I have got anxiety.
This is because the rest of my university class are posting their homework enthusiastically on the Virtual Learning website, and I have not even started to think about it yet.
I did not even know about it until the first people started to put theirs online, and since then I have been in a terrific flap.
I am going to go home and get it done.
This is not as impossible as it might sound, because we are actually on the way home even as I write. We left Number One Daughter’s house this morning, and Lucy’s house about twenty minutes ago.
I was sorry to leave them behind. I always feel as though I ought to rush round after them, clucking, and gathering them up under my wings, even though I know perfectly well that they think I am a mildly tiresome incompetent, and are very pleased to see me buzz off so that they can get on with their own, tidily ordered, satisfactory lives in peace.
Lucy is going to a wedding tomorrow and was very pleased to see us go. She has got a party dress to polish, and obviously wishes to wash her hair and think about ear rings.
Number One Daughter has got plenty to do as well. Ritalin Boy has done an entrance exam for his secondary school this week. This is an all-boys affair run by monks, and which sounds perfect to me. It was a difficult exam, and so we do not know how he has gone on, and we have all crossed everything and hoped.
Even if they do not want him, I expect he will soon find somewhere that does. It is sad that they are such a long way south, because Gordonstoun especially likes reckless enthusiasts like Ritalin Boy, and tries to encourage them to apply. He would have a very good time there, except that he could not possibly find anywhere further away. Surrey is a very long drive from Inverness, and I think that it is probably too far for a person who is only ten, even with Oliver being there as well.
I am not exactly sure when Oliver will be going back to school at the moment. We were supposed to be setting off on Sunday night after work, and then two days ago we got an email telling us that the Scottish Government were making them do online lessons for the first week, so we were to stay at home. Then this morning we got another email telling us that the Scottish Government had changed their minds, and so he could come back if he liked and not if he didn’t.
We had to read them all several times before we understood what they were talking about, and frankly I am still not sure that I do.
He has got online lessons every day from Wednesday onwards, so we can’t travel then. It will have to be either before then or next weekend, when we are supposed to be at work.
This has thrown us into another complete flap, because obviously Oliver wants to go back as soon as he can, but I have got an awful lot of work that I need to do for my course, and I had thought I would take the extra days and do it.
I will have to get on with it tomorrow.
LATER NOTE:
It is long into the night, and we are home at long last, having arrived into the dark silence of Windermere at just before midnight.
It is not much like London.
London is finally over. I have thrown away all of the lists of Things To Do Before We Go, which still cluttered my desk. I do not need to wrap presents or remember Nerf Guns or pack Oliver’s coat or print out the tickets.
It is all done.
It has been magnificent in every imaginable way, and now it is over.
I am suddenly, and profoundly, glad about this.
There have been motorway difficulties, and detours, and wearisome moments. Worst, I have just tried to get on with writing this and the stupid computer, newly switched on but painfully elderly and forgetful, has deleted half of it. I have just spent almost half a frustrated hour trying to restore it, but it does not want to know.
I am tired and cross, and somehow feel encrusted with hard-water London grime.
I am going to go away and wash in soft Northern water, and restore my tranquillity.
