Breaking with the past

As the rest of the world is out partying, I'm sitting in my new home reflecting on the turn of the year. 2009 has been turbulent, with children flying the nest and my own life moving into a new stage. The last fortnight has been a succession of breaks with the past, each one tinged with a little sadness.

I said goodbye to my old colleagues, friends and students with a leaving party and a private showing of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. One of my students sang for the gathered throng, and raised a collective chuckle and groan when he looked meaningfully at me and sang "I get a kick out of you". I've always given tough tutorials...

Then five days of moving, tearing up and down motorways with cars full of pieces of my life in carrier bags and boxes.

The new suite is awesome, and my bed is humongous;

the piano was a close thing but the piano-movers did their magic and it now graces my sitting room.

Bertie and Mab are well settled and everything except my books is now put away.

The final break was a more physical one. My last moving-in chore was a trip to stock up with food and household stuff, and as I was unloading the car, Bertie managed to escape. I didn't notice his absence until later on, so set out in the snow as it was getting dark to look for him. This is a friendly village, and as I passed people I asked them to look out for a lost dog. Just as I was giving up for the night, my phone rang, and the chap on the phone told me he had found my dog, and would I like to join their Christmas party when I came to collect him? Their gracious hospitality was tested to the limit when I slipped on the ice just outside their house and broke my wrist.

People have been kind and generous: my next door neighbour walked Bertie until the ice melted, and one of the party-goers I met has called in to ask if I need any shopping. My hostess and friends dragged me off to the pub to try out the anaesthetic effects of Old Hooky, and my new colleague invited me round for Christmas lunch when he heard that I wasn't able to drive to spend the day with Second Son.

I'm excited as the first day of my new job approaches, and happy in my new home. And yet... New Year's Eve is a time when regret is allowed a little space. I miss the dear friends who made life so varied in my old home, and I would give much for someone to share a glass of champagne with as the bells ring out the old year. But perhaps this is the most potent way to break with the past - to keep the vigil, to let go of the past and to face the future alone. It's going to be good.

Nightmares, and a dream come true

One month from today, I'll be in my new home. Somewhere between now and then, I have to get straight enough in the old one to leave it liveable for the remaining resident, and equip the new one from a distance ready for the big move weekend. The awkwardness of the entrance in both houses is causing headaches: I had to measure carefully to make sure that the new beds will fit through the narrow doorway and along the entrance hallway.

Sitting room furniture turned into a real nightmare. After hours of complicated trigonometry to work out the biggest dimensions in all directions that could be squeezed in, I was forced to conclude that nursery furniture and beanbags were the only things likely to fit. But then I discovered an outfit that makes sitting room furniture in modular, self assembly packages, with a money-back guarantee to fit. So I have ordered a whacking great settee/sofabed and a bum-and-a-half sized armchair, in the gleeful prospect of stretching out in comfort with a book when the hassle of the move is finally behind me.

The next cause for concern is the piano. I can't really play it beyond busking nursery rhymes, but I can't imagine living in a house without it. I'm in touch with some specialist piano movers, so if it can be done, they'll do it. I wonder if you can dismantle a piano, move it, and then reassemble it, like Ikea furniture? Probably not...

Having an industrial size family means that I have a workforce to call on for the actual move. I hope that sons and daughters can be distributed at each end of the journey, loading and unloading cargo (mostly books, of course) while I have only the chore of moving a hired van up and down the M1 a few times. Which reminds me - I need to book a van-hire.

If I intended a nice orderly run down of work here, it is

not turning out that way. I'm doing my best to make sure that colleagues can handle the things that need doing, and putting arrangements in place to cover all my students, but I worry that things will be left undone or unplanned for when I leave. I'm sure no-one is indispensable, and they will do very well without me. Almost weekly, I find myself doing something for the last time, and there are so many aspects of my work I'll miss. Watching my students graduate in York Minster a couple of weeks ago was one such occasion. (Please note that the chap on the pedestal watching us is Constantine, instigator of the Nicene Council: a most appropriate interloper for a meeting of theologians.)

At the same time, I'm slowly starting to pick up tasks associated with my new job. At present it's little more than doing lesson plans and thinking through some teaching strategies, but there are already a few departmental matters that I have considered, and in the next few weeks until the end of term, I hope to become gradually more engaged. It still feels a little like a dream come true, but as I do more, it is starting to feel real. I owe my predecessor in the post a good deal for his generous welcome and thoughtful inclusion into the department.

Between now and then, I am breaking the habit of a lifetime and throwing a party. A surprisingly large number of friends, colleagues and family are joining me for drinks, nibbles and a film at the local arthouse cinema to celebrate the end of the old and the start of the new, and with one of those scary birthdays coming up shortly as well, it seemed that if I was ever going to have a party, this was a good time to do it.

All this excitement means that other projects have been temporarily relegated in importance. I have a burning urge to do some writing towards a resource collection, but time in appropriate quantities for such an undertaking is hard to find just now. I'm horribly conscious that I have neglected the offspring and my lover, and I'm dying to see them all over the holiday to get a bit of serious mothering in. So much to do, so little time...

Liquid refreshments

Life is very pleasing at present. Penultimate son and daughter have flown the nest to university and I follow their lives through their Facebook updates. This means I don't know about wild freshers' parties until after the event, and I no longer have a daily duty to nag over homework. Instead, they actually miss me, and the state of their rooms are their own problems. Youngest son and I, meanwhile, are free to indulge our shared taste in experimental soups without the refrain "But Mum, soup isn't a meal."

Nothing ever runs smoothly, of course. On the way back from a meeting, another driver ran into the back of my little Ford Ka, doing considerably more damage to the chassis then the dent in the bumper suggested. Three weeks later, and I finally have my own car back, having had the most unpleasant experience of trying to stay mobile in a hire car that drives like a tank and replaces basic comfort and functionality with gizmoid gimmickry.

Work was supposed to be easier this term - a measured disengagement, carefully transferring my duties and responsibilities to colleagues over several weeks. The sudden illness of my immediate boss, absent now until the end of term, scuppered that as a plan of work, and instead I am trying to uphold her role while disengaging from mine, a complicated dance that takes political wisdom, academic versatility and unfailing good humour, qualities I am working hard to cultivate. But if this unexpected workload is onerous, the prospect of new adventures next term is a powerful motivator.

This last weekend involved a trip down the M1 to spend two days dipping a toe into my new job. Meeting colleagues, learning the ropes and feeling my way into a new role has

been made so much easier by the generous patience of the chaplain and the warmth of the staff and students I have met. I am delighted that I'm to be tutor attached to a boys' boarding house in addition to my academic role, and a pretty little house in the middle of the village will give me a home close to the school and three pubs. Each morning I wake up and have to pinch myself: this is a dream come true in every way I can imagine. I veer between sheer delight and utter terror at the scope of the task I have taken on, but always there is a bubbling excitement and energetic optimism.

Working closely with my lover on our joint project has been fun and challenging, as we try to anticipate problems and deliver quality. Time together has been scant over the summer, but oddly enough, as autumn comes on our diaries mesh more often and we have time to work and relax together more frequently. As the days grow shorter, the leaves turn colour and fall, and a morning chill shivers the daily walk to work, life looks very, very good.

From this day forward

I confess. I'm a proud Mum, and never more so than when my children do something remarkable. On Saturday 12th September, my firstborn married a lovely lady whom I am honoured to call my daughter in law. Each of the children excelled themself in special ways. Youngest son, looking terribly grown-up in his suit, was charming and gracious. Penultimate son curbed his natural tendency to smart-arsity and charmed birds off trees. Foster-daughter sang "Ave Maria" during the signing of the register in a voice that is naturally beautiful, and with a confidence she has grown into over the time she has been living with us. Daughter was the most gorgeous usher I have ever seen, and she fulfilled her role with poise and grace. Second son has all the social graces in abundance, and delighted family, friends, and total strangers. And eldest son gazed into his wife's eyes with love and made my heart leap with hope.

The run-up to the wedding was a nightmare. I only had the Friday off work, so it was a crazy day, buying shirts and cufflinks and wedding cards, and having my nails and hair done. By the time I got home my beloved uncle had arrived and the resident offspring were all at a pre-wedding reception in Leeds, so he and I walked down to a local Indian restaurant and enjoyed a lazy and gastronomically satisfying evening.

Saturday morning saw the arrival of another three bodies, so that by 9am I had 8 people in the house. Second son took charge of the iron and made sure all had shirts and frocks worthy of the occasion, while daughter supplied caffeine to all who needed it. Thanks to my colleague who volunteered to act as a driver, we were all on our way to Leeds by 11.30.

Arriving at the groom's house, scruffy youngsters were transformed into smart young men and women, and by 1pm I was at the church distributing buttonholes and tying ties (it is astonishing how many young men do not know how to knot a tie). Meanwhile daughter overcame her natural reticence to ush efficiently alongside the bride's brother with poise and charm.

The wedding was was perfect, the bride breathtakingly lovely, and the groom so happy I was close to tears of joy myself. Foster daughter's wedding present to her brother and sister-in-law was to stand in front of 90 strangers to sing Schubert's setting of "Ave Maria" - I was so proud of her as her rich, pure voice rang round the chapel. Check it out on YouTube here.

Interminable photographs - perhaps the least appealing aspect of a wedding - were followed by a magnificent reception in Leeds Met Hotel. Flawless service, excellent food and heartfelt speeches, and the delightful company of the bride's father and the best man made for a most pleasing wedding breakfast. Then there was an interlude to chat and catch up with old friends as the staff rearranged the room and the photographers whizzed through a gazillion photos to produce a slideshow of the wedding and reception. Then another wave of guests arrived and the evening party began. The tables had been pushed back, a dance floor laid, and a buffet of cheese, biscuits, fruits and wedding cake provided sustenance for those with more stamina than I for dancing into the night.

A family conspiracy provided the musical highlight of the evening as the bride and groom were coaxed onto the dance floor to a recording of "Sylvia's Mother" by Dr Hook, a favourite of both. What the groom did not know until the music started was that we had resurrected a recording of his eight-year-old self, with siblings, singing lustily, if out of tune, along to the recording.

By 11.15, exhaustion was setting in, my feet hurt, the bride and groom were bopping madly to "Things can only get better" and the kiddiwinkles were all enjoying the fun, so I left the happy gathering with a glow of maternal satisfaction. My abiding memory of the day is the utter joy in the faces of my son and daughter-in-law as they turned towards the congregation at the end of the ceremony. All of a sudden, 27 years' parenting seems worth all the effort...

The threshold of the future

It's only ten days since results day, and already there's a sense of loosening in the family unit. I used to bemoan the fact that as the kiddiwinkles got older, they no longer came into the bedroom in the morning bouncing with excitement. On 20th August, I decided that perhaps this wasn't such a cause for regret after all, when two very excited 18 year olds woke me up at the crack of dawn to say that their university places had been confirmed on the UCAS website. Both penultimate son and foster daughter got the A levels they needed to take up their university places, she to do psychology a few miles up the M1, and he to do law on the south coast. Youngest son's AS results allow him to continue to A2, so there was plenty of cause to celebrate.

Since then it has been a flurry of form-filling, finance-juggling and removal-planning as the two of them prepare to leave home and start the next stage of their life journeys. Halls of residence are now expecting them, new bank accounts (with free railcards) are hungrily awaiting the arrival of student loans, and the logistics of moving two people in two different directions in the same week seem to have resolved themselves.

We are also into the final countdown for eldest son's wedding in two weeks: the hen and stag parties in early August were fun and congenial, and pretty well everything is now in place for a wonderful celebration. The table plan from daughter-in-law-to-be arrived with a delightful set of explanations about who everybody is, which I shall print out and file in my handbag for quick reference on the day. Foster daughter has been practising her song and I've been getting to grips with the reading: all that is outstanding is the purchase of suitable shirts for the resident boys and a frock for foster daughter. I'm looking forward to the once-in-a lifetime experience of seeing all my sons in suits at the same time. Of course the real joy is welcoming a whole new set of people into our clan, and sharing my first-born with his new extended family.

My own departure from Sheffield is only a little over the horizon, and as I write up the teaching plans for the coming term, I'm acutely aware that each task is being done for the last time. I alternate between delight and dread: delight at the prospect of a new challenge that is full of excitement and promise; dread at the enormity of the task before me. To thank Sheffield friends for thirty years of their presence in my life, I'm having a film-party - expect your invitations shortly.

This has been a busy summer, but there has been a little time for leisure. Opera in

the Park in Leeds with eldest son and d-i-l-t-b was enormous fun: a very extravagant picnic, the Halle orchestra and soloists, and the perfect weather for such an event. (The picture shows the "arm can-can" - a local tradition apparently. Odd.) There have been meals with friends, and the odd afternoon curled up with a book and a glass of wine. Now the holidays are almost over. (What holidays? I didn't even get away with my lover this summer because things have been so busy) We all stand on the threshold of a new academic year, new ways of living and working, and new futures. This is a good place to be.

All change please

Once more, there has been too long a gap between posts. Two very busy months have passed, and the resident minors have taken their exams, so they now anxiously await results. Penultimate son and foster daughter have officially left school, and have instead spent much of the summer cluttering up the house with their friends, all polishing their skills at poker. There's mounting excitement at the prospect of leaving the nest for academic pastures new, as we book accommodation, complete student finance forms, and start to collect living essentials for their new lives. Subject to exam results, these two will be heading in opposite directions to study, leaving youngest son at home for his final A level year.

At present all the resident minors are non-resident for a couple of weeks, having headed off for a bit of Mediterranean sun and luxury with their Dad. The house is deliciously quiet and, for the first time in months, is almost tidy. It isn't just the tidiness I appreciate - it's the fact that it looks exactly the same when I get up as when I retire to bed, the same when I come in from work as it did when I left in the morning. I find such changlessness calming and peaceful.

Meanwhile, we are now in the countdown to eldest son's wedding in September: suits are being bought and hair

appointments booked, hen and stag parties are in the diary, and I even have my hat. I'm not sure how radical the change will be for the two of them, though. Whilst their ontological status will of course be transformed, they already have a happy and stable life together, and my biggest wish for them is more of the same.

Second son and daughter, who have been sharing a flat in Islington, are moving, too; he to a single flat and she back to Sheffield for a while. This delights me, since I see much less of my London children than I would like, though they have always been generous with their hospitality. I gather second son is planning to acquire a motorbike, a travel decision which makes sense for someone in his position, so I shall have to suspend my reservations. Daughter, with a much better sense of self-preservation, has instead arranged to borrow my car when she needs it, contributing the occasional tank of petrol and acting as chauffeur for me once in a while.

My own summer has been less exciting, mostly spent marking exam papers. In an attempt to get the maximum done in the minimum time, I have been starting work at 6.30am and finishing around 10.30pm, weekends included - a quite dreadful regime, but one that started to feel worth the

pain when I was asked to mark enough additional papers to buy a Radley handbag. The final batch are, as I write, packed up for collection on Monday, and for the first time for weeks, I shall be able to spend the rest of the weekend curled up on the settee with a book and a clear conscience. Even the limited time I managed to spend with my lover this summer was overshadowed by the need to continue marking, and we probably won't get a proper break together now till the autumn. We have much work yet to do on our joint project, and little time over the summer to tackle it.

But the minors are not the only ones with change on the horizon. I too have exciting new plans, having been appointed to a job to die for starting in January 2010. It is a new adventure for me, with younger students and a quite different kind of community, but one that allows me to fulfil long-standing ambitions in an institution that is the very best of its kind. I shall be sad to leave a place where I have been so very content, and learnt so much; but the time is right to move on, and I pinch myself daily to be certain that this isn't just a happy dream.

Flu, friends and fun in a church

Easter has come and gone, and once more my favourite cherry tree is in extravagant blossom below my office window. a sure sign that summer is not far away.   One of  the resident minors passed into adulthood in April, and another celebrates her 18th birthday this coming week.   Both have now chosen their universities, and by October, I shall only have one resident child.   How quickly time seems to slip past when my mind is on other things!

As the rest of the country goes hysterical over the risk of Mexican swine flu, the family has all been afflicted with a much more British chesty cold.   With four of us hacking away, the house sounds like a TB sanatorium.   I comfort myself with the thought that once all are recovered, we have probably completed our annual quota of respiratory viruses, and the minors can look forward to a healthy summer and untroubled exam preparation.

The latter part of last term proved frustrating for me.   Other training demands on my students' time left them struggling with their assessed work.  Although some threw themselves into their final assignment, others were distracted and diffident, and it took all my energy to keep them going.   This ebb and flow of concentration is a hazard of teaching adults, and I sometimes flirt with the idea of diverting into schoolteaching instead.   But it would have to be a special kind of school, I think.

One bright spot, though, was the weekly visit of a dear friend who came to sit in on one of my courses, and then joined us for a meal afterwards.   The children competed to produce pleasing meals each week for him, and he rewarded them with generous appreciation and good company.   To celebrate the end of term, his wife came instead and wowed the resident minors with her wry perspective on the idiocies of life.   I have a small circle of friends, but those I have are all rather special.

Time for relaxation was harder to fit in.   Both of us have jobs which make erratic demands on our time, but my lover and I managed to have a few days away at half term, which gave me my first real chance to escape from the treadmill of work and parenthood this year.  Easter gave us another weekend  to enjoy together before the onslaught of the summer term.

The lesiure activity this term has been some ad-hoc research on stained glass.   Back in the days when I was a real student I did a course on medieval glass and iconography, and I never lost the sense of wonder that ancient glass provokes.   So when I heard of a perfect early 15th century church with a contemporary East window that was largely undocumented, I got hold of some photos and started exploring.   It is at such times that the internet provides a dilettante researcher with resources previously only available to the most assiduous scholar.   Identifying the heraldry was as simple as describing the arms in the correct technical terms and running a Google search.   Facsimiles of books online provided evidence, dates and names of those involved in restorations, and the most wonderful archive of stained glass photographs has given me hours of pleasure, searching for iconographic parallels and stylistic similarities.

So when the sun was shining last week, and I was 

owed some time off, I borrowed a pair of binoculars 

and set off to find this pretty little village with its fascinating church.   The churchyard was snowy with cherry-blossom and the church deserted, so I spent two hours peering at the window light by light to refine and correct what I had discovered from studying photographs.   In fact, although almost all of the East window is 15th century glass, not all of it was originally in the East window. The detective work involved in identifying which was which makes this an intellectual puzzle as well as an aesthetic treat, and I made discoveries and came to conclusions that left me with a deep sense of having done something satisfying with my time.

But satisfaction is a fleeting thing, and the approach of the minors' exams, uncertainties about the future and a yen for a new direction stir troublesome currents under the calm surface of my life.   I wonder what the summer holds?

Penitence and hope

Good heavens! Is it really that long? I assume that I no longer have an adoring public, after such wicked evidence of neglect. But in this lenten season, as an act of penitence, I write my blog to appease the ghosts of adorers past. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

This has been a winter of - well, not discontent, but certainly of stress and irritation. Christmas came and went with the usual merriment. The day itself was was delightful, and not only because two of the three resident children were enjoying the sybaritic life in Alexandria. The remaining minor worked all day, so I had an interlude of calm once I'd delivered him to work, until second son arrived in the afternoon to do his filial duty. The evening was unexpectedly brightened by the arrival of friends who stayed late into the night, gave me good cause for a hangover, and ended the day with fun and with good companionship.

Epiphany brought the brood home for a day; and then term started in a blaze of irrational optimism under an insane workload. The first few days of January saw an additional flurry of work on a research project which may or may not come off, before the arrival of students and the grim reality of a heavy term and a lot of evening teaching. Bouts of illness, injury and scheduled surgery means that we have rarely had a full complement of staff, and the load has sometimes fallen heavily in my direction. Meanwhile, my A-level project proceeds only by fits and starts, and all hope of peace on the domestic front is lost as the minors hurtle towards A level exams.

This season's weather event was a spell of snow which turned the cemetery behind the house into a Christmas card scene and messed up all teaching for a week. Sub-zero temperatures for ten days ensured that the snow remained and kept students away, but the price had to be paid during half term week, when I had to run extra sessions to make up for the cancelled classes.

Meanwhile, working on exam resources has been a wonderful opportunity to indulge in artistic and literary approaches to theology, to read gorgeous books with glossy pictures of works of art, to wallow in front of films in the name of research, and to revisit some of my favourite classics. Middlemarch drew me in and made my heart ache, and oh, bliss, Brideshead Revisted... I have yet to see the latest film of the latter, but surely no-one could do justice to Waugh's masterpiece as wholly as the 1981 TV series? And yet, faithful as Mortimer's script was, beautiful as Anthony Andrews was, Waugh's language is a more whole (and holy) experience. The pleasure I have always taken in this book was heightened this time through by insights from other recent reading, especially the private letters of the Mitford sisters and Powell's Dance to the Music of Time. Self-indulgent bookishness is the tired woman's alternative to pleasures of the flesh.

I do have a personal life sometimes, even now. I've seen my lover more frequently than expected because our collaborative work schedule has required more or less regular meetings to progress the project, and we have managed to fit in one city break since Christmas. All the extra evening teaching means that these can be taken as time in lieu, and exploring together possible material for incorporation is a sweet reminder of our earliest days together when I was primarily the artist and he the theologian.

And now lent settles in, term moves purposefully towards its close and slowly, unobtusively, the changing season sneaks in, a  few hours at a time, a day here and there, a morning of sunhine or an evening of gentle warmth.   It has been a long winter, and I wait patiently for the kindness of spring.