We dawdled home as slowly as we could.
It has been nice to be with Lucy, but high-speed motoring down to Northamptonshire and back again does not feel very much like a holiday, even with champagne in the evening and A Game Of Thrones on the computer. We thought that we would like to feel rested and energised and mellow when we got home, and so we thought that we would tootle along slowly in order to squeeze as much holiday feeling out of the day as possible.
This is never really possible. The camper van works like an intergalactic black hole where time is concerned, sucking it up so that hours vanish in milliseconds, and coffee and a trot out to empty the dogs takes us until three o’ clock in the afternoon. No matter how we try and rush, no matter how carefully we plan things, it is always time to go home before we have even finished working out which way up we should hold the map.
We chugged along slowly in the sunshine, and went into Kendal so that I could have a haircut.
Usually I do not bother about this until my hair is so irritating that I am contemplating the dog clippers, but we have got to look smart quite a bit over the next few weeks, and my usual bird’s nest coiffeur does not qualify. I do not want to turn up to sponsored walks and summer balls and sports days looking like an electrified sheep.
Hence today the wonderful hairdresser clipped and snipped and combed until I was suitably shorn and tidy, and my head felt delightfully light and uncluttered. I bounded into town feeling relieved and free. I wish it was sartorially acceptable for elderly ladies to shave their heads, the way men can. Mark hardly needs to bother with shampoo, and all the rest of the faff, with hairdryers and conditioner and brushes, escapes him completely. Maybe when the children have left school and it won’t matter if I look astonishing.
We ambled about Kendal in the sunshine for a little while. If I had had thirty quid I would have purchased the most beautiful pair of shiny gold training shoes with blue and purple flowers embroidered all over them, but perhaps fortunately for my future appearances at school, we had spent everything already. We drove out to Staveley when our parking ticket ran out, and went for a stroll along the river, until guilt overcame us, and we had to go home.
When we got home there was a mysterious oblong box on the doormat, which turned out to be a large box of Hotel Chocolats addressed to Lord and Lady Ibbetson, and which were, the note explained, a token of Number Two Daughter’s affection.
We were very pleased about these, especially I was pleased, because I have got the sort of hormones that appreciate chocolate at the moment. Number Two Daughter is feeling pleased with the world at the moment, having just landed a job with a substantial wage packet. She is also in love and in the sunshine, which combination can hardly fail to put one in the very best of moods.
I am very glad she is having a good time, because it sort of balances out poor Number One Daughter, who is having a very difficult time this week.
Not only have the Army made the unexpected decision that she is going to be posted out to Afghanistan for the winter, when she made her way home where she could sulk about it in peace this evening, she discovered that Ritalin Boy has developed chicken pox. He is itchy and uncomfortable and I felt very sorry for him, there is nothing worse than an itch, and I speak as one who has just had a haircut.
She does not even have Number One Son-In-Law to pour tea and make sympathetic noises. He is on an oil rig and she is by herself.
Afghanistan is not ace. It has dreadful creatures called camel spiders which crawl into your boots and eat your feet, and it is cold and sandy in the winter. Compared to Woking, which is where she lives at the moment, it is a non-starter.
On the plus side she will save an absolute fortune because there is nothing whatsoever on which she could possibly spend her money. She will come back and look upon Sainsbury’s with happy wonderment.
It will not be until November, so at least she will not miss the summer.
I hope she has got some decent wine to help her evening along.
