perioddrama
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Period Drama
Still here
I don't really have time to blog anymore. Which is a shame, because I enjoyed it, especially the rows, often with myself. But I still occasionally look at Don't mention the skiing, and a recent comment from her reminded me that I should log in here and try to make the blog visible again. Who knows - maybe I'll even spend some time making it look presentable? A fair while back I intended to return to this blog and start writing again. Honest I did. But I managed to get my fucking wife pregnant - which was great for 9 months worth of peace, but shite for the raw material needed for this blog as you can imagine. She's making up for it now, but then I am lucky enough to have another beautiful daughter now to compensate for the curse my wife, and I, share. If you're at all interested, I think my wife is getting worse, not better. She's even more of a control freak now during her periods, and the almost funny thing now is she can't control it in front of other people. So where I used to be the target, now everyone is! It's fantastic to watch jaws drop while my hormonal wife just says what's on her mind. It's like a form of tourettes syndrome, the swearing, the emotion, the compulsion. I'm living a car crash and both my legs have been broken and I can't drag myself over to the verge to die. I will have to get round to making visible again all the other blogs I used to write, some in partnership and some alone. Some of you knew a lot of 20six blogs had the same author/s but I wonder if anyone - with the possible exception of H, ever guessed how many different blogs were actually by the same bloggers? It must have been nearly 15 or so I think. Fucking hell we deserved an award for services to blogging, during the golden age of blogging no less. But this was the first. And much like a serial killer, the first crime always reveals more about the perpetrator than the subsequent offences. This was local, personal and above all true. Oh fuck was it true! The tears, the camping, it's still fucking true now and I'm still here and she's still bleeding. Maybe I'll see you soon. Maybe here, perhaps some where else. PD
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Happy Birthday Chestnut Tree
We live, or more accurately exist, in an old-fashioned house typical of some English towns a century ago. Inside we've modernised obviously, I'm something of a new man, with electricity, running water, a fridge-freezer, colour television and all manner of time-saving gadgets but I still make my wife walk 5 miles to the river and use a mangle for washing and drying. In every other respect, however, the interior is reasonably up to date.
This preface is to introduce our typically English garden. Like an Edwardian cock, you have to admire the length and ignore the width.
At the bottom of our garden, is a huge chestnut tree. That tree is 50 years old today. I know you are probably wondering how on earth I can know such a thing, but the fact is this house has only had one family live in it, three different generations since 1902 when it was built. The tree was planted on this day, fifty years past, when the grandson of the original owner, and the person who sold it to us, was born. It was he who proudly detailed the tree's heritage. Besides that, I had it carbon dated, this is the English property market after all, if he could lie about the tree, what else would he try and stitch me up with?
The area around the tree, was something dark, dank and foreboding. Two rotten sheds, a bowed but unbeaten collection of fence panels, looking like they'd been press-ganged unwillingly into action, and a flower bed with a brick surround that I suspected held various remains of pets or other such wonders.
Now I'm not a gardener. I barely know the difference between a weed and a flower. I once weeded a small area and removed all the flowers but left all the weeds, by virtue of leaving everything that was flowering there and anything that just looked green and boring I was yanking like a two-bit whore in a crack-rush. My wife claims I "did it on purpose" in order to be released from weeding duties again. But if so it didn't work, because now she supervises with industrial strength language.
So despite my lack of skills, I do try, and I'm good for manual labour. Jobs such as clearing areas of all their rubbish, that I can do. So the area around the tree became my small project this year. It took me three weekends, and a hired skip, to do it, but I managed to remove 2 sheds, half a tonne of concrete and bricks, I got a tree surgeon in to cut back many of the branches and give the tree a health check, I completely de-planted everything around the tree for about 40 square metres and dug it over, and then I bought some weed control matting and covered the entire area with that. I laid some paving stones to make a small, lazy (how apt) path around the tree, a bench, and bark chippings (the shredded remains of the branches as provided by the tree surgeon - how ecologically sound.) It's probably ever so dated and out of garden-fashion, but it looks ok to me, with sun light dappling through the newly shorn branches and leaves, a woodland feel to the previously dark end of the garden, somewhere nice to sit and read a book, and an area that I plan to put a swing for my 5 year old daughter.
Now during the 3 weekends of this project, and bearing in mind that I worked on it for 8 hours on at least 4 of those days, my wife made various comments as to it's progress. She loved it at first, there were minor criticisms obviously, she wouldn't be my darling wife without those.
"You've only dug down 3 feet? You never wanted to do this anyway did you?"
But there were some compliments too.
And then came along the herbaceous period, bloody distemperia, named in honour of cranky menstrual gardeners everywhere, and suddenly nothing was right.
But the absolute worst, the one thing which kicked everything else into touch, was the positioning of the weed matting. Or to give it it's full title, weed control matting.
It is supposed to let moisture and goodness through to the soil beneath, but inhibits anything growing through it, like weeds for instance, wanted plants should be pulled through small cuts in it, rather like a swimming-cap hair-colouring operation.
In the midst of her interior walls crumbling one weekend, she decided to examine at close detail the laying of the matting. Allegedly, I had left a gap of one to two inches uncovered by this matting by the right-hand side fence. That one to two inches of uncovered area includes underneath the fence panels too I should add.
"You are fucking joking aren't you?" She asked me, standing there, pointing aimlessly at the futility of my matting.
"What? What's wrong with that?" I asked.
"Oh just a HUGE fucking gap where all the weeds are going to come through. And I suppose it will be ME doing the weeding as per usual." she accused.
"That's not a huge gap. It's just a slight edge by the fence. I'll stick some more bark chippings over it."
"yeah, that's it, take the easy way out, don't do it properly will you?"
"It's not that bad sweetheart." I said.
"Look at it, here and here, it's terrible, we're going to get weeds all over the place there." She said, pointing.
"Look, it's fucking weed control matting at the end of a garden, not fucking ground zero nuclear zone where nothing is ever supposed to grow again."
"No need to get sarcastic." She stated.
"Have you any idea of how hard I have worked for 3 fucking weekends doing this?"
"Oh yeah, really hard, you should try looking after a 5 year old."
"I do." I said. "And I love doing it." I certainly don't bitch about it like you do I thought.
"What are you going to do about this area then?" She asked.
"I'm going to fucking concrete the garden."
"Don't be stupid."
"No fuck it, I'm sick of these bastard weeds. Let's be done with it all, just fucking concrete the lot and make it look like a fucking carpark. As long as you don't have to pull a weed up we can be happy."
"Now you are just taking it too far, you always have to over-react." she said.
And as she walked away, I could see her shaking her head. Later on she was on the phone to one of her friends. I heard her relate what I'd been doing in the garden. She said it "looked ok, but he's only done half a job as usual... oh I know... men!"
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Chips with everything
No matter how hard I try, there are sometimes occasions when a menstrual wife just has to offer hostility. Take a previous period in our history for instance, which co-incided with a weekend.
I'd made valiant efforts throughout the (satur)day to avoid the conflict which can arise, and we found ourselves in the evening, wondering what to eat.
She remarked that what she really "fancied" was a nice chinese take-away and a bottle of wine.
And I, being the dutiful and loving husband that I am, provided it.
She made her order, which was for a number of things, but which included egg fried rice and smoked chicken at it's core, and a "few chips." Until that point, I hadn't considered having chips, but then I remembered that the local take-away does indeed do a most excellent chip, and having eaten a number of rice and salad based meals that week I thought, fuck it, have some chips, you deserve it, even your skinny within deserves it.
This information was relayed to her, and at that point in the proceedings the understandings were thus:
Chips for her were a side issue.
Chips for me were a main porky part of the meal.
Now, some thirty minutes or so later, the chinese order arrived, and the divvying up of the food began.
She was served first, her rice and chicken that is. Seated at the table, I began to serve my own food.
I opened the delightful brown paper bag containing the chips, and put some on my plate.
She watched me do this and a strange look came over her face. Then she said:
"Oh.. ok, why don't you just take all the chips from the top of the bag?"
"sorry?" I began, not really understanding the complaint but hearing the vehemence in her voice.
"I said why don't you take the chips from the top of the bag and leave me with the horrible ones at the bottom."
I looked in the bag, and I looked at my plate. There didn't appear to be any material differences in chip quality between the two locations.
Ire rising, I replied:
"I'm sorry sweetheart, I haven't yet learnt how to put the chips from the bottom of the bag on the plate first, how stupid of me."
Now of course, I think maybe I should have just cut open the bottom of the bag with a sharp knife, rather like someone gutting a shark to see the contents of the stomach, and then I could have let the allegedly inferior chips just fall on the plate, along with an assortment of number plates or whatever other objects are always found inside sharks.
But at that time I wasn't thinking so clearly. I just felt this sense of despair. She was by now very angry. Offers to "take these chips then", which were at that point untouched, were refused with a fuck off I don't want any chips now.
There are things that seem worth getting worked up about and things that do not. I put it to you, members of the jury, that a husband who hasn't yet learned how to serve the low-lying chips in a bag without first emptying the upper strata of chips is perhaps guilty of something, ignorance, stupidity even, but not anything worth turning into a major fuss.
But a major fuss was had, one which required a 3-hour-long strop. And all because I was selfish.
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Comeback
I wanted to explain a little more about the reasons for restarting blogging.
Last year I wrote a blog for a few months about my relationship, and particularly how it fared according to where it was in my wife's monthly cycle. It struck a chord with a few, made a couple of people laugh, and then I upset a few others. And then I left.
If you had asked me even 2 months ago about blogging again, and some kind but obviously deluded soul did indeed do that, I would have replied I would never come this way again. At that time, I didn't really know what would be happening with my marriage. I'm not even going to bother describing the absolute turmoil and gut-wrenching, stomach-churning pit of misery I found myself in during various points of the last year, because words are useless, we all know that. Nearly all the trouble I've ever found myself in has been a result of words, my own usually, like I love you, or will you marry me, or go on then I'll have another.
It's enough to say that my wife and I spent some months apart and we are back together now. There is an acceptance from both of us that we will always have a shit relationship, the odd high punctured by regular absolute lows. We do not and probably will not ever understand each other. We argue, we bicker, we bring a thousand slights to the most trivial of conversations, we bring a history of hatred and love to making the tea, to the anniversary of each and every day, but we also know we are better together than apart.
In some ways that is almost liberating. We no longer try to work out where we have gone wrong, (well ok - I do) we just shout and get it over with. We took off for a holiday, a second honeymoon if you will, which was a mixture of comedy and disaster. But we came through it. The children are happy. My wife is probably as happy as she will ever let herself be, and I'm not sad. There are many people out there with better relationships, but I do not envy them, not really.
I made a commitment that I take seriously. I don't feel that I am entitled to seek happiness or even less misery elsewhere just because we are fucked up. You can't tell someone you will always be there and then leave when it gets tough. So I came back. I still have to stand one step removed from the ridiculous things we fight about, but I also know that the woman I love loves me the best way she knows how. I make her mad, but I also make her laugh. I've found out more about her in these past few months. Some of the things I've found out I wouldn't have chosen to, but there is no undoing knowledge. I guess they at least help explain the anger in her core. Maybe one day we will put those things away and never visit them again.
But the reason for restarting the blog? It's the same as it was last year, I need the outlet. I have to play it reasonably carefully, because it would be easy to let the outlet define the relationship. If I'm honest there was one very specific small incident which convinced me I should start the blog again, and that was a young girl smiling at my wife and I bickering over a coffee bought at a station. My wife is one of those people who sometimes takes coffee with sugar and sometimes without. So I asked her if she wanted a sugar, having already picked up a couple of the meagre sachets.
"Just one" she replied. And then she looked at the two already in my hand.
"Just one sugar" she says again, but louder.
"No! Just one SUGAR" she shouts.
"The other one is for me ok?" I say. And I look round to see this young girl smiling and holding up one finger as she mouths just one sugar at me in amused chastisement. I laughed, and it reminded that there is always humour there. That the everyday mundane actions of two probably unsuitable souls who can't live apart does at least have the capacity to make others smile. I enjoyed that about writing this before. I'm hoping I can enjoy that again.
I'm not sure how regular the updates will be. But quite frankly who gives a fuck? I'm not doing this for you. This is for me. I deserve it.
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Scene not heard.
Scene: A garden, somewhere in England.
Cast: Mrs PD, Mr PD and little PD.
The remains of the day are filtered through an old established chestnut tree. Mr PD is clearing the bottom of the garden. Mrs PD is weeding a small flower bed. Little PD is bouncing up and down on a trampoline dressed as a princess:
Little PD: "Daddy, I'm going to be Snow White, you can be the handsome prince, and mummy can be the wicked, ugly, stepmother!"
Mrs PD: "Charming!"
Mr PD: "That's not very nice sweetheart, that's called typecasting."
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Scooby Snacks
So I would hazard a guess that if any of you read this before, you are thinking, Hey Mr PD man, you must have had some classic arguments since we last heard from you.
You're right.
Arguments over how to make a ham sandwich for instance.
Picture a scene of domestic bliss, chez PD. It's sunday evening. Families across the land are preparing themselves for the return to work and school that Monday heralds.
Mr & Mrs PD are having a cuddle on the sofa. That's right, we were getting on well. And so, whatever godforsaken home improvement show we were watching finished, and we went to the kitchen, put the kettle on, and began to empty the dishwasher.
"Do you want to make the packed lunches for the kids?" says Mrs PD.
"Ok." I reply.
"Use the white bread" she says, "no, not the new loaf, use up the other one first."
"Ah ok, sorry didn't see it properly." I say.
"What do you reckon, cheese or ham?" I ask, in pleasant tone.
"Erm, ham."
"ok."
I take two slices of bread from the loaf, then realise I haven't got the butter.
"Put 2 slices of ham in."
"ok" I agree.
The sandwich making begins in earnest. I've made a few sandwiches in my time, so I like to think I know what I'm doing. It is a relatively simple affair, at least in terms of making a plain ham sandwich you would think.
"What the fuck are you doing?" she begins.
"What?" I ask.
"Why are you putting 2 slices of ham in?"
"Erm - because you told me to?"
"No I didn't."
"You said put two slices of ham in."
"I said put one slice of ham in."
It's at this point that I should point out she may well have been right. If you look above, you will see that I have written her words as:
"Put two slices of ham in."
And that's because she said something about the ham that I didn't hear properly because I had my head in the fridge under the worktop. Because it was at that point that I bent down to get the butter. I distinctly heard her say "put" then I didn't hear the next word but thought I heard "slices of ham in". So rather than ask her what she said, I just said ok, and thought, hmmm, what did she say, she must have said put two slices of ham in. No one says make a ham sandwich, and put one slice of ham in, because there has got to be at least one slice of ham in it to make it a fucking ham sandwich hasn't there? And unless you are in the habit of making multi-sliced fucking scooby doo and shaggy snacks, any instructions as to limiting the amount of ham that's going in the fucking sandwich are surely superfluous.
So I say:
"Why would you tell me to put one slice of ham in? It doesn't make sense sweetheart?
"I was just telling you how to do it."
"Do you really think I can't make a ham sandwich?" I say, beginning to laugh.
"What is your problem?" she replies. "I'm just saying I only said to put one slice of ham in."
"Well yeah I figured that any ham sandwich should surely have at least one slice of ham in it. That's why I thought if you were telling me how much to put in, well surely you must have said put two slices in? Sorry I must have misheard you." I explain.
Now, to me, I think I have explained my flagrant misuse of the ham. But she doesn't agree.
"You're such a contrary bastard." she says, before looking at the sandwich again and adding: "Why are you cutting it into 4?"
"Er it's just what I'm doing."
"She's not a baby."
I start to laugh again. "It's not baby-ish, I'm just making sure it goes in her lunch box."
"Honestly I should have made this fucking sandwich myself." she says.
"yep I think you should." I agree.
So the sandwich is made, and I ask her if she understands what I was saying, that it didn't make sense to me to be told put one slice of ham in a sandwich. Because I'm looking at her face, and it's set in such a way that I really don't think she appreciates the point I am trying to make.
"You are doing my head in now." she replies. "Here, let me finish doing the packed lunches."
"Ok" It seems safer after all.
So I take over dish-washer-emptying duties in time for the big saucepans, which never ever fucking dry properly, there's always a bastard bit of water waiting to drop from somewhere as soon as you pick it up.
I put the pans away in the cupboard where they go. First the lids, then the pans themselves. Then I close the cupboard door.
She reaches down, opens it again, and says:
"You can't even put the pans in the right place."
I begin to disagree "How's that wrong? - the lids are with the lids and the pans are together."
"I've got a system for doing them, I sorted that cupboard out so everything has a place. You think I'm just sitting on my arse all day, but I'm sorting things like that out, but you never say oh thanks well done."
"And after you completed this pan system, what did you do next, invent a fucking cure for cancer?" I say.
"Fuck off." She said, leaving the room.
Status: Period Incoming.
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No Favouritos
Hey PD man, why did ya delete ya favouritos?
It's been a while hasn't it? I'm starting clean. Most of those favourites are probably gone anyway, to the land that bloggers go when they are no longer blogging. I think it's called itsmylimboland. Or something like that anyway.
And if you were on there, and you are still active, and I strongly suspect that Don't mention the ski-ing is, then do not fret. Because I shall find you again, and put you back on there if you are worth it.
G'night campers.
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