Husband decided that besides doing my yearly tax shit he would completely empty the contents of every single piece of paper work that I own and dump it the middle of the living room and sort it out. Window cleaning and washing down the huge Welsh Dresser and all its contents was included in this activity.

 

As you can imagine I was over the moon with suicidal feelings!

 

I do things bit by bit and slowly- he attacks chores the same way George Bush went into Iraq. The living room resembled downtown Baghdad, after crack addicted violent soldiers had been on a rampage

 

There was no piece of floor untouched by the mess and no where to actually step when I woke up. The sound of that fucking shredder had been going all morning, he shreds everything. I think he has just shredded my entire life. He then shredded all his own stuff and that included paper work going back to when we owned a bar together.

 

My husband would have been a valuable asset to President Nixon if only he had been old enough and American enough to be involved in US politics. This man leaves no trace of his existence; I swear if he dies I will be hard pushed to prove he was born!

 

“Go through all of those old diaries and see if there is any valuable info you need to keep” he shouted orders.

 

I looked at the shredder and wondered if it could take his big fat head.

 

So there I was washing windows, cleaning small ornamental cups and knick knacks and trying to work out if this is actually grounds for divorce. I hate this stuff.

 

There is an upside, he discovered amongst the many bank statements that people owe me cash…whoopee... now that’s a by product that I love.

 

Sometimes paper work and countless invoices get on top of you and you can get buried amongst it all and lose track.

 

That’s the great thing with emails; you can just delete them and keep the ones you need. Real paper work is fucking shit and I hate it.

 

Ashley was clever enough to fake sleep and hide in her room, which meanwhile does look like it had been bombed, fuck knows how she finds stuff in there…it scares even me. Her filing system is akin to just throwing her paper work high in the air and wherever it lands- is where it should be.

 

I am sure when she gets her own place she will be found starving and dying beneath DVD’s, letters, University work and underwear.

 

Husband is now in full Aspergic mode and as I write this he is continually holding up tiny pieces of paper and asking me to ‘Kill or Keep’…I am off to get drunk…and trust me…I don’t even drink. I may not be here in two days time, I am going to strap a canoe onto my back and fake my own death.

It was the year of punk that I met Louis Philippe. Well, we never actually met in person; he was my foreign pen pal; he lived in Portugal and we wrote to each other ever week.

 

I loved the letters. He cheered me up.

 

Dear Janey,

 

I am sitting on the beach today with my father. He owns a fishing boat and my sister and I help him on weekends. I am enjoying school and hope to get into the hotel business when I am older. I liked your photograph; you have a nice smile and lovely curly hair. Please write back.

 

Your dearest friend,

 

Louis

 

I thought Portugal was as far away as the moon back then. Living in the East End of Glasgow and lying in bed listening to God Save The Queen Sex Pistols style. Reading his wonderful letters made me feel somehow detached from the poverty and dirty bed sheets that smelt like bad eggs.

 

I never really told Louis about my true home life.

 

Dear Louis,

 

My mum is drunk but not too much as she couldn’t really afford to get totally pissed as she needed money to pay the fine after she got caught stealing the electricity.

 

Today I only had one slice of blue mouldy bread and a sausage that was clearly off as it tasted sour and my budgie died of hunger yesterday. I couldn’t afford bird seed and, though I tried to give it breadcrumbs, it refused to eat them. I feel so guilty that pigeons outside my window can still live and flap about yet I couldn’t even keep a wee bird alive. I buried it outside in the back garden and cried with shame. Then a cat tried to dig it up and I cried again.

 

No, I couldn’t write that, so I wrote…

 

Dear Louis,

 

Life in Glasgow is good. The weather is roasting hot and tar on the pavement outside melted and stuck to my sandals. I got quite burnt around the shoulders and my face hurts a wee bit. Hope you are happy in Portugal. Tell me your news.

 

Your pal,

 

Janey

 

Louis sent me a picture of himself. He was really handsome and looked all broody and dark haired. I wished I had a boy like that in Glasgow who was interested in me but, even at sixteen years old, I knew it was hopeless to assume any man would like me. I was flat chested, very plain looking and possessed hair so curly that the knots had to be cut out. I ended up looking like a clipped Shetland pony.

 

I continued my correspondence with Louis for months after that hot summer of ‘77 and, later that year, I started work. I bought boxes of bird seed with my wages and just kept putting the boxes under my mattress. I wasn’t sure why I kept buying them but they did mount up.

 

At night I dreamt about the wee blue bird that lay stiff on the cage floor. In my dreams, I would pile box upon box of seed into the cage. The seeds rattling through the thin metal bars would finally cover the bird and bury it.

 

Years fled past in a flurry of jobs and boyfriends. Louis and I kept in touch and Louis got married and I finally found a man who liked me just enough to put a ring on my finger.

 

I was 43 years old when I found Louis again.

 

It was in the strangest of circumstances. I was sitting in a hotel lobby in New York. I had been there on a working holiday. As a stand-up comic and radio broadcaster, I was working the comedy clubs in Manhattan and reporting back to the UK on Radio 5.

 

On the final morning of my trip, I was waiting for my taxi to take me to the airport at 6.00am. There was a man opposite me in the coffee bar who was also surrounded by luggage. We smiled at each other as we both reached for the sugar sachets. The café was empty except for us and the waitress.

 

We got chatting.

 

“I am from Portugal,” the tall, dark haired man said; he had flecks of grey at the temples and a nice face.

 

I was really tired and slightly bored; I wasn’t really up for chatting and swapping lives with some tourist.

 

I smiled and tried to think of anything I knew about Portugal: “I had a pen pal many years ago in Portugal,” I said as I sipped my coffee and watched the main door for the cab driver to arriveThe man smiled: “Well it’s a really big place, so I don’t think I will know her.”

 

I laughed and warmed to his sense of humour.

 

“Actually, it was a boy. He was called Louis Philippe. I can’t believe I even remember his name.” I shut my eyes and thought of the dark haired boy with big shy smile. My mind wandered back to the summer of 1977 when I used to rip open the blue air mail envelopes and I even pictured my wee blue budgie.

 

The man looked at me with curiosity, and then he laughed out loud and started wagging his finger at me: “That’s a joke - a good joke! How do you know my name?”

 

I stared at him: “I am sorry. I don’t know what you mean.”

 

He pulled out his passport and flicked through the pages and then thrust it at me: “My name is Louis Philippe.”

 

I sat bolt upright in my chair and looked at his passport and stared at his face. There was no way this could be the same person. my mind raced and tried to make sense of what was happening.

 

“Did you have a pen pal in Glasgow, Scotland when you were 16?”

 

The man sat there staring at me, his hands shook slightly and he sat up close and looked at me.

 

“You are Janey?”

 

“Yes, I am!”

 

I laughed out loud.

 

Just then, my taxi driver arrived.

 

We hugged and laughed, still both shocked at the amazing coincidence of the meeting.

 

“You always wrote nice letters and you were very cute, Janey. I spent years wondering what happened to your life. Are you happy Janey?” He spoke quickly as I grabbed my luggage.

 

“Yes, I am Louis. Are you happy?”

 

“Things have happened Janey, but I am good in my life and am going home to Portugal today to see my son.”

 

We stared at each other and, somehow, it just seemed right not to say any more.

 

 

And I walked off into the snowy streets of New York.

My daughter Ashley fell a few weeks ago when her trainer caught on the escalator of the underground tube train station and hurt herself. At the time it was just her knee that seemed to take the blow. But since that first week of December when the fall happened she has had chronic back pain.

 

She convinced herself she was dying of liver or kidney failure or ‘back cancer’ as she called it. This morning we went to the doctor (who has since stopped saying mmm…mmm…over the top of me speaking) and it seems Ashley has muscle spasms due to the fall and is now on anti-inflammatory drugs to help ease the pain.

 

Meanwhile we have convinced husband that we deserve to own a puppy.

He is distraught as he never really liked having animals around. He is not cruel to them, he just isn’t as enamoured by pets as Ashley and I are.

 

So we were all sitting on the sofa and Ashley talked me into getting a dog as husband made a whole orchestral arrangement of noises like tutting and huffing.

 

As I got more eager Ashley blurted out “I am not even going to get a fucking sea monkey out of this conversation am I?”

 

“Yes, we are getting a wee dog” I assured her.

 

Husband went foetal.

 

“Can we call it William Shatner?” she pleaded

 

“Yes, we are getting a dog and calling it William Shatner” I assured her.

 

So I am going to cat and dog home to get a puppy or a wee dog.

 

Watch this space.

I have a mole on the top of my shoulder at the back of my neck. I insisted that I would finally get it seen to as it has been itchy lately.

 

I made an appointment with the doc for 5pm and ran across the street in the driving freezing snow and sat in the Georgian drawing room that is my doctor’s waiting room. I was ten minutes early for the appointment.

 

I sat quietly and flicked through the People’s Friend magazine which is aimed at pensioners and blind or mad people to read. There is always a lovely wee watercolour of some Scottish landscape on the cover and loads of adverts for furry boots and novelty hot water bottles. It always features a short story about some middle aged pretty woman who is divorced and finds a swarthy man on Scafell pikes on a walking holiday. They end up in love and live in a cottage overlooking a lake.

 

I was quickly becoming brain dead…the clocked ticked loudly and everyone was getting taken before me into the doctors room and I was becoming impatient.

 

I am unable genetically to cope with waiting rooms. My mum was the same and my dad is even more tetchy about queues than me…I start bouncing off the walls if made to wait.

 

So I flicked through another Peoples Friend magazine and read about some other middle aged woman who met a dark handsome man on a painting retreat in Cornwall…for fucksake, who writes this shite? I flicked through recipes for scones and bakewell tarts and watched the clock hit 5.20pm.

 

I took three phone calls on my mobile and the receptionist came through and told me to turn the phone off!

“Look I am taking work calls and I should be out of here by now” I shouted back.

 

People tutted and I ignored them and read a recipe for a light Victoria sponge.

 

The clock hit 5.40pm and finally my name was called.

 

I jumped off the seat and ran to the door; the doctor was new to me. I have never seen this female before, but I didn’t care. I needed to get out of there as soon as possible.

 

I walked in and before she got to her desk I ripped off my scarf, pulled my jumper down and said “I have a mole, is it dangerous?”

 

She has this annoying habit of saying “Hmm Hmm” as you speak!

 

So I ignored her annoying tick and said “It’s been itchy” she said “Hmm Hmm” through my words.

 

“Ok you need to stop saying ‘Hmm Hmm’ every time I talk, please look at the mole” I snapped.

 

She looked at it and both of us was still standing as I didn’t want to sit down I had been there long enough for her to speak over me and as far as I was concerned that was fucking long enough.

 

“It’s not a melanoma…” she spoke.

 

I pulled on my scarf and said “Ok thanks bye” and left her room.

 

She came running after me “Would you like it frozen off?”

 

“It is dangerous or cancer?” I stopped in my tracks in the hallway.

 

“No” she answered.

 

“Then no, bye” I shouted as I walked into the frozen air as the door slammed behind me.

 

I was so annoyed at having to wait ages to get seen and all she could do was make noises as I spoke, I didn’t want a chit chat…no wonder she takes so bloody long with her patients.

 

I was raging with frustration at having to sit in that place for nearly an hour in that I went stir crazy. I stomped along the road and two young teenage Asian boys stopped me.

 

“Do you have cigarettes?” the taller one asked.

 

I was annoyed at being stopped in the cold “Yes I have loads in my bag, why?” I asked.

 

He looked at me in astonishment “Well can I have one?” he added.

 

I looked at him and his wee Asian friends all staring at me in anticipation.

 

“No” I said and walked off.

 

“You fucking whore!” he shouted.

 

“A whore with loads of cigarettes, get it right you fuck wit” I laughed and carried on home.

 

I may not have a cancerous mole, but this smoking may give me a cancer of a different kind.

 

I need to lighten up and stop being grumpy.

Husband and I spent the New Year bells watching TV and reading quietly. I had just come off stage at Glasgow Jongleurs. I was on Scottish television on their New Year show called ‘From SR to Lavvie Head’ it was all about famous advertisements.

We inadvertently clicked on and I saw my big fat face staring back at me and he quickly changed channels!

So we spent New Year watching Star Trek Voyager instead.

Ashley went out partying as all 21 year old should do.

I fell asleep and her dad waited up for her. She came home at 5am all giggly and drunk.

This morning I went into her bedroom and she wasn’t there, the bedroom did look as if it had been burgled, but that’s normal for Ashley’s room.
She has her own bathroom; it has no windows and is very cool and quiet, so I tried to check in there for her.

The door stuck and I realised she must be on the floor behind it, I didn’t panic as she often goes in there for a sleep on the floor if she feels ill. So I knew she must have been sick or hung-over.

Ashley has often slept on her bathroom floor since childhood.

She seems to feel happy in there with her head jammed between the toilet pan and the bath!

The door creaked open and one wee white hand reached out! It was like a scene from a hostage rescue.

“Are you ok baby?” I whispered to the dark crack in the door.

“Yes, I have vomited up a steak pie and bits choked me mum” she huskily answered.

She sat up and pulled the door open to let me in.

There was her Flintstones duvet and pillow all crumpled on the toilet floor, she looked like one of those poor illegal immigrants who hide in a box to get to freedom.

Her make up was streaked all down her face and her hair was tied up for vomiting purposes in a big bunch on the top of her head.

So I took a photo of her on my phone as it was too good an opportunity to miss and will be a great blackmail tool for future!

Vodka and champagne may not pass her lips for yet another year!