Dragons, Orange Juice and repeat ad nauseum - 23.10.12

The lifecycle of the human being; you are born, grow up, go to school and education, get a job, retire and die.  There are many nuances with this depending on personal preference; having a family, holidays, trips to outer space (depending on one’s career choices).

There are certain things in your life that you have no choice or standing on whatsoever.  You can complain about them, moan and have a nervous breakdown over them.  Those not prone to flights of psychological unrest might opt to take a more traditional War Time approach: The Put Up and Shut up Maxim.    I’m talking about family... Or am I?

Having been raised by a single mother with assistance from her mother, I got a very “lady-centric” point of view on the world, all aspects there in and, of course, men.  Then, add my elder sister.  They formed an enchanting triangle of oestrogen which would allow no manner of testosterone to penetrate the feminist zone (that sounds very lesbi-onic...)

Don’t start – Im not a misogynist.  It just made things a little difficult for me growing up.  Hormones a-flowing, gangly limbs a-growing and all that.  As soon as I hit puberty, along with my sister, my Mum shortly followed suit and became The Dragon Lady as I referred to her: The menopause had landed.

The memory that floods most prominently to mind is the Orange Juice Incident.  In my mind, this will forever be the most terrifying my mother would ever prove to be.  

On a warm summers day, what’s a 14 year old lad to do, but to make himself a nice cool glass or orange juice, with ice – Add in vodka and you have one of my tipples of choice! However, as my mother will still tell you to this day, I was more than a little clumsy as a teenager... and we had a beige carpet.  The glass slipped from my hand as I was walking through the living room and landed on the floor.  One glass of orange juice with ice and carpet, please!  The short end of the tale would be on that fateful day, I learned how to use a Vax; not one of those silly stand-up-vacuum-shaped contraptions they call a Vax.  It was a proper Vax – bright orange and looked like an space ship.  I’d say she went mental, but it wouldn’t be doing her any justice at all.  I had no idea one woman could yell quite so loudly.  She didn’t speak to me for days, even though there was no evidence it had ever happened.  Crazy-lady-hormones!!

So between a Grandma, a menopausal mother and a teenage sister, I have had my fair share of crazy women.   If I were prone to such thinking, I might suppose my sexual orientation could be attributed to my upbringing, but I don’t swing that way on the theory, so we won’t bother.

As you grow, develop and progress through each of these stages of your life, you are thought of and treated differently by those around you.  You might be regarded as a leader and pioneer in your workplace, but the brew-bitch at home.        

                 

In the same way, very few people will go through their entire life in the same situation; people change homes, careers, even life partners.  So why is it that I find myself in a situation not too dissimilar from my 14 year old self?  On my left I have a woman, not four months my senior of a hormonal and highly strung persuasion today and on my right I have the most politically-incorrect-busy-body-to-walk-the-face-of-the-earth.  Neither of them are bad people, like my mother and my sister.  I’d go as far to say that I like both of them.   But,  like when I was 14, sometimes the safest thing to do is just keep my head down and keep my mouth shut and await the eventual passing of the Oestrogen storm.

I have been left wondering; despite all the changes and alterations that we make in our lives, does anything really change, or do you change crazy bitches you live with for crazy bitches you work with (And for any man who works in a family business with his wife, God help you around her time of the month)?   Is the whole of life as monotonous as listening to the same track on your iPod for the rest of your life, only sung by different artists or, perhaps worse, learning a foreign language at school?  J’mappelle Michael.  Je suis vingt six ans.  (sp?!)(It’s been a very long time since I did French!)

There is so much repetition in our lives, even the bare basics of our work lives and routines to a daily life, sometimes it’s hard to see the big difference between growing up, school and work. 

   

Oh, wait!  I have found the difference!  I get paid in seven days!