Debt and Danger

IT'S BEEN more years than I care to remember since I left school and started my university career.

I remember my first day very well. I packed up my newly purchased kettle and hairdryer, threw them in the back of my parents' car and we set off for Jordanstown where I moved into the small, freezing cold cell that would become my home for the next nine months.
My surroundings at the Halls of Residence where far from luxurious, but I suppose I was lucky in that they were clean and cheap enough for me to be able to afford to pay for them with my meagre student grant.
Yes, I was one of the lucky ones who still got a grant. If I remember properly it wasn't an awful lot, but it covered the rent and books and left a few quid over to buy essentials like food and West Coast Coolers in the Students' Union (I was never a trendy drinker- while my cohorts sipped beer or cider I was the nerd in the corner with the fruit flavoured drink).
I got a couple of Student Loans out in my time- small amounts I used to fund end of term trips to visit my sister in London but I didn't leave university shackled with enormous debts.
I'm not showing off about that because I have no doubt that if I was just starting out I would be facing thousands of pounds in debt all in the name of gaining an education.
I read on the BBC website yesterday that students packing up and heading off to the likes Magee, Coleraine, Queens or Jordanstown can realistically expect to end up more than £22,000 in debt at the end of your average three year course. And if the people doing the sums are right, your average student may not even have had a single West Coast Cooler to show for it.
Fees for entry to most university courses are £3,000 per year, add to that the cost of living at what will still be a subsistence level and you don't need to be a mathematical genius to work out that the graduates of 2009 will be starting work knowing that a large portion of their pitiful graduate wages will be going directly back to the Student Loans Company.
I have to say that in the same position I would be questioning whether or not a university education was worth the inevitable financial burden.
Being out the other side I know how enjoyable it can be. My three years at Jordanstown where not only years in which I learned bucketloads about ethics, philosophy and- weirdly- what the lyrics to 'American Pie' really meant, but I also had a genuinely enjoyable time outside of the classroom.
Everyone should have the chance- if they want it- to sink a few drinks (cool or not) in the Students' Union. We should all have the chance to live in substandard accommodation with poor heating to 'toughen us up' and everyone should spend at least one night in said house with 20 other students drinking to the wee hours and using a space hopper up and down the street.
We should all have the right to fight with another student for the last edition of that much coveted text book in the library and we should all have the chance to sit nursing a fry in the cafeteria on the morning after the night before.

Letting loose
Having settled down all too soon into adult life I can look back on my uni years and realise they were the nearest I ever got to be being wild and letting loose. I studied hard and played harder and I can honestly look back on those years (with the exception of the freezing cold of our house which was decorated primarily in brown and my finals) with fondness. They really were among the best of my life.
A university education is about much more than book-learning and getting good grades. Of course that is a major part of it and the ultimate reason for going, but your three years should be about finding yourself, becoming an adult and- if we are being honest here- having a degree (geddit?) of fun before you settle down to the nine to five of the rest of your working life. (Even saying that depresses me).
Students should not have worry about the debts they will face or work their fingers to the bone in menial jobs to try and prevent them accumulating in the first place. Time spent mopping floors in McDonalds should be spent studying, relaxing and enjoying life.
Without starting to sound too much like a new age leftie here, an education should be a right and not a privilege and I think it is a damned disgrace that people are starting out in their working lives with a massive debt hanging over their head.
I dread to think what it might all cost by the time my wee man (just two-and-a half and so obviously a child prodigy already) reaches university age. I have friends who are already saving huge amounts to ensure they have enough in the pot to put their toddlers and babies through college.
Not everyone can afford to have that much forward planning however and I think we will have a generation of young people who miss out on education simply due to the prohibitive expense.
It's about time those in power re-examined their priorities and stopped making a good education simply available to the wealthy.

I can sing a rainbow

Month 30- How could I love you more?

Dear Joseph,
If this were an ordinary relationship and you were just some random little creature I let crawl out of my uterus two and a half years ago I would be thinking the appeal should be wearing off by now.
I can't imagine I'd have put off with tantrums so loud and public as I do with you and I imagine had you just been "some guy" I would be kicking you to the curb right now.
But you aren't just some guy. You are my boy and tantrums and all aside I love you now more than I ever have done. Each days brings a new joy, a new thing to laugh at, a new smile, a new word and new moment of heart-stopping pride.
Month 30 will go down in the history books as the month you asked "Why do my have to go to sleep?"- Daddy was amazed, and so was I but then we've always known you were by far the most clever boy in the history of the world.
From the moment I see you each day- when you bark hello- I want to spend so much time just drinking in your babyness, revelling in your innocence. It blows my mind that just 3o months ago you were as much a part of me as my own heart. It feels now as if you are my heart and I love you so fiercely.
Stay precious my gorgeous big and beautiful boy.
Mammy loves you.
xx

Operation Bridesmaid

In precisely 47 weeks and one day my sister will be traipsing down the aisle to marry the man she loves. I am very worried.

You see I'm going to be a bridesmaid- a chief one if you must know- and unless I take some drastic action in the very near future it's just not going to be pretty.
For the last two and half years- indeed since my son made his grand appearance into this world- I have been vowing to lose some weight and gain some self esteem.
To be fair to me I have lost about three stone- sadly it has been in half stone bursts and I've managed to put the same half stone back on between each attempt.
I've tried Rosemary Conley, Weight Watchers, Paul McKenna, going it alone and a half hearted attempt at Slimming World.
I improved my fitness levels so that I could swim 50 lengths without getting dramatically out of breath but then the winter hit and I'm afraid climbing into the paddling pool leaves me out of puff these days.
And of course in this time I've also managed to pass my driving test and much as that has changed my life in 101 positive ways it certainly has done nothing to improve the girth of my rear end or my cardiovascular fitness. (I'm not quite as bad as my husband who has been known to drive to the corner shop- but I'm not far off).
So I'm faced with a dilemma. I want and need to slim down and get fit but no matter how hard and fast I have looked for my willpower I have been unable to find the blighter. (Admittedly if I looked in the right places and not in the vending machine at work or through the pizza takeaway menu I might get a bit further with things).
On Saturday I accompanied my sister (aka Bridezilla) to Direct Dresses in Springtown to have a lookie at bridesmaid dresses for myself and my two fellow maids. Somehow it all seems to have become a lot more complicated in the years between my own wedding and Bridezilla's forthcoming nuptials.
First we had to design on straps (wide, spaghetti or not at all) length (long, ballet or Tea- which was new to me) and material (Satin, silk or taffeta). Once that was sorted and we spotted a dress (strapless, satin and tea-length so you know) that we liked, the assistant muttered the dreaded words "Would you like to try it on?".

Size matters
I knew from looking at it that it wasn't in my size. When she handed it to me and I straddled my wide hips into the skirt I knew for definite it wasn't my size and it was only made worse as I struggled (in vain) to try and zip it up at the back.
My sister, God love her, did her best not to look overly alarmed but I can assure you that the sight of me in a dress three sizes too small with legs that had not seen a razor in a week and back fat spilling between the seems is not for the faint hearted. No amount of breathing in was going to make this a pretty sight- it would take liposuction and a bout of gastric banding.
That said, I knew the dress could look stunning in the proper size but I made a resolution that I don't want my current size to be that right size.
So I'm joining the hordes of women who each day/ week/ year/ month decide they are going to do something about their appearance in advance of a big occasion.
The only problem is, I'm not quite sure what that something is going to be. I don't do so well at calorie counting and my current work pattern means it is difficult to fit in exercise or indeed keep to a healthy eating regime. When I get through the door at 7pm, and once I've deposited the wee man in his bed and cleaned up Thomas, Percy and James from the floor the last thing I crave is salad and grilled chicken.
The strange thing I know I feel better when I do eat salad and grilled chicken. I have more energy, feel less bloated and my skin takes on the glowing hue of a baby's bottom and yet I still can't seem to get that message into my thick head in anything other than three week bursts.
I know I don't want to look like a green Mr. Blobby in my sister's wedding photographs. I want to be able to walk down the aisle with my son (who will be page boy) by my side and not trailing three foot behind me because my rump takes up too much space.
But I'm open to suggestions. I'm willing to try almost anything- from Weight Watchers (again) to dysentery, I'm not fussy. All I know is that I have reached the point of no return.
So if you see me heading for the sweetie machine, or giving into temptation in Thorntons- then I'm pleading with you to hit me a quick skite across the head and remind me that in 47 weeks and one day I'll be a bridesmaid for the first time ever- and it would be nice if I managed to fit into one dress and not two sewn together.

On a lighter note, (no pun intended) I'm off on my holidays for two weeks so this column will be taking a short break.

Just a word of thanks...

AS regular readers will know I'm an aspiring writer. Well because of that I've been hanging out at Write Words a lot and have made some lovely new virtual friends- esp in the Chick Lit forum.
I have to say these enormously talented ladies have taught me so much about my craft and I want to thank them wholeheartedly.

And for the record I"m now 10,000 words into my second novel 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered'.

Enjoy this tiny taster:
After Jake had left me, swaggering out of my flat with his T-shirt inside out, I had tried to win him back.
I became, I can admit with the fullness of time, a little psychotic over the whole thing. I bombarded him with phonecalls and when he changed his number I started with letters and emails.
I wanted him to know that I was as shocked by the whole thing as he was and that I had reacted myself with the same anger and disbelief but that it would and could be ok and sure we hadn't planned it, but that didn't mean a baby would have to be a bad thing.
He didn't reply. I would have handled the whole thing better if he had repeatedly told me to feck off, but he didn't. He just ignored me and that allowed me to tell my pregnancy addled, hormone riddled brain that perhaps he never got the 36 letters or 49 emails and that his phone must have a fault.
Eventually, after sobbing like a mad woman all over Janice Grayson's new nursery, Beth sat me down on the luxury rocker and told me that I needed to let go. I needed to realise he didn't want me or our baby. I nodded, agreed- I mean I hadn't really wanted our baby myself. So I decided that I had to change my tactics. He might not have wanted us then, but surely that would change when he heard about his own daughter?

Disgusted with Derry

I'M ANGRY, and -to paraphrase that great philosopher of our time 'The Incredible Hulk'- you will not like me when I'm angry.

I have always been exceptionally proud to call Derry my home. I have been proud as punch of our sense of community spirit- our ability to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps and get on with life when everyone and his granny seems to be conspiring against us.
Always a home-bird, I have never wanted to leave this city. I never wanted to be part of the 'brain-drain' and when I'd finished studying I returned to Derry to set up a home, start a family and settle down. I even managed to persuade my other half, an English man who had heard enough about the Troubles to put him off Northern Ireland for life, that Derry was different. I persuaded him that all that nasty business of the last 30 years was behind us and that this was actually a safe place to live. I was very smug in my praise of my hometown.
Last Saturday night Paul McCauley was kicked half to death. Two others were injured. My own brother had been at that party earlier in the evening and, by the grace of God, had gone home early. I cannot bear to think about the position our family may have been in now had he stayed.
I know the people who were at the party. I've met most of them at various times as they sauntered in and out of my mammy's house to see my brother. It seems trite to say it now, but there isn't a bad bone in any of them- but then no-one deserves to be jumped upon in their own garden and have their heads kicked in, bad bone or not.
The attack may or may not have been sectarian, but I think that in focusing on putting a label on the assault we are ignoring the most frightening aspect of this whole episode: There are people in this city who think it is perfectly acceptable to do as much physical damage to another human being as possible without thinking, for one second, about the consequences.
Those people include, but are by no means limited, to the scumbags who left Paul McCauley for dead. They prowl our city streets every weekend looking for people to batter to within an inch of their lives. They enjoy it. They thrive on seeing people scared, on hearing people beg them to stop. They are the worst kind of scum and they are dirtying the name of this city every time they lash out at someone for a bit of craic.

Emotional
I find it hard not to get emotional when talking about this issue. Twelve years ago my brother was their target. He was pounced upon at 8.30 in the evening as he walked along the river with his friends. He was kicked in the head until he was battered and bruised and his teeth were smashed. His attackers kept on kicking him in the head until a passing car stopped and hauled him to safety.
I have emphasised the fact that he was kicked in the head because this shows how his attackers clearly didn't give a damn if they killed him. Every blow could have been fatal. Every blow knocked a little bit of confidence out of him that took many years to rebuild and yet we know that he was ultimately lucky.
If you are wondering, my brother's "crime" was that he dressed differently to his attackers. He didn't talk to them, didn't engage with them. He was just walking to a friend's house (in fact the same house where Sunday's attack occurred) when those responsible took a dislike to him.
My mother's best friend is a social worker attached to the Brain Injury unit. She admits she has been shocked at the increase in people needing support and treatment as a direct result of beatings they have sustained in this town we all love so well.
It is a shocking and sickening indictment of this city and how it is becoming a place that people no longer feel proud of.
At a time when we should be pulling tourists in by the thousands, when the City Council is doing all it can to make Derry as attractive as possible to residents and tourists alike, these animals think of nothing of destroying anything, or anyone, in their wake.
I think it is time that we got tough on our culture of street crime. I think it is time the people of Derry told everyone for once and for all that enough was enough and we aren't going to stand for this any more.
The fact is it could have been any of us who were beaten to a pulp in the early hours of Sunday morning. This wasn't a city centre street, it was a private back garden and any one of us could have been in it, enjoying a few drinks with friends while waiting for the sun to rise.
The attack on Paul McCauley shows once and for all and none of us are safe as long as these thugs are allowed to wander our streets and get away with attempted murder.
So yes, I'm angry. I want to be able to convince my husband that he lives in a city where we won't judged for our accents, our religions or what clothes we wear. I want to know that in 16 years time when our son goes out for the night I won't be pacing the floor worrying that he will be the latest victim of an unprovoked attack.
I want to feel proud to call Derry home again.

Boys and their toys

MY SON is a typical wee boy. He loves Bob the Builder, Noddy and Thomas the Tank Engine and gets terribly excited when he claps eyes on a 'PC Plum' (police man), fire engine, "ambliance" or airplane.

He looks every inch a boy- from his curly bap to his battered sneakers. He always has looked like a boy, to the point that he has never once in his entire life, even as a week old infant, been confused for anything other than a little boy. (I do remember one well meaning old dear peering the pram and saying: "That can't be anything other than a boy, can it?")
But love for cars, trains, planes, footballs and rough-and-tumble aside, the real love of his life at present is a TV character most certainly aimed at little girls- the wonderful Fifi ForgetMeNot.
He has not one but two talking Fifi dolls (he did have a third but she met a sorry end under the wheels of a passing car). Fifi must go everywhere. In her pink welly boots and denim dungarees, complete with flower motif, she must sit in his high chair with him at every meal time, must go to bed with him, to his Auntie Stella's with him, in the car with him and dare he wake in the middle of the night and she is not to be found there is all hell to pay.
I have taken to avoiding Foyleside because Joseph has renamed it "Fifi's House". He knows that Adams sell Fifi clothes and that the Early Learning Centre stocks a variety of Fifi toys- all of which he thinks he has an automatic right too just because he loves her so much.
Similarly I have lost count of the amount of times I have been woken during the night to Jane Horrocks' voice announcing "Hello, I'm Fifi ForgetMeNot, you're my best friend" as Joseph brings his cuddly best friend into the bed beside me. The added joy is that Fifi also has the power to automatically switch herself off after two minutes declaring loudly: "Don't forget to come back soon!".

Fifi's world...
As a doting mammy I don't really have any problems with my son's fascination for Fifi (who comes scented with a real flower smell). At times she is a welcome relief from the endless episodes of Fireman Sam or Noddy but other people are perhaps not so understanding of my son's love for a girl's toy. In fact I have received a few odd looks when people see my child cart his treasured pink and yellow doll around with him.
Earlier this week I bought a bright pink Fifi ForgetMeNot duvet cover for Joseph and some of my mammy friends were shocked. A few said that while their sons loved Fifi too, there is no way they could put a pink duvet on a boy's bed- and their husbands would go mad at the very notion.
It seemed strange to me. My friend's little girl, Amy, who is the same age as Joseph happily sports a pair of Bob the Builder pyjamas. They are dark blue and clearly designed with little boys in mind. No one has batted an eyelid. Amy loves "Bob De Da" (as she so very sweetly pronounces it) so why shouldn't she have pyjamas emblazoned with the Bob the Builder logo?
It would seem it is more acceptable for a little girl to cross the gender boundaries than it is for a boy. No one would be concerned if Amy had a Bob the Builder duvet cover. I doubt they would bat an eyelid if they saw her peddling around the streets on a Bob the Builder bike- but should you put your average Derry young fellah on a pink bike or in pink pyjamas and you would be asking for trouble.
Personally I've never had any problem at all with Joseph playing with toys for girls as well as boys. He owns a tea set (admittedly he is about as interested in it as he is in molecular biology), a pram and a rag doll. He has been known to dress up in a Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus costume and practice his Bella Ballerina dance steps in his granny's living room. I don't think any of this will have done him any harm. He is just as likely to spend three hours driving the same truck up and down the garden path or to run around the garden dressed as Superman shouting 'Super Joe' at the top of his lungs.
So I don't have a problem with letting him go to sleep at night under a pink duvet cover. I'm aware that as he grows older and spends more time with his peers he will more than likely die with embarrassment at the very notion he once took Fifi to bed every night, but for now, while there is still a touch of babyness about him, he can do whatever makes him happy. (That said I'll be vetoing his his repeated request for Fifi pants to go alongside his newly acquired set of big boy underwear- a mother has to draw the line somewhere and wearing girls' underwear is a bridge too far, even for me.)

I predict a riot!

All because the lady loves her wain...

What a stunner, eh?

Drum roll please!!!

This is my 100th post on this blog.

It should be something momentous I feel- sadly it's not.
It's just me, sitting here, smiling and feeling rather smug.

When you're smiling...

TWO YEARS ago when I was dealing with the 'joys' of sleepless nights and other new parenting gems I took to yamming down the phone on a regular basis to my VBF friend Vicki.

As a mother of three (well, she had two then- but she breeds fast) she was well versed in the stresses of dealing with family upheaval and she calmly told me that a good laugh beats a good cry any day of the week.
I thought about what she had said and realised she just may have been on to something. You see, when I phoned Vicki to off-load my woes, or vice versa, we inevitably managed to bring the conversation round to something light-hearted in an attempt to cheer up whichever one of us was standing on the proverbial window ledge.
At the end of each conversation we would have laughed until our sides hurt and gone away much less stressed and ready to take whatever renewed 'joys' the next 24 hours would throw at us.
I started to realise that when I needed a release of emotion, it was often more productive to stick on a Billy Connolly video and laugh until my pelvic floor muscles begged for mercy than to lie in a darkened room listening to Sarah McLachlan CDs and weeping like a Banshee.
I'll admit however that being a typical Derry woman my immediate reaction to almost every situation is to automatically think the worst, get myself into a state of blind panic about it and come to the conclusion that the world as we know it is set to fall in around my ears in a spectacular style.
I have always believed, you see, that if you prepare for the worst and expect it to happen you will be pleasantly surprised when things go right. I have always seen huge danger signs when it comes to anticipating that everything will run smoothly. It is in just these situations that someone on high will delight in switching on that great big celestial candid camera in the sky and then watch with glee as your life implodes around you.
I'm not sure where I got my extreme pessimism from. My parents are fairly normal, and my sister is positively Mary Poppins-like in her outlook. She lives life one day at a time, having developed a rather impressive"cross that bridge when she comes to it" attitude. I, on the other hand, have been building imaginary bridges to cross most of my adult life.
My husband is equally optimistic in his approach to life. The phrase "so laid back he is horizontal" was designed specifically with him in mind. So there I am, the lone merchant of doom in my family.
Unsurprisingly I have discovered that walking around under a black cloud of my own making does not make me happy so - with the help of Vicki and her wicked sense of humour - I've set about trying to make myself laugh when I'm more tempted to cry.
Billy Connolly is a good start. I have yet to watch a video of his without howling with laughter throughout. The jokes don't get tired. I find his impression of drunk man, be it walking or singing, hilarious.
Also guaranteed to raise a giggle is an evening spent with friends, be it the real ones who I know in person or the TV show of the same name. It is a great treat to lock the doors on the world and curl up on the sofa with a kingsize Galaxy and an hour of two of Ross, Rachel et al.
Vicki and I share many in jokes. All I need to do is call her Mabel and she returns the favour by calling me Betty and the laughter starts. Likewise, and back to the Billy Connolly theme here, there is one friend I only have to mention the phrase "A Roman and only one" to and we both convulse with laughter. (For those now looking at this page with a look of confusion on their face, I highly recommend the 'Billy and Albert' DVD)
I'm sure onlookers would think we are cracked, or as the lovely Rosie McCann who used to sit beside me in work would say, that we were on the glue, but nonetheless such simple expressions and jokes can lift you from the sourest of moods and make the rest of the day that little bit more bearable.
Of course there are situations when a good cry is necessary. It would be wholly inappropriate to hoot with laughter at a funeral, but in the majority of cases a smile can and does help.
So, I'm asking the people of Derry to cast aside our reputation as grumpy so and sos and to start smiling more. It won't be easy- old habits die hard- but go one give it a go, it can't do any harm!

Month 29- Behold the spawn of Satan

Dear Joseph,
I would like to start this month's letter by saying I love you dearly with all my heart and what may follow should not take away from the surge of positive emotions I feel about you on a daily basis.
You have turned into, what we in Derry like to call, a wee shite. It's not that you are bad as such. You haven't killed any puppies or thrown anyone out of a window (with the exception of your Tigger glove puppet)- you have just become, how can I put this, trying.
You have discovered the joy of tantrums and, much to my 'joy', the ability to do the full body slump whereby you collapse into a gelatenous heap on the floor and wriggle about so that even the most wily of mammies/ childminders/ daddies can't lift you up as you screech and shout "Me no want to".
I should, I guess, applaud your stand for your rights but when you take that stand in Tesco, while people tut and look on, it can be hard to deal with.
You have also discovered the 'excitement' which can be created by you running off in crowded shopping centres sending your mammy/childminder/daddy into a frenzy of panic as we search for you all the time imagining the worst.
And, you have also discovered just how much 'fun' it is draw blood from your own mother while you sink you teeth into her boob while giving her cuddle.

That's not to say you aren't a joy. You make me roar with laughter each day. Just yesterday you sang "Don't you wish your mammy was fun like me, don't you, don't you" in the car and I almost choked. You tell me I'm "so handsome" on an almost daily basis now and you love me, entirely and totally.
And I do love you back baby boy. But, if you can help it all, please stop with the mammy abuse.
Love you squillions.
Mammy
x

A friend for every season

YOU'LL FORGIVE me for sounding exceptionally smug this week when I say that I really have been blessed with some of the nicest friends on the planet.

My birthday has been and gone and I now, as a woman in my 30s, reserve the right to be exceptionally self indulgent and quite publicly say a huge thank you to everyone who made my transition from a young thing to an official grown up lady so smooth and enjoyable.
I think we women rely on our friends much more than our male counterparts. There is a many a crisis I could not have survived without my friends around me. Himself has a role to play, of course he does, but he doesn't understand my need for chocolate, wine and a good cry or giggle in the same way as 'the girls'.
Now usually us women have a group of friends from every era of our lives and never the twain shall meet. You know, you have the school friends, the uni friends, the work friends and the mammy friends. Then, of course, you have the family friends, those who are bound to get on with due to blood ties but who you do actually quite like when you think about it.
Each of them knows a different you. Your school friends know the gawky, silly you who wanted to be Teri Hatcher in 'Lois and Clarke' and who cried herself silly for a whole day when Bros broke up.
Your uni friends know how you were madly in love with the class mate who didn't ever look at you twice. They may even have driven you past the object of your affection's house as you did your best 'Fatal Attraction' impression.
Your 'mammy' friends can sympathise about the sleepless nights and could recount your labour story to you as if were their own. They even know the appropriate moments to cross their legs and grimace while telling the tale.
Your work friends know the you that is both at times the consummate professional, but who at other times is prone to a snottery big cry in the toilets when you have a bad day. They know what bun you take with your morning cup of tea and when to leave you alone as deadline approaches and steam rises from your keyboard.

Do you do voodoo?
As for family, well they know everything about you. Nothing escapes them and when everything goes horribly wrong with your non-related friends you know there is at least one person who will be nice to you and help you make the voodoo doll.
As a general rule, you don't want them to mix. Your work colleagues could do without knowing that you used to make up dance routines to Bananarama songs in your family friends' living room.
Likewise your Mammy friends, who think you are exceptionally grounded and responsible, do not need to know how your uni friend also brought you to the shop where your unrequited love's mother worked just so you could check out the prospective mother in law.
For my birthday, however, they all got together and, better than that, they all got along wonderfully with each other.
I was spoiled rotten. My sister booked me and my VBF (very best friend) into the City Hotel for the night. My school friend brought enough pink champagne to sink a small ship. My work friend showed up with a voucher for a fancy pampering session at a local hairdressers. My VBF (who is also a mammy friend) travelled over from Scotland just for the occasion and jointly they paid for a trip around town in a fancy stretch Mercedes limo, where all my friends had put together a collection of my favourite songs for us to sing to.
Each song, just like each friend in the Limo, represented a different stage of my life, but funnily enough each friend sang along loudly to every song and we roared with laughter together as we shared our individual memories.
As we sat together in Pitchers for our meal, I looked around and couldn't help but feel emotion choke me. It's a wonderful experience to realise people care for you and genuinely want to spend time in your company. Each of them gave me a thoughtful gift, from some gorgeous jewellery to a bound copy of my novel (perhaps the only time I will ever see it in print).
More than that, these girlies, many of whom had never met and only knew about each other through me, had been scheming, plotting and saving for weeks before the big day to make it special for me. They had formed their own friendships through email and phone calls.
Ever since that night each of them have contacted me to tell me how lovely the rest of them were. They have vowed to keep in contact and we all plan to meet up again next year when my sister gets married (exactly one year today- woohoo!).
Self indulgence aside (before this gets too tedious), I think this is a perfect example of just how supportive, open and welcoming women can be. Friendships can be the most nurturing and inspiring relationships in our lives and as far as I'm concerned every woman should have her own set of 'the girls' to call her own.
So to 'the girls' I'm proud to call my friends, Lisa, Vicki, Erin, and Nora- thank you all from the very bottom of my heart and remember, a friendship is for life- not just for a 30th birthday.

You're beautiful, it's true

MY SISTER phoned me on Monday night to tell me about an ad that is currently airing on TV. (Sadly, no, we don't have more exciting things to talk about in our family).

She said the new ad for Dove, of all things, was really moving. Well, in the interest of journalistic investigation of course I sat down in front of the TV and flicked the channels until I found out what she was going on about.
Dove, who make very lovely soaps and shampoos, have launched a 'Self Esteem Fund' for young girls. While Cyndi Lauper (or someone trying to sound like Cyndi Lauper) sang about letting your true colours come shining through, images of young girls flash on the screen. One hates her freckles. One thinks she isn't smart enough and then an impossibly skinny girl lets us know she thinks she is fat.
Then Dove announce they are going all out to show every little girl just how beautiful she really is. It's a lovely sentiment and I admit feeling all warm and glow-y as the ad ended.
The cynics out there will no doubt write this whole escapade off as a cynical marketing ploy by a company who, by dint of their very existence, are more interested in selling products to stop you smelling like a back end of a donkey than changing the world.
But I, for one, have to commend them. I like that a company isn't afraid to use real women in their ads. I like that they feature ladies over a certain age and women with real, saggy boobs and wobbly cellulitey thighs in their campaigns.
And I really like a company who has made it their mission statement to make little girls feel like the most special and beautiful little creatures on the planet.
I visited Dove's website (www.campaignforrealbeauty.co.uk) and discovered that 92% of girls aged between 8 and 12 would change one or more aspects of their appearance.

Sindy and Barbie
My God, when I was eight all I cared about was Sindy and Barbie and which was the cooler. I remember being vaguely aware that I had a wee touch of a pot belly and what my mother lovingly referred to as a "duck arse", but this was, in my mind, just the normal S bend shape of a child.
I never thought about getting rid of my freckles, nor did I really contemplate my weight or long for bluer eyes or a smaller nose. I never thought I was stupid, even when long division baffled me beyond words.
It saddens me to think that young girls can doubt themselves in this way- and it angers me that we have allowed them to believe they are anything less than perfect and beautiful and that up until now no one has really deemed it an important enough issue to do anything about it.
Sure, we had the Spice Girls, with their "Zig a Zig Ahs" and shouts of "Girl Power" but in reality were they role models for us to aspire to? Erm, there was the skinny one who married a footballer and lives off his money. Then there was the chubby ginger one, who became skinny, the chubby, then normal, then had a baby she called Bluebell. I'm sure there were a couple of others too, but they didn't really amount to much in the grand scheme of things.
Looking around today it's hard to know who young girls aspire to be. The charts offer little inspiration. I mean there is that stupid Fergie woman singing about her humps and her lady lumps or there are the Pussycat Dolls (or is that Dollz, with a z? I'm so not with it) encouraging young girls to be freaks like them.
The best selling toy for the 8-12 year olds are dolls (with an s) called Bratz (with a z). Now I know I'm nearly 30 so hurtling towards old age at lightning speed now but surely things haven't moved on so much that we no longer regard being a brat as a bad thing? Next thing you know there will be a range of dolls on the market called "Wee Feckers" and no one will bat an eyelid.
If our toys and our heroes aren't there championing our self esteem and letting us know it is ok to be nice, polite and non freakish young ladies then how are our young girls supposed to accept themselves for the people they are?
I, for one, find it so sad to see young girls trying to conform to perceived notions of what being beautiful and cool is. It's a sad day when you see a seven year old wrestle her way into a boob tube and slip on a pair of heeled shoes. Similarly there is nothing as heartbreaking as seeing a child of the age of four point to her belly and tell you it is fat.
So I'm all for Dove and their Campaign for Real Beauty and I want to tell all the little girls out there with freckles, or pot bellies, duck arses, sticky out ears, you are beautiful, it's true!

A load of balls

*First published on June 2, 2006.
DISCLAIMER- THIS COLUMN WAS WRITTEN WITH TONGUE FIRMLY INSERTED IN CHEEK. ANY ENGLISH PEOPLE OF A SENSITIVE DISPOSITION SHOULD LOOK AWAY NOW


IT IS with a heavy heart that I have realised we are now in the month of June.

As the days pass, the sense of impending doom and dread I feel grows stronger and stronger. This is the month I have dreaded all year- the World Cup is almost upon us.
In precisely seven days time my husband, my male relatives and the lion share of my male colleagues will morph into football obsessed yahoos who will become incapable of discussing anything other than the qualifiers between the Ivory Coast and Serbia.
This delightful experience will last a joyless month, during which time I will have to fight with himself for use of the remote control- which I imagine will be a pointless exercise anyway as there will be nothing on the TV remotely non-related to the footie.
There will be no escaping it. Matches will be played at all hours of the day and when the matches aren't actually on there will be pre-match coverage and the post-match coverage and the between match coverage.
Nothing will be sacred. They will move Coronation Street and EastEnders to accommodate the matches. (I am physically restraining my hands here from typing bad words to express my displeasure. I realise that is neither big nor clever and I apologise for my thoughts).
To add insult to injury even the priests are in on the act- and worse still they support England!
As you may have guessed I'm not a ladette. The astute among you may realise that I don't care for football. The closest I've got to watching a match in recent years is checking out the latest series of 'Footballers' Wives'.
I may have feigned an interest if Ireland had managed to qualify. I'm pretty sure that if the boys in green had made it to Germany (and yes, I did have to ask my colleagues if that was right) I would have shown some enthusiasm just as I have done in the past, when I joined the throngs of people watching the big screens in Squires in 1994 when Jackie's Army stormed the USA (and yes, I had to ask that too).
I'd have found a player I fancied and ogled his legs. I'd have gone to the pub with my friends and waved a cheap agus nasty plastic Irish flag around and sang a resounding chorus of "Ole, ole, ole, ole"- but in the absence of a national duty to watch the football, I would love to ignore it entirely.

Tense month
Unfortunately I am married to an English man. You may realise that sets the scene for a very tense month in the Allan household.
It's not that I hate the English football team. I'm sure some of them are fine footballers in their own rights. What I hate, however, is the jingoistic, self satisfied smugness that particular nation sees fit to adopt if they win a match.
They go overboard with the news coverage, the songs, the flags, the Union Jack boxer shorts and (yes, I've seen this) toddlers carted about in special edition St. George's Cross buggies.
It's galling. It is not like they've found the cure for cancer or caught Osama Bin Laden shopping for Weetabix in Tesco. One man who has spent his whole life kicking balls around has simply managed to kick another ball into a net the size of your average bus. Oh, some men chased him while he did it. Whoopee! Hardly cause for national celebration now, is it?
Himself, of course, is very excited. He loves the World Cup. He is is giddily excited about being able to share the World Cup with his son for the first time. They will bond over it, as I sit with a face like thunder in the next room- excluded entirely from my family unit.
I should say I'm lucky most of the time. Himself is not a mad football supporter, so for three years out of four I can more or less pretend the blasted sport doesn't exist- but there is a strange mist that descends on him around the time of the World Cup that changes everything.
He becomes an English version of Homer Simpson, who melds into the sofa, can of beer in one hand, cheering and jeering at the footie and nodding at the sage words of Gary Lineker as if he was given said words on tablets of stone from on high.
If he gets together with his best mate Chris, we have a real life version of 'Men Behaving Badly' played out in our living room. I remember France 1994 being particularly traumatic on this front. The two of them dragged a cool box, filled with ice, into the living room for each major match and drank their way through the Ivory Coast's supply of cheap and nasty beer.
For four solid weeks I gave up on the notion of getting any sensible conversation out of him. There was no point. Like all strong women, I know when I am beat.
I'm hoping the eight years between then and now will have mellowed and matured my other half and that his threats to train the wee man to fetch the beer from the fridge for him are, indeed, just idle threats.
I'm stocking up on a selection of the finest Chick-Lit books, fine wines and soppy DVDs and I'm going to lock myself into my room to escape the nonsense. Hopefully by the time 2010 comes along (which will be in South Africa- and yes, I had to check) I'll have a little girl to bond with and the men can get on with it themselves.

Watch yourself Mazza!

Dear reader,
I have written a novel! A proper one with loads of words (86,000 of the blighters if you want to know). Most are spelled correctly. Some have more than one syllable. There is a fair smattering of incorrect usage of the whole its/ it's thing, but hey, it's a first draft!
It's called This Little Piggy and if any agents out there fancy signing me up and finding me a fancy dan publisher, that would be just dandy!
I'm prouder than punch about it because this was one of the three life goals I set myself for before I turned 30!
The first was to learn to drive and pass a test. Well I ticked that badboy off the list on March 21! This particular ambition was resolved on 6/6/6 (hope that isn't an omen!).

Big up to Queen Mazza who inspired me in 'Under the Duvet' by revealing she wrote her first novel in her 31st year and also big up to my friend and colleague Siobhan, who always wanted to write a book but sadly never got the chance.

Also thanks to everyone who read it while it was a work in progress! Love ya all!

(For the record, my third ambition was to lose bag loads of weight- but in the words of Meatloaf, two out of three ain't bad!)

Month 28- "No Mammy, it's a orange lorry"

Dear Joseph,
Welcome to your 28th month birthday. In so many ways it feels you have been here forever and yet, there are times, I wish you really had been. It seems like a heartbeat since I held you in my arms and wondered what the holy feck I was going to do with this newborn creature.
You seem to have become a human sponge this month. Of course, as your mammy, I have to say I'm well aware of the fact that you were born the most handsomest, smartest child in the world bar none- but this month you have exceeded even my wildest handsome and smart expectations.
The curls on your head have become wilder than ever and I swear when I looked at your this morning your eyes were that little bit bluer.
The real beauty in you though is your personality. I love to hold you close and say: "Joseph's my baby"- this month you have learned that the best way to impress your doting mother is to reply "Mammy's my baby" back.
Smart and gorgeous- what more could a mother want?

Of course you can catch me out. On our mornings in the car, driving to see your favourite Pepsi dog, we like to spot the vehicles as we go.
By about now, I can tell you what we meet before we go and I can get sometimes get a little lazy with the lorry spotting.
Seeing a lorry speed towards us I said: "Look Joseph, it's a yellow lorry"
"No mammy, it's an orange lorry," you replied.
My heart swelled with pride as I skited you one across the top of the head for being cheeky!
Love you loads,
Mammy

(No children were actually skited across the top of the head during the month of May)

A sofa is for life

I AM the proud new owner of a sumptuous red sofa. It takes pride of place in our front room and is deliciously soft to the touch.

I love it more than I ever thought it possible to love a piece of furniture. My heart swells with a sense of pride and happiness each time I see it or sink into it's cosy cushions.
For me this red sofa represents so much. You see it's predecessor was a hand me down- a cast off from my sister in law who had moved on to bigger and better things.
It was, once, a gorgeous cream colour and my sister in law had bought it before she had her own family. Given that her daughter is now approaching 10 years of age, you can imagine it's vintage.
It has survived many spills, copious attacks by crayon toting toddlers, a fair smattering of assaults with baby sick and it remained comfy 'til its last hours. It was, however, bogging and no amount of steam cleaning or bleaching could restore it to it's former glory.
I would sit on it each evening, my heart sinking as I noticed another mark or stain that would refuse to budge and I would covet the fancy new sofas of friends and family.
Earlier this year we took the plunge and ordered our new creation. I was stupidly excited- not only because I knew I would be getting rid of the muck magnet that was making our 'good room' our 'dirty room', but also because we are one step closer to being proper adults and not owning a plethora of hand me down furniture.
When himself and I bought our house we relied strongly on the kindness of family and friends to furnish it. We had the basics- a bed, a TV and a couple of Argos' finest creations in MDF with a real wood veneer.
The sister-in-law donated the sofa and my friend's mammy sold me a table and chair set for tuppence ha'penny. My Godparents bought us a shiny new fridge freezer as a wedding present and we scraped together the money for a washing machine.
The rest of the house was bare. Two bedrooms were empty, a second living room held a bookcase (you know, one of the one's that was on offer with tokens from SuperValu- you all have one) and the house was more a shell than a home. There was a echo in almost every room.
According to my parents we were actually quite well off. When they first married and moved into their own (rented) home they sat on boxes until they could scrape enough together for their first sofa and there wasn't a luxury fridge freezer to be seen.
That was how life was then, you see. You didn't expect to have it all as soon as you signed your wedding certificate. People didn't move into show homes with the latest of everything as soon as they came back from honeymoon and I can't help but think that progression hasn't necessarily been a good thing.
A friend of mine married last week and has just bought her first home with her husband. Each time I've tried to get Gillian on the phone between last November and now I've been told she was down in the new house painting.
Chatting with her over a glass of wine at the festivities, I reminisced about my own home buying experience and how we had next to nothing. Gillian informed me her house was "just about done" and there was "only the New England room to finish".
My jaw dropped. The New England room? Whatever happened to newlyweds buying a bulkload of magnolia paint in the B&Q sale and slapping it up over crumbling plaster walls of a first time buyers' fixer-upper opportunity of a house? Now the in thing is, apparently, to choose a theme for each room and decorate it accordingly. And of course, it is very much the in-thing to have a shiny new house in a shiny new estate with lots of shiny new furniture to fill it.
I doubt very much my second-hand sofa would look the business against her classy New England colours and I bet her furniture is not the wooden veneer type from Argos. I'm guessing she won't be married five years before she buys her first brand new sofa either!
I know of couples who are getting married who feel totally overwhelmed by the expectations foisted upon them. It is expected now that you can't possibly get married without buying your own house at the same time. Viewing the marital home holds almost as much excitement as seeing the bride saunter down the aisle in her big frock.
I'm proud of the fact we held on to our beloved hand-me-down sofa for five years. It was comfy. It served us well. Our son loved it, especially colouring in between the lines with crayons (his new fascination).
More than that, the fact we've had to wait five years to be able to comfortably afford a shiny new suite, and cast off the last of our cast offs, means that we appreciate everything we have all the more.
Of course, the other theory is that I'm just horribly jealous of Gillian's New England room when mine are colour coded around the latest shades from Crayola.

Men!

IT'S THE ultimate cliché to write a column about the battle of the sexes. I mean every female who has ever put pen to paper has at one stage knocked out a quick couple of hundred words on how and why women are so much more superior to their male counterparts.

It pains me to go over old ground. It makes me question whether or not I'm providing a decent level of service to my readers but there are some times, and ladies we all know what I'm talking about here, when all a woman can do is grip her head in her hands and sigh.
We all know the old adage. Men, can't live with 'em. Can't kill 'em. Much as I love my husband deeply, sometimes I genuinely feel as though I have not one, but two sons to look after. The second of my sons just happens to be 34, with a decent smattering of chest hair and an addiction to computer games and a couple of cans of lager on a Saturday night.
The wee man is no trouble in comparison. I can tell him what to do and generally with a bit of a foot stomp and the odd tantrum he will eventually realise that mammy rules the roost and he bows to my God given right to be the boss of him.
Himself (the big one) is a little harder to handle. He knows he doesn't have to agree to my every demand. He is aware that he is, in theory, a grown up but that doesn't change his need to have me there making sure everything around him runs as smoothly as possible.
I may well work full time. I may well have the lion share of the responsibility for making sure our two year survives another day without meeting some grisly end involving a mouldy yoghurt and a Bob the Builder friction vehicle. I may spent my evenings in a semi-comatose state loading and unloading the washing machine, setting out the clothes for the morning for the Messiest Toddler in History (Copyright, Joseph: 2006) and making sure we don't catch Bubonic Plague from the mildew in the shower- but apparently, and I didn't know this when I got married, none of these count as a excuse for not making sure himself has a clean, dry shirt for work the next day.
(Before I continue, I'm not saying himself turns into some wife battering maniac if the shirts aren't clean- he will happily wear one that stinks and show me up in front of the rest of Derry. I may be a modern woman of the noughties, but I'll not be shamed by anyone leaving my house in clothes reeking of body odour- no sirree!)
I'm sure some of you are wondering if my husband is okay with me revealing his inadequacies in the highest selling newspaper in the Derry area. The thing is, he is fine with it. He knows it is true- just as he knows deep down that he is not the only man with a woman behind him making sure his shirts are clean, he has new, sensible shoes and that his diet includes something a touch more nutritious than sausage sandwiches.

Home truths
Get any group of women together and the stories will start flooding out, and trust me, there are a few common themes here. I'm not one to tar people with the same brush, in the words of the wonderful Jane Austen it is a truth universally acknowledged that:
A) Men, great explorers of the world, responsible for discovering new lands and widening our horizons to new cultures and experiences, cannot 'discover' the car keys that are two feet away from them.
Instead they will phone their wives or partners or (being Derry) their mammies and ask them where their lost treasure might be. Their looking involves a cursory glance in the direction of the sky or somewhere equally as useful before giving up and looking for help from their more sensible halves.
B) Men, responsible for running the country, and planning military battles- cannot remember that when taking a child under the age of two out for the day you might want to bring some nappies.
Oh, he'll remember his cigarettes, his mobile, his money, his golf clubs (just in case they pass a golf course) but nappies and wipes? Are you mad?
C) Men, icons of fashion who crave to look like David Beckham and covet Armani suits- cannot dress children for love nor money. Let your other half free to dress a child and he or she will end up looking like a poster child for the NSPCC.
D) Men- proud of being handy, of having logical and technical minds and who can wire a plug quicker than saying "Job's a good 'un"- cannot bring themselves to show off any of these skills in their own home. Hands up who has a wonky lightswitch or dodgy washing machine?
E) Men- business geniuses, responsible for the financial management of multi-million pound businesses- have no concept that the £30 in the bank has to last until pay-day and no, it's not just there for the purpose of buying the latest Playstation game- especially when there are no nappies in the house and your child has a dodgy tummy.
Now, as I've said, I love my husband. And my father. And my brother. Indeed I have a certain degree of affection for most of the men in my acquaintance but please, for the love of God please, don't try to tell me that they are the superior sex because, as I see it, the facts more than speak for themselves.

Confidence in confidence alone...

LIKE MARIA in 'The Sound of Music' I have confidence in sunshine. I have confidence in rain. I have confidence that spring will come again, but besides which, you see, I have no confidence in me.

I'm a great fan of that song. It brings back hugely happy childhood memories of curling up on the sofa , watching Maria dance towards the home of the Von Trapps swinging her guitar and getting ready to face the Captain and his seven children. (What's so fearsome about that?)
It also reminds me of pushing my clapped out, second hand, rust bucket of a bike up the hill towards Grianan Fort, my aunt and sister beside me.
The sweat lashing off us, our wee legs knackered from the exertion of the cycle run out from Rosemount, we would sing the words loudly and push ourselves to our limits to reach the Fort- where we would settle down to a picnic of custard creams and Kia Ora.
Those days, in the brilliant sunshine, as we looked down over Donegal and Derry, we really did feel on top of the world. We had confidence.
When someone told us we looked nice, we believed them. We didn't shrug our shoulders and reply that we looked like we had just been dragged through a hedge backwards.
If someone said we we could sing or act well, we rewarded them with an encore- performed with such over enthusiasm they would wish they had kept their mouths shut.
If someone commended our work, we boasted about it to everyone who would listen. We didn't care if we came across as a 'spoof'. We were taught it was perfectly acceptable to be proud of your achievements.
I wonder when that changed and we all stopped believing just how fabulous we really are?
Most days when I see my niece, Abby, I will ask her at some stage who the best girl in Derry is. With no hesitation whatsoever she will reply with her own name before skipping off not even giving the question a second thought. Of course she is the best girl in Derry. Everyone is always telling her that- why would she believe any different?
I know someday though, and it saddens me, that she will stop believing the hype. Someday (probably when she is a surly teenager and telling us all to "Shut up") she will question not only if she is the best girl in Derry but whether she is even the best girl in Shepherd's Glen?
The truth is that there comes a time when being boastful, confident and contented are no longer considered to be desirable qualities in the modern woman, and without the positive affirmations of our youth we start to question everything about ourselves.

Melodramatic
It may sound melodramatic of me, but think about this. When was the last time you met a woman truly content and happy in herself? It amazes me to meet beautiful women who can't meet the gaze of others because they think they are ugly. It angers me to have conversations with women peppered with phrases like "Ignore me, I'm stupid anyway", and perhaps it angers me so much because I know I'm one of them.
A few weeks ago I was talking with a relatively new friend when I revealed my greatest secret. I'm actually quite shy. Painfully shy in fact. (It was, in hindsight, ridiculously stupid of me to have chosen a career in journalism given this personal affliction).
I'm constantly afraid of not sounding intelligent enough- of not making much sense. I'm afraid that if I say the wrong thing the powers that be that will strip me of my academic accolades realising that there was some dastardly mix up in the exams office. ("Sorry that was meant for the other Claire Allan. The one with her name spelled the uncomplicated way- Clare Allen".)
The better solution I believe is to do all we can to make sure young people, and young women in particular, never forget that sense of self belief we all had when we were wee. Someone should ask us all on a daily basis whether or not we are the best girls in Derry and we should force ourselves to reply that we are.
Maybe if we say it often enough, and loud enough, we will start to believe it ourselves.
Failing that, I'll hoke my old bike out, brush up on my Rodgers and Hammerstein and start singing as I clamber up the hill to Grianan Fort.