Cannot Catch a Break
On the way to work yesterday morning a four wheel drive monstrosity driven by a trophy mum forced be into the hedgerow alongside the road. She had just passed a passing place, but I was just a bicycle – so she carried on. I didn't think much of it at the time, so carried on to work. When I came out of work yesterday evening I discovered a bike with very flat tyres.
After a panicked call home – because I was supposed to be arriving at the running club an hour later with Miss 19 for our weekly club run – my other half drove out to fetch me.
Arriving home in a blizzard of waterproofs, backpacks, coats, and bicycle helmets, I discovered Miss 19 in the dark of the study, waiting for me – wearing her running kit.
“I don't want to go”
I didn't hear her at first. She had such a small voice.
“What?”
“I don't want to go.”
My shoulders sank, while pulling up my socks and slipping running shoes on. While my other half tried to talk her around, I watched the clock tick inexorably past the time we would need to leave the house, and then began washing up, taking rubbish out – all the usual chores.
We ended up running on our own. It's worth noting that I'm still sick, and the cold has gone to my chest now – so any doctor worth their salt would have told me not to run under any circumstances. Balancing that against a daughter that would probably stop running altogether if I didn't go, I decided to risk it.
I'm still paying the price now. I have not been able to get my breath back properly for the last 24 hours. On top of that, just as I was about to leave work this evening the phone rang.
“You're not going to make it to the exam meeting at school are you?”
“What meeting?”
“The one I've been telling you about for months.”
(nobody has said anything to me)
“I'm leaving now”.
And that's how I found myself cycling home through the darkness, coughing like an idiot, before dumping my bag, spraying half a can of deodorant over myself, and setting off for the school on foot.
I'm home now. The meeting was attended by perhaps 25% of the parents. I really didn't need to be there. I still can't catch my breath properly – or at least, if I try to, I explode into a fit of coughing.
When will the world give me a break?