I am having a bit of difficulty with this whole authority thing. My recent circumstances have shown up, in very sharp focus, my complete aversion to being told what to do. It does ring a familiar bell, this rebellious streak. You won’t find my mother, for example, gasping in surprise to hear this. Nor my siblings or high school teachers. But somewhere along the way I learned a new type of formula that looked something like this:

Co-operative+Compliant  = Successful Adult Relationships
Capable +Insightful

My husband's extra-marital activities and corporate politics, among other recent events, have led me to believe that the above formula should look something more like this:

Co-operative+Compliant  = Being Screwed Over by Those in Successful Adult Relationships

Using my somewhat scanty knowledge of mathematical principles, I have come to believe that a more useful formula would perhaps look like this:

[(-Co-operative)= Uncooperative] + [(-Compliant)=Obstructionist]  = NOT Being Screwed Over by Those in Successful Adult Relationships THEREFORE

Uncooperative+Obstructionist  = NOT Being Screwed Over by Those in Successful Adult Relationships

Capable and Insightful are optional but largely irrelevant.

I thought about this a lot the other night when my 7 year old son was resisting, with particular energy, the idea of going to sleep. After I had pretty much forced him to do so, with the threat of being sold to cover the expenses of his birth and upbringing to date, he got into bed reluctantly. He was angry. He kicked his legs around and passionately swore never to hug me again. Feeling particularly noble, I thought about my recent reactions to 'being told what to do', and so decided that in order to have any integrity I should give him a choice. This is what followed.

Me: What do you think will happen if you don’t go to sleep now?
Him: I will carry on playing my Playstation game.
Me: Yes but how do you think you will feel tomorrow morning when it is time to wake up?
Him: Pretty much like I feel every morning when its time to wake up.
Me: I am sure you will be very tired and difficult to wake up. And you will be grumpy.
Him: But that’s okay. Everyone gets grumpy sometimes.
Me (getting desperate): Well, it is your choice. You can stay up, but if you are tired in the morning, and behave badly, you will not get a star and you wont get your Ipad (don't ask and don't judge - whatever you may think, one day you too will use overpriced gadgetry to bribe someone).
Him: (After a long pause). Okay.

He slipped out of bed. I heard the sounds of his Playstation game start up and decided to wait him out. I lay there, knowing that his guilt and the need to make good decisions would drive him back. A few minutes later I heard the patter of his barefoot feet. Relief washed over me. I shut my eyes, pretending to be asleep. Let him have the dignity of returning to bed without a self-righteous mother watching knowingly. I felt a tug at my hand, and opened my eyes. "Sorry mom" he says "I just need your cell phone".

After he was finally asleep, his tears at being forcibly dumped in his bed and having his eyelids held shut having dried on his beautiful cheeks, I realised a fundamental truth - somebody has to tell other people what to do. I just want to be the teller. That’s why consulting will suit me wonderfully.

The Dead Dachshund and the Beagles

Okay, so if you read my previous post you will know that Johnny the Dachshund puppy died under circumstances that could, with an ungenerous eye, be seen to be somewhat due to my dereliction of duty. I cried copiously, had him cremated at great expense, scattered his ashes with great ceremony, and woke up several nights in a row screaming "I came to get you but it was too late". A friend told me that it was for the best - that the last remnants of my Life With (Cheating) Husband were now gone (we had bought the puppy together in what was clearly a vain attempt to make our suburban lives look like the ones we saw in bad, but enjoyable, movies). I cried even more. My 7 year old son pondered the meaning of life and death, and wondered, often and aloud, whether Johnny would have died if he was inside. My 3 year old daughter, then 2 years old, was not verbal enough to say much. That would come later. When we bought the Beagles.

Sufficient time had passed for the mourning process to be complete, and for me to forget my solemn oaths never to love another living thing again. The children, I felt, needed to get back onto the proverbial horse. My daughter had taken to telling passing strangers that her dog was dead, eliciting coos of sympathy and sometimes even sugary treats from them. My son had taken to long monologues about Johnny's death and his profound loss, monologues that were worryingly free of any memories of the feral behaviour that had landed the dog outside on that warm summer evening to begin with.

And so one week ago I brought home Charlie and Lola - two gorgeous Beagle puppies who are going to restore our faith in the world again. This is clearly needed as the following conversation I had with my three year old daughter this morning will attest: 

(Puppies frolicking on the bedroom floor)
3 year old Daughter: Oh mommy, they are so cute.
Me: (Feeling smug and very Mommy-like) They are, aren't they?
3 year old Daughter: Can we get another one when they die?
Me: But darling, they are not going to die (unspoken "yet")
3 year old daughter: (Looking at me with disbelieving eyes) But the rain is coming.

Oh we fuck them up, even with puppies and love we fuck them up.

How My Life Became a Bad Country and Western Song

I'm getting divorced. My husband was having an affair with a very uptight and earnest colleague who wanted, I think, to save him from the domesticity of two kids, a dog, and a house in the suburbs. They are academics, you see. And domesticity is the death knell of academic mystique. Then the dog died. Really. He was a one year old daschund who apparently died of fright during a particularly loud storm. He was outside at the time, and by the time the thunder had woken me and I had gone to call him, it was clearly to late because he didn't come. He was outside because I hadn't had the time to train him and he had become undisciplined. Also because it was a warm summer night when I went to sleep and he hadn't cried to come in. It storms in summer where I live. And then I got a new boss. A very blonde, very young boss. Did I mention I have my Phd? I got it when I was an academic at the same University as my husband. The same one I had to leave so that I could get a real job and we could afford to keep the children. And then I turned forty.

And really, the only thing I could think of doing in response to all of this was to start this blog. Because it gets really exhausting putting an upbeat spin on everything so that people wont feel so sorry for me. Its hard work providing friends and colleagues with narrative 'outs'. It was easier with the cheating husband - he doesn't deserve me, I will look back and be grateful I got out when I did, I'm his third wife, you know. Not so easy with the daschund puppy. He was outside, you say? Warm summer night huh? Well I'm sure he is in a better place. When I told my friend we were getting two new puppies, his only response was "Don't leave these ones outside. I don't think the kids could take it again". By the time I got to the blonde boss all I could do was plaster a smile on my face and talk fondly of my graduation night and how air hostesses confuse me for the other kind of doctor.

So this is the place I can be a deserted, puppy-killing, forty year old corporate under dog. Without apology. Without any spin. Woohoo. Free at last.