the answers to the really important questions?

  Different pillows

  Sometimes we went to stay with Nan and Bok. This made me very anxious indeed. They had different pillows.

  Nan wore shiny blouses and smelled of cupboards. Bok had a knee that clicked on the twelfth stair whenever he went upstairs.

  As soon as we arrived, Nan would put us in the bath and scrub us clean. Then she would cut our hair with the kitchen scissors and then march us to the shoe shop to buy shoes that pinched my toes.

  I could never sleep at Nan and Bok’s because I was too clean. And they had nylon sheets. And my too-clean body would just spin in the nylon sheets and I couldn’t get comfy.

  Sometimes Bok would come and tell me stories to help me get to sleep. It was too dark to see him. I could just see the glowing end of his cigarette.

  My favorite stories were “Naughty Georgie” stories. I loved these because not only was the Georgie in these stories naughty, but she didn’t worry about it. She didn’t worry about anything.

  Jimmy

  When I was four, I was given the record of Jimmy Osmond’s “Tweedle Dee” for Christmas. (For those of you who don’t remember, Jimmy was Donny’s brother, the ninth Osmond child). I also appeared in the Nativity play as Stable Door. God’s appearance in my life coinciding with Jimmy Osmond’s appearance in my life was a little confusing and, for a long time, I thought they we
re the same person. The same happened with Bob Dylan and Santa Claus.

  Even as an adult I can’t quite shake the image of God as Jimmy Osmond in a sheet.

  This may be the problem I have with religion. Having a podgy pre-pubescent Mormon as a God isn’t very reassuring. I mean, I love the song “Tweedle Dee,” but somehow I don’t feel my fate is safe in his chubby, slightly sweaty hands.

  Baby bird

  I started writing before I could write. I would speak stories into a tape machine in a breathy, snotty voice. They were all, without exception, about baby budgies who fell out of nests and couldn’t find their way home. It’s a niche genre. I would like to say that these stories have been kept and treasured—but I’m pretty sure they got taped over with Santa Claus singing “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

  Fluffy

  When I was little I used to think that sheep were clouds that had fallen to earth. On cloudy days I used to worry that I would be squashed by a sheep.

  Fame

  Fame came early for me. The teachers at school informed my parents that some photographers had visited the school and I was going to be on the front cover of a book. They were very excited.

  This was the book.

  In answer to your question, no, I never did learn to adjust. And in answer to your other question, yes, that is a yellow smock coupled with some green polyester flares.

  Finding my voice

  At school I spent every second of my time with My Best Friend David. We held hands all day.

  I would wear my yellow polyester smock and my green polyester flares. He would wear a zip-up brown polyester cardigan and purple polyester flares. We were a highly flammable couple.

  My Best Friend David was more confident than me. My Best Friend David didn’t worry. My Best Friend David liked talking to people. My Best Friend David liked new things and adventure. My Best Friend David encouraged me to speak. He did this by teaching me to swear. But he explained that if we said a syllable each it wouldn’t be so bad.

  My Best Friend David: Fu

  Me: king

  My Best Friend David: Ass

  Me: hole

  Those were my first words at school.

  Happy endings

  When I was five, I asked for a pet canary. We got on the number 12 bus and went to the pet shop. I chose a green-and-yellow canary with a noble look in his eye. On the way home, we passed Nelson’s Column. I realized Nelson must have been very important because he had a column and everything. So I decided Nelson was a good name for my canary.