Opposite Sex

According to my children the opposite sex is disgusting. 

Whether or not they change, or have already changed, their views is not going to make a difference – I have a feeling they will be in outward denial for a long time.

They are constantly giving each other grief about some particular boy or girl in their class, rendering the poor victim pink-cheeked and vehemently denying the accusation.

The oldest came home from his second week at Intermediate with some big news:

“Mum, at the end of Year Eight, we have to ask a girl to dance!” he declared with repulsion.

“How do you know this?” I asked.

“Because some Year Eights on the bus told us.”

I’m not sure if they were just taking the Micky but I decided to go with it. His utter dismay was amusing.

“So who are you going to ask?”

“No one!” Then: “Can I take you?”

Well this was saying something, considering I’m one of those embarrassing mothers.

“Sure,” I beamed.

It’s actually a good thing my kids aren’t early bloomers, like some of their classmates who follow them round with crazed crushes, much to their embarrassment. Thankfully, Master Ten is way more into his cat, affectionately re-named “Baby Girl”, who can do no wrong in his eyes.

As soon as Bella (her real name) walks into the room, it’s like a celebrity has stepped into our midst.

“Baby Girl!” one will announce and they all jump off their perches in front of the square box to mob her.

Today at 1am there was an almighty crash and I leapt out of bed to investigate. Too blurry-eyed to find the crash casualty, I focused on the culprit instead: ‘Baby Girl’ leaping from the windowsill, having arrived, rather ungainly, through her Master’s window.

“Meow” she announced in her overly loud pitch, to which all the kids sat bolt upright in their beds and simultaneously called her. But Baby Girl was more interested in making a beeline for upstairs to check out the contents of her dish, before making her way back down to my bed to annoyingly lie across my face.

The next morning I remembered to mention to Master Ten to check for any carnage in his room. He returned a little sombre.

“Bella has broken all my Lego base and my big space ship – now I’m gonna have to start again.”

It was true – his room is Lego Central and hours and hours of work had been destroyed in an instant.

But unlike when I accidentally broke his Lego jet boat while doing the hoovering one day, after which he didn’t speak to me for several hours, apart from reverting to her full name, his prized cat went unpunished.

Nevertheless, even if I am second-best in his eyes, at least Baby Girl won’t be accompanying him to the school dance, if indeed there is such a thing.