I am a big old prude, it’s fair to say. I don’t like discussing rudery, I won’t go bra-less and I hate it when I have to explain the excruciating facts of life to children – either my own or those in a Science class. You have never seen blushes akin to those I sported when I was made to front a Year 8 Sex Ed class when I was 7 months pregnant. That was pure, hilarious hell.
It is also fair to note that when it comes to the subject of S.E.X. I am by no means… fluent. I find it awkward!
Oh, I can play the game! I can flirt and I can be something of a minx when necessary -or when safe to do so. It’s fun! But life is busy, work and stress* intervene and let’s just say that Big Seymour is a patient man. Also, I am now quite old.
But a complete drought there is not. I will not have it said.
So, imagine a scenario when maybe, just maybe, one has a small amount of energy very late at night. One is confident that all the Little Seymours are otherwise occupied or preferably fast asleep and one starts to proceed with caution, shutting doors and listening out and then BOOM! The door bursts open, and a child who shall remain nameless stands there in the dark, and in a booming voice declares “I know what you are doing! I can hear you! You have ruined my day!” and then proceeds to stand there for another five minutes in the pitch black and silence, whilst we both lay stock still, chastised and contemplating our next moves.
In the end I stayed mute. I was, after all, “asleep at the time”, according to the statement I have since made in my head. I may even have had my headphones on. Big Seymour said nothing to incriminate himself either. He must also have been *asleep*.
The Seymour Child that was clearly on the prowl for parental misdemeanours was vigilant – but saw nothing . There was nothing to see. Nothing doing. That is our story and we are sticking to it. But can I just ask: what sort of child with fears that parents actually have some sort of physical relationship would go looking for evidence? What would be the benefit of catching one’s folks in flagrante? Surely, of all the things that child is worried about, then seeing such horror would be at the top of a list? Why risk it? Why snoop?
The most worrying notion to come out of this episode of the Seymours’ sitcom life is that the thing that alerted said child was not the sound of headboards or (God-forbid!) moaning, but talking. Big Seymour and I were actually laughing and communicating in bed at night, instead of ignoring each other. And thus, we were in trouble.
I have spent the day feeling a whole variety of emotions on this Mothers’ Day. I feel annoyed that I have no privacy: proud that Big Seymour and I can still “laugh in bed”, in spite of the challenges life throws at us all. I feel humiliated and chastened by a midnight telling-off, and I feel confused: what is the right way to behave in your forties?
If I think back to how awkward I was as a kid, then I recall that any kind of sex terrified me. (Have I told you I thought I was pregnant for two years (!) after a randy springer humped my leg?) What my disgruntled child doesn’t realise, therefore, is that it’s a miracle she’s here at all. Mothers’ Day? I know there are all kinds of mothers out there, but most of them have to be initiated into the sisterhood by some kind of bonking. And whilst I tell them the Little Seymours that they all came from The Baby Shop, they may have now sussed the unpalatable truth.
This post was hard to share, but it sums life up at the moment: essentially, I am always upsetting someone! But life is rich and life is interesting and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
I am grateful!
Happy Mothers’ Day, all you bonkers!
Just a little crab picture by Mini Seymour. For no reason.
*last week’s source of stress? Plotting to buy a house with Japanese Knotweed. As you do.
0 Comments