Dammit, the man has a point

So I have this post I've been wanting to write ever since I got back from holiday and I haven't dared to write it and now I have a few glasses of vino in me and all of a sudden I feel brave. It may not be linguistically brilliant, and chances are I will delete it in the morning, but what do you expect when I use the word "vino" (italicized) in the first sentence? That pretty much sets the tone, don't you think?

Anyway, here's the thing: in the holidays, I was meeting my most wonderful friend - let's call him Igor - in London. He has been my friend since university when we used to meet in the middle of the night - both of us kept irregular hours - and walk the fields around Cambridge while discussing the world, its dog, and the fleas on its dog. It creates a bond, that kind of thing.

So there we are, sitting in the pub, and we have got past the particulars of how are the children, the wife, the husband, the house, the car, the job - you know, the whole inventory of young married life - and then he asks me how I'm doing and am I happy and he can tell I'm at peace but really isn't there anything else I want? And I'm all "No, I'm fine, I'm a wife, a mother, I will soon be a teacher again and I am learning not to ask too much of life." (This being, in my thoughts, the proper mindful line.)

And then he goes and throws this glass of metaphorical acid in my face by saying "Yes, that's all fine, and I'm sure you're a great mother, but what would make you really happy for yourself and what would you accomplish in your dreams?" And then I say (and I swear I only had a half of lager before food, and this was at least an hour later, so I can't even blame the drink) "I'd love to write a book." And then he's all like "You should live your life to the full, and your children should see you doing something you love and want to accomplish, and patati patata" and then I just want to kick him but also hug him.

Now, of course, I'm sitting in the sofa with a glass of wine thinking how many people who write better than I do have an unpublished novel or two sitting on their bookshelves, and how much I really don't need any more rejection in my life. But then again I suppose I could just write a book for the hell of it, or for my sister An (may she only have one sister who guilts her into reading her experimental novels because how many diplomatic responses can you think up and still sound genuine).

To top things off nicely, I also gave my lovely friend Igor the address of this blog (hi, Igor, don't know if you're still reading) which has caused me no end of fretting in the last week because a few most definitely female friends know about my alter ego, and my husband of course, but I have been mentally reviewing the topics I discuss and they are most definitely things I generally only discuss with my less hairy friends. I always say I wouldn't post anything I wouldn't be happy for everyone I know to read, but I think really what I've been doing is writing stuff that wouldn't make me die of embarrassment if my daddy read it, but it's still a lot more of my soul and other particulars than I would voluntarily share with most of the people I know. Even with my very bestest friends if they are, like, kind of - male. But there you go. I'm not going to change what I write, so I hope he can still look me in the face in the future.

Right. That's it. I needed to get that out, I think. I'll be hiding in the cupboard with a cup of tea.