Back to School

Well, this was going to be a deep and meaningful look back at the last six months, the first of Dot's life and by far the best of mine, before the world shifts on its axis tomorrow and I go back to work. I think I had something Important and Very Sentimental to say.

But the hubby seems to have got me a bit drunk on some expensive Zinfandel - probably in a bid to stave off the tears he's been dealing with at bedtime for the past few nights - and the serious stuff, whatever it was, eludes me.

In fact, he needn't have worried. As with most things, I think this going back to work business will turn out to have been far worse in the anticipation than it is in reality. Indeed, if motherhood has taught me anything it's to just bloody get on with things because not much turns out to be as hard as you thought it would be and even if it is, you soon get used to it and then it isn't so hard any more after all. So today, after weeks of hardly being able to look at Dot, let alone sing her a song or get a laugh out of her, without getting all wobbly-lipped (my friend Sally confessed she too has been being a complete drama queen about leaving Paloma, including not being able to look at holiday video clips without bawling. Sally, I'm with you) I suddenly came over all sanguine and no nonsense and decided that if I was going to be a working Mum I was going to try to a) enjoy it and b) be a damned good one.

So Dot and I had a lovely last afternoon with our neighbours in our little commune here in Brooklyn (we've spoken to our neighbours more in the past two days than in the other six years in NYC). Sarah, Peggy, Dot and I spent a jolly half hour in the local health food shop (we can't afford to join the co-op till one of us gets paid). Olive, who's 3 and lives upstairs, dropped in on the way home from school to play us a tune on the harmonica. Sarah then offered to let us add our compost to her bin and came up at 7 to collect the dirty nappies as pre-arranged. After dinner (organic sausages, mash and seasonally appropriate Swiss Chard), I set about sterilizing and packing bottles and breast pump for tomorrow, sorting out Dot's meals for the hubby, washing her toys, making my own packed lunch (didn't think I'd be doing take-out containers, did you?!), getting my school bag ready and selecting an outfit. I also had a little pep-talk with myself about going to the office and making this green thing work come hell or high water. I would even have polished my shoes had I not left the shoe polishing kit upstate.

But now I can't keep my eyes open and I know Dot'll be calling for food in a couple of hours so I'd better get my head down.

Tomorrow the next phase begins.

Wish me luck.