October – How I Dislike You

Posted in Autumn, Mixty-maxty, October, Vita Sackville-West by buzzanniebee

It’s that time of year again when people I know and love start going misty-eyed at the autumn – the colours being the main draw. What I see is this: dark death and decay and 2020 is throwing more nastiness into the mix just to add to my feeling that this is a rotten time of year.

I am at a slight loose end this morning and am dressed up (as much as one can be these days) to go out later. Should I do the dusting; clean the windows; tidy the shed? No. Time to reach for my old pal, “In Your Garden” by Vita Sackville-West. I turn to October 22nd 1950 hoping to find some comforting words from V – perhaps she hated October too.

Vita for blog

What I do find is the phrase, ‘mixty-maxty’ which I like enormously. First used by Robert Burns in the 18thC, it means a confused assortment, a jumble, promiscuously mingled. V uses it to describe a new border she has decided to create:

…a mixty-maxty border it shall be. I shall tear open all my packets [of annual seeds], pour them into an old tobacco tin, and shake them up together and then sow them and let them take their chance. Very odd effects may result. The fun of gardening is nothing unless you take reckless risks

She goes on to list (“half-sensible, half-temerarious”) the things she will sow and the possible result. Read down to the bottom of the page and you find the following:

* July 1951. Do not follow this advice. It was a complete failure.

Reading on, I find she loves October, describing the joy she gets from long dark evenings, reading seed catalogues, “no slugs, no rabbits, no moles, no frosts”. Perhaps I need to take a leaf out of V’s book and look for the upsides. I will let you know if I think of anything while I am hunting for my almost totally lost sunny disposition. In the meantime, happy autumn.

Annie Bee blog signature

Annie Bee xxx

1Sep2015

Hello Autumn: September 1st

Posted in Autumn, equinox, Fall, Met office by buzzanniebee

Hello

You might be thinking that I, and indeed the vast majority of British people are obsessed with the weather. You are right.

September 1st marks the beginning of autumn, but only from one point of view ~ that of the Meteorological Office, who describe it thus:

……… each season is a three-month period. So, Summer is June, July and August; Autumn is September, October and November, and so on.

If that fills you with dark and damp feelings of utter disbelief and horror (summer is over, and it was RUBBISH) you can take the astronomical definition of the seasons which uses the Earth’s position relative to the Sun as the cue for separating one season from another. It is the equinox, when days and nights are of equal length which marks the beginning of autumn if you prefer to delay the inevitable. In that case autumn this year (2015) starts on September 23rd. Astronomical seasons therefore are about three weeks behind the meteorological ones. Whew.

The third way of looking for the beginning of autumn is based on phenology – the process of noting the signs of change in plant and animal behaviour. Ripe sloes and blackberries (tick), mushrooms growing on the lawn (tick), Japanese anemones in full flower (tick). In the case of this animal, thoughts turning to Christmas (tick), feeling cold in bed (tick) and the need to start cooking warming stews (tick).

I reckon it is here. You can run but you cannot hide. For those who love autumn/fall, enjoy. Some of us will have to fight the instinct to hibernate.

Now where did I put that SAD lamp and those bed socks?

Annie Bee x

26Aug2015

What To Expect Of Your Empty Nest

Posted in College, Empty Nest, Empty Nest Syndrome, freshers, Parenting, University by buzzanniebee

Autumn: Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.

And season of empty nests too, or at least here in the UK where the academic year begins in September.

I have been at this parenting malarkey for 31 years now, and have seen a fair smattering of things in that time, but am faced this year with a new chapter: Empty Nest Syndrome (ENS). While technically not a medical condition I think many parents find it a very real problem. How can it be described? This pretty much sums it up for many:

Empty nest syndrome is a feeling of grief and loneliness parents or guardians may feel when their children leave home for the first time, such as to live on their own or to attend a college or university.

I haven’t decided yet which sort of ENer I am most likely to be. Many of my friends have started out with a wry smile on their faces (‘Empty nest? Me? Are you kidding? I am doing the EN Dance round my kitchen in high heels and full make up, dreaming of a cheap not-school-holidays-priced week away in the Caribbean’) only to end up being that parent who spends the entire autumn with their mobile glued to their ear dealing with their fledgling’s very real psychological/medical issues.

A bit of humour might be useful then to start. Dorothy Parker is always good for a bon mot

~ The best way to keep children at home is to make the home atmosphere pleasant, and let the air out of the tyres.

Out of curiosity I ventured onto a parents’ forum to see if ENS was showing up as a thing. There is anxiety galore out there ~ worries for both the kids and us parents. I didn’t go so deep into the Dark Web as to find ENers who have survived (maybe they are all busy redecorating their kid’s bedrooms and building a sauna/fully stocked bar/disco room) but there is a palpable sense of concern from those whose little babies are leaving for Freshers Week in less than a month. There are plenty of stories about the nightmare of “helicopter parents” too, those of us who can’t let go and hover, thinking we are being helpful. The following was written by a weary academic:

One year we had a mother who camped on her daughter’s floor in Halls for the first two weeks and not only walked her to lectures, but sat in on them as well. In the end we had to insist she b*ggered off and left her ADULT daughter to get on with her own life.

Is our current level of concern increased by the amount of student debt our kids are now letting themselves in for? In many ways, we (the student, the parents, indeed the entire family) are now the client in the whole University decision-making operation. When your kids are going to graduate with a substantial debt (£27k or thereabouts) is it any wonder parents want to advise on courses, accommodation etc?

On a very practical level, there is some useful advice out there on how much stuff Little Jonny should take in the first year. I definitely over-bought when the middle Baby Bee went off, and probably also overestimated the size of her room as well. And if you buy too much kitchen equipment, the chances of it ever being washed up diminishes for starters which may not go down too well amongst their brand new flatmates.

When I went off to Uni (back in the late 1800s) I failed to read the information pack and very stupidly took NO kitchen things at all. None. I went out to the Army and Navy store and bought one bowl, one teaspoon (which I still have) and a small saucepan. This kept me going for a surprisingly long time, though I did lose weight in those first months. And ate a lot of Alpen which, for the record, is not solely a breakfast food.

So when you are in Ikea, or John Lewis, looking at those Freshers starter packs, my advice is to work on the assumption you can halve it and Little Jonny will still survive. Better that your son or daughter ends up buying a few more bits and pieces a month into the experience than let them take so much gear it is literally impossible for them to unpack.

As for my empty nest ~ well I will let you know what it looks like when I am a month or so in. It might be a tale of abject loneliness, or a postcard from a beach in the Caribbean. Who knows which way I will go. Only time will tell.