What A Poor Reception.

I have just realised that television is terrible for my creative Chi, in particular that BOGOFF advert for windows. It is the Yoko Ono to my flow. I feel like Coleridge writing Kubla Khan, without the opiates and laziness.

So, recently a friend of mine got married. Everyone is getting married at the minute, making me feel like a spinster at the tender age of twenty-two. Sadly I don't fit the stereotype due to my allergy to cats. Another thing about all of these weddings, I'm never invited to them. Boo. Even Tom didnt invite me, which is probably for the best considering even his great friends snickered cruelly at the question "Does anyone have a reason for these two not to be wed? Speak now or forever hold your peace." The thing is, a lot of them are not a fan of his recently made honest woman. After many rumours abounding about her secretly coming off the pill to trap him into marriage, trying it on with his close friend (who looks a bit like Richard Hammond, a strange sex symbol for many women) and being found in bed with said friend, and also him not allowed to go out without her, it became difficult for Tom's friends to warm to the supposed love of his life.

At the reception was a bizarre oppressive atmosphere which mirrored the muggy weather (to sound like a J.G Ballard novel). I arrived with my twin sister Gemma, her fiance James and their 15 month old son and I stayed with them for the evening, not feeling comfortable enough to mingle. Reason number one for this was the lightly flickered sneers and slightly slitted eyes from the women at the sight of my dress; a long, black, clinging number that fell to the floor yet had a slit that reached halfway up my thigh. At least I wasn't wearing a short white mini-dress like one self absorbed girl, a huge faux pas in the wedding rules.

Reason number two was the brides distance towards me and my next of kin. We got a brief "Hello" upon our arrival as she raced to the toilets but for the rest of the evening she would try to pass us, with her head down and her feet racing. This, I was told, was probably her insecurities about Tom's crush on me in college a mere FIVE YEARS AGO. Hardly the same situation as Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston is it? For a start, as nice as he is, my friend is no Brad Pitt and even if he was I doubt I would be interested. Out of all of them I'd probably take Jennifer. That's not a metaphor for me finding Tom's wife attractive, but is my own opinion that Jennifer seems a nice, witty, charming and attractive woman with few emotional hang-ups. Anyway, the overall point is that I am not a man eater or man stealer, especially on the couple's wedding day!

This all brings me to the question "Why are so many of my school and college friends getting married so quickly?" The most recent additions into the land of wedded bliss had only known each other a couple of years and with a background so fractured with insecurities I wonder why did they do it? My sister and I have noted this couples severe lack of understanding of each others humour, with the younger wife appearing frustrated with her husbands jokes and puns. If you don't have laughs to pull you through the hard times what else is there?

My sister has been with her fiance for eight years, since they were both in high school. Through their long relationship they have never broken up or got with other people, despite some nasty rows. They know and accept each others faults, are fiercely loyal to one another, bicker frequently so issues rarely build up and have a similar humour that can change a growing feud into laughter. Their son was wanted by both of them and is well provided for thanks to James's career in I.T. Nothing in their relationship or wedding plans has been rushed, they are together out of love for one another and wanting to have a life together. In this day and age their love is rare. It is not for me to say that my friend married for the wrong reasons and if he is happy I am happy for him but if I personally had to choose between the tortoise or the hare I'd take the tortoise every time.

The Earliest Memory.

I am part of an imperfect and easily broken circle in the darkened lounge of my parents first home. No, this is not a seance. My Nanny, twin sister, Gemma and cousin Julie are holding hands as we sing "Ring a ring of roses". Despite the song being about the plague killing thousands of people we are in good spirits. My sister and I are very young, with large fringes that start at the back of our head and are wearing nighties that show off our bruised match stick legs. The bruises are from typical clumsy and hyperactive activity, not from being beaten with a big stick or other such atrocities heard on the childline adverts.

Nanny does not have any hair on her head and we are too young to understand why. This means that instead of being allowed to fall into despair about the cancer in her womb, my Nanny is forced into playing games like Buzzy Buzzy Bumble Bees and singing nursery songs with her grandchildren. When we sing the final line of the song; "We all fall down!" Gemma, Julie and I fall to the floor and we all burst into giggles.

My cousin Julie, still laughing, takes both our hands and helps us up. She is a pretty, blonde haired child with a pock scar between her eyes. Recently she snipped the piece of flesh between her top gum and lip which has left her with a scabby and sore red flap in its place. Julie is the prime example of a child who suffered poor parenting. With no one to willingly pay her attention she would thrust herself into the limelight throughout her childhood and teenage years for such things as stealing, balancing on the sixth floor of a block of flats, hacking away at her hair, fighting, gallavanting around with older men and eventually falling pregnant at thirteen, choosing to keep the baby and running away.

We start rotating again and my Nanny looks tired but happy. Later in life she'd become a gossiping hypochondriac, old before her time, who would tell us every Christmas "Your poor old Nana won't be here this time next year." despite having a clean bill of health. Obsessed with soap opera's she would try to cause those dramas in her own life. This would alienate her from some of her children and snatch away any trust her family had with confiding in her. None of this matters in my earliest memory though. We are all happy, frozen in time, united in a circle of roses.

Rounders, Sausage, Chips and Beans.

I am six years old and have been called in for lunch with my cousin Alex and my twin sister Gemma. My brother is a baby and is therefore too young to play rounders with us, which thus makes him irrelevant. We are puffing our cheeks out, red in the face with exertion and dispute. Alex had cheated and hit the ball on a "No Ball" and, ignoring our shouts, had ran and kept running as we desperately tried to release the ball from its jail in the rose bush. He had completed five home runs by the time we got the ball and was beaming like a con man who had just ripped off his third old lady that day. The problem was we weren't doddery old women, we were stubborn six year olds who were not willing to let this go.

"Just let it go, will you?" said my Mum, clearly not understanding the politics of youth. What did she know anyway, with her crazy Michael Jackson perm and checkered lumberjack shirts. No wonder women would wink at her in the streets. We scowled at her as we walked through the salloon doors that allowed us into the kitchen.

Sitting at the table, we saw laid before us was one of our favourite meals: sausage, chips and beans. Unfortunately Alex had a speech impediment that caused him to stutter and repeat the word "and". When he saw this glorious feast he excitedly shouted "Wow! Sausage andandandandandandandand chips andandandandanandand beans!" With a meal like that, ours was clearly a health conscious house hold.

Ecstatic, we used our fingers to pick up the soft and slightly greasy chips and asked Mum to put the radio on. She obliged, squinting as she fiddled with the radio as the sun glared at her through the window. The radio came to life with the croons of Wet Wet Wet's 'Wishing I Was Lucky'. We jumped down from our chairs, united in our love for 90's music and danced around the table, picking up a chip or sausage as we skipped passed our plates. We never picked up the beans though, what do you think we were, animals?

Alex's favourite song came on. It was Ace of Base "All That She Wants" which made us dance faster and sing louder despite the low tempo of the song. My Father, who has never been a fan of children making noise, stomped through the salloon doors and looked us all in the eyes, his own slit. With a fag placed effortlessy between his lips he looked like a cowboy about to tell some no good varmints to skeedaddle. In his Scottish voice (which was terrifying for its intelligabilty) he ordered us to "Sit doon" and eat our dinner properly.

We fell silent, sat in an orderly fashion and bowed our heads. The cowboy took stage exit one, sucking the joy out of the room with him, leaving us with a smog of sulleness.

"At least I hit five runs today." said Alex.

What Makes A Memoir?

I have no idea...

Honesty? Purging to excess? The bullimic child weeping inside us all, holding it all in, gorging on our woes until we vent every thought and feeling. Page upon page splurged with the blob of reality which we bend to our will. In memoirs, our opinion is fact.

The 1900's were all for the cult of the 'beautiful child' but these days we are all for the child that is beaten black and blue. The child who is told he or she is "ugly" or an "it" only for said child to rise up, up into a brilliant and outstanding member of society.

That's what we all want isn't it? The under dog dog gone done good and making it big. Why the Hell not? As long as they have a sob story that ends with a smile we love them.

I read "Ugly" by Constance Briscoe last Summer. She suffered mental, physical and sexual abuse from her own Mother. Apparently the book is a lie. Constance Briscoe saw a buck could be made from being a child treated appalingly and ran with it. Part of me thinks "How could she?" and the other part thinks "Clever bitch. Why didn't I jump on the bandwagon?"

Other novelists take another view on the memoir genre and mock the "Poor me" genre. Look at Bill Bryson's 'The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid'. Funny guy, old Bill.

That is about all I know about memoirs. Sad looking kids on front covers, sitting in corners or covering their faces. Will we grow cynical of it? Probably, which is why I am making my own wagon made of rubber bands: The memoir of me. I didn't get pulled about by my nipples or fan of China, I didn't get locked under the stairs for days at a time and I didn't go on the game at four. I had a typically English family life mixed with the eccentricities that go on behind most doors. I guess that will just have to do.