A Proper Distraction
As ya’ll know, the T-Rex has been fairly disruptive to my newly single life.
Making me think I wanted to get married again. Kissing me in a way that makes me want to have another baby (or Lord help me, twins which apparently run in his family). Thinking I might want to move to Fulham or some Godforsakenshire which is A LOT further than a black cab ride away from too many things, including Heathrow! I mean, I actually switched one of the pre-programmed buttons on the radio in my car to Radio 4 from XFM!!!
Does that sound like a nude sunbathing on a yacht in Ibiza when we are seventy kinda beginning to this fairytale?
No it don’t. No it don’t.
After a lot of soul searching and quite a few tears, I am doing my best to walk away from him.
It hurts like hell, because it could have been out of this world. And he knows it too.
But honestly, how could I possibly be thinking of falling any more in love with someone that doesn’t have the guts to bring me home to his parents (bear in mind he is supposed to be a grown man at the age of 45) just because I am divorced? Or that doesn’t have the guts to meet my beautiful boys?
What kind of man is that?
He ain’t a man at all is he really?
And he sure as hell ain’t man enough for me on the back of that and I know it (won’t even tell you what my girlfriend calls him on a regular basis).
Thank God for work, my sons and the Loaf to take the edge off the rather large T-Rex hurtie I have been nursing for the last two weeks.
And back me up and slap grandma, just when I thought I had plenty of distractions to keep my heart and my mind off T-Rex, God sends me another one.
Sweet Lordy Jesus. Let me tell ya’ll about him.
See, since the divorce, the Toeheads have been good, I mean really good considering what they, what we, have been through in the last year.
They have taken to their new life with a grace and simple acceptance in a way I could have never predicted. They have been brave, strong, funny and kind to each other and to me.
It seems odd, but its like we have fallen in love with each other in a way that is stronger and more sure than it ever was.
But, about a month ago the guys were in a funk and on top of that our mother’s help had to return home to Poland to sort out her passport.
While she was gone, the boys and I had a great week. Walking home from school real slow, feet crunching through the leaves, going concker hunting, singing silly songs and eating dinner together at six o’clock. The funk had lifted.
Except for a case of nits, it was fabulous. Even the nits weren’t so bad as my oldest brought the portable DVD into the bathroom for his little brother to watch Pokemon while we combed the nits out. Talk about a mother’s heart bursting with pride. Is that not the sweetest thing you could do for your little brother in the entire world?
Then our mother’s help came back and all of a sudden, the funk was back.
Jesus, the funk was my mother’s help. How could I have not seen it?
Between work, the T-Rex and my Dad not being well back home, I hadn’t noticed that they guys couldn’t stand her. God I felt like a jerk.
I gave her her notice and we bumped along for a week or two with no help, but my work was getting more hectic and Mr. Magnolia was like, we can’t just not have childcare (neither of us have parents nearby to help or siblings and with my Dad being ill in the US, we need to have someone that can be there for the boys if we can’t, its just logistics).
Of course it is my job to find new childcare, so I thought, right. We need to shake things up a little. Get this really right.
And a good friend had told me about how great male nannies are for divorced families, especially ones with young boys. Now the old me, a year ago, would have called Mr. Magnolia and asked him what he thought about the idea.
Did I this time? Did I hell. I just called up and said, when can I interview some candidates. They run a speed interviewing night and one was coming up, would I like to go? Hell yeah.
I met 10 terrific guys, all British, all RADA actors or university students. Dynamic, high energy, all really still boys, just in 22-26 year old bodies. Instantly, I just knew this was the answer to a prayer I didn’t even know needed answering.
Two boys stood out.
One fella was Scottish and I have to admit, he was my number one choice. He was talk, dark, engaging and bold, confident and straight in with questions about the boys. Very sporty, very can do.
My second choice was just as good but completely different.
We shook hands (good handshake, always important in my book) and again he was tall, and engaging, but more mellow, more calm. There was something warm about this kid.
We started talking about what the boys like to do, football, ninetendo, drawing, dancing in the living room to the pet shop boys remixes and the Killers, and dressing up. I showed him a picture of my oldest dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow in full black eyeliner and wig with beads. He loved it. He was so laid back I felt my blood pressure drop just sitting next to him.
They only reason he was my second choice was because he lived the other side of London from us. Wouldn’t he hate the commute? Talking the agency the next day, apparently he was very interested in our family and didn’t care about the commute. Would we like to arrange a trial afternoon?
Why the hell not?
He arrived and within minutes was playing football in the garden with the boys, jumping on the trampoline and playing Uno. Then they carved the pumpkin in the garden and lit it. Surely this was a one off. Would he be as good next week with them?
Oh dear.
He was if it’s possible, even better.
I called Mr. Magnolia and told him that the boys and I would like him to meet our new mother’s help, er, Leo. Audible silence on the other end of the phone. My oldest said, mummy let me tell Daddy. Next thing I knew my oldest had talked Mr. M into meeting Leo later in the week. Go, go, go my beautiful baby boy!!!
I briefed Leo about meeting Mr. Magnolia the day before. He is like, no worries.
He turns up the next day in his best jeans. Newish Converse trainers. Collared shirt, grey v-neck sweater (cashmere?), leather blazer and God help me, his family pinky ring. Very little product in his hair and a nice clean shave. He certainly had made an effort.
And what does he do that afternoon? Cooks the boys fresh stir fry, while simultaneously building a fort in the living room and had not one, but two light sabre fights in the garden to tucker the boys out.
When Mr. Magnolia walked in about an hour later, the pumpkin he’d carved with the boys was lit in the garden, the living room was almost dark, and with torches, he and the boys were in the fort telling ghost stories. Giggles and a blanket of happiness filled our flat.
I take the boys for a bath. Leo offers and then makes Mr. Magnolia a coffee. Mr. M proceeds to interview him for an hour in our tiny little kitchen. Leo tells him how he’s doing two degrees at Kings and how he loved teaching English to kids in South America all last year.
After Mr. M left, I must have sighed rather loudly, but if Leo heard it, he didn’t say anything. We tidied up the flat and we were quiet. I think he sensed I’d won a huge victory. I thanked him and gave him the keys to the flat. He touched my shoulder, looked at me, smiled and left.
He starts officially next week.
I am a bit shattered at the moment and Dad is not well, but every fibre of my being is telling me that this is right in about a million different ways.
I don’t’ need a second husband.
I certainly do not need the T-Rex (might still want to shag him, you know, some hard core Gorilla-love shagging…cannot believe I am never going to shag that man, dammit, dammit, dammit) and his blessed Range Rover.
I just need a little help with the guys, from a man.
Yes, a man.
I can do a lot of things, but I can’t be a guy for them and Leo can.
And here’s the really fun bit fun bit:
Watching the Mulberry bags hit the deck when my blonde blue eyed, 6’3″, 24 year old Manny in his Diesel jeans, leather jacket and impossibly long blonde eyelashes walks through the school gate and I introduce him to the boys’ teachers.
My fellow yummy mummies are gonna have to scrape their tongues off the playground floor.
Hot damn diggity, I can’t wait!
Now that ya’ll, is a proper Distraction.
Ms. Magnolia
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