A double swimming lesson at the end of a pleasant, exhausting day. So many bodies to look after, in and out of the water. And into this place that usually just sees me sweating (the changing rooms of children’s pools are rarely kept beneath Lightly Roast) and chivvying my infants with various Gothic endearments/threats, kind strangers step in. A four-year-old hands the baby her pens and lets it colour all over her careful bright pages. A mother with a face like a Botticelli angel produces an Ipad mini for two others in my gang, and an older girl arrives just in time to keep the baby from eating all the pens.
In the changing rooms, while I sweat myself into moderate-to-severe dehydration and the baby puts on a swimming cap which, combined with chronic ink mouth, brings a young Zandra Rhodes into our presence, one of M’s friends declares to the whole room that They Don’t Have A TV. M – like anyone who’s generally only ever really watched TV when Clockwork Orange-d by her mother into consuming family favourites from two generations ago – doesn’t know how to respond. Her friends says, What? What’s weird about that? And I say, in an attempt to help the situation, Wow, that’s cool. It’s not even out of my mouth before I can hear how sarcastic it sounds to the rest of the room. Her friend says, Does she watch TV? M is apparently paralysed by the two of us. I know the feeling. I try to explain that she doesn’t really, maybe… once a fortnight? Maybe? to try and normalise whatever it is this six-year-old is seeking to shock us with, and I can feel with an audible click the room turn against me. I want to explain, No, I love the Square Au Pair, she’s the best, I just… I… but everyone drifts out and I’m sweating so hard it’s stinging my eyes.
I resolve to try again next week.