My Mum, in that way Mums do, recently asked me how it is that I have an (allegedly) high IQ, a degree, a post-graduate diploma and a successful career but I frequently manage to leave my front door keys in the door overnight.
My theory is that there are only so many available slots in the human brain. And when you become a parent, and particularly a single, self-employed, portfolio careered sort of parent, there simply aren't enough slots for everything. So if I'm going to remember that trousers go on OVER underwear, then something else is gonna have to give, frankly.
How else do you explain last week in the Whittle household?
Monday: There’s a note in Flea’s reading book from her
teacher. ‘Please could you put some white socks in F’s bag tomorrow as her PE
socks are missing.’ That'll be because they've been in her bedroom since half-term, then.
Tuesday: We remember the PE socks. Unfortunately, the PE
shorts are still in the washing machine.
Wednesday: We remember the PE shorts. We forget the morning
snack. It’s on top of the washing machine when I get back from the school run. The afternoon snack never made it out of the fruit bowl.
Thursday: We remember the snacks and it’s not a PE day. Ha!
I rock. Or I would, had we not completely forgotten Flea’s school bag. I realise just as we walk into the classroom and I see Flea's only carrying a frozen yoghurt and an apple. Bugger.
Friday: We remember everything. We totally rock. Until Flea
goes to a friend’s for a playdate after school and when I collect her (in her
miniature England kit) I forget to ask for her school uniform. Which is still in someone's hallway,
somewhere on the other side of Lancashire, I presume. Oh, and the Father’s Day card Flea spent all
week making? Is still in her drawer at school, so I had to do an emergency run
to M&S on Friday night to buy one instead. Gah.
Tell me it isn't just me, is it?
