Heroic defeat

Imagine what it feels like. You wake up on Monday morning feeling flattened. Perhaps for a few seconds there is blissful oblivion, but then the full weight of your disappointment crushes you like never before. This is Ed, this is Nick, this is Nigel and all the MPs who lost their seats last week. The political casualties of the general election are facing up to their failures, after six weeks of campaigning hype, nerve-bending adrenalin and exhaustion. Their bid to change history, to alter the course of their own lives, has come to nothing.

Being shown the door on election night

Of course these men and women are thick-skinned and tough - to survive in modern politics you probably have to be - but I imagine public defeat still makes them feel empty and demoralised. Where they may differ from us ordinary mortals is in their ability to pick themselves up, dust down their political colours and get on with their lives. 

Social butterflies

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mum

If I could bestow a single gift upon my children, it would be social confidence. Already I can see that my eldest is struggling to make her mark on the world, preferring to hide away in the corner rather than attract undue attention to herself. When I picked her up from dance club after school the other day, she was standing on her own while the rest of the girls chatted away to each other. "I just don't fit in!" Quiet One snapped at me when I committed the error of asking if she had made any new friends. 

Parties: back in seek-a-snog mode

I was similar at her age, or certainly during those precarious teenage years when you would rather die than cause a fuss or go out on a limb. My best friend at school was much more gregarious than me and at parties I used to drift along in her slipstream. She would launch into a group of people like the Titanic on her maiden voyage, holding forth on any subject, while I threw in the odd laconic comment. Fortunately parties in those days were simple affairs. A little flirtatious chat and a lot of cider were just a prelude to a snog in some dark corner of the room.

Cornish fantasies

Just on my way, Ross...
© Mammoth Screen / BBC

Last week I saddled up my horse and galloped off to find Poldark. Well, in a manner of speaking. It was more a case of cramming the boot of our Volvo with buckets, spades, suitcases, wellies, wine and coats, whilst leaving a slither of space for the dog. Meanwhile in the back seat, the kids were wedged in with a box of board games and various bags of food (including a rogue red pepper that had escaped its casing) as I rested my feet on another three bags in the front. Only my husband enjoyed the luxury of a footwell, but then someone needed to drive. This was us, off on our hols to the West Country.

Our destination was a Landmark Trust cottage, tucked inside the border of Cornwall, with no television, wifi or mobile signal to pollute its venerable rafters. Quite an undertaking for my family with our various addictions to Instagram, Facebook and Amazon instant video. In their stead, we had Cluedo, a 1000-piece jigsaw, chess and Bananagrams to while away the time. 

Poldark country

How were we going to cope? Oddly enough we felt excited about our wifi-less wilderness - not exactly 18th century Poldark, but a return to more simple pleasures. Regretfully not much bare-chested scything came to pass, but there was a fair bit of trekking along coastal paths while gazing over the clifftops at the turquoise sea and spumes of white spray below (where, oh where, were those pilchards?).

Lose yourself

My daughter found something out about herself this week. After taking a narrator role in her school play, she discovered she rather enjoyed being in the limelight. Quite a departure for my shy girl who generally feels more comfortable observing life from the sidelines. Standing on the spotlit stage, she delivered her lines with aplomb and basked in the audience's attention like it was warm sunshine. For a few hours, she was free from the self-conscious strictures of pre-teenhood.

Lost in a good book

The transformation came about because she was able to borrow the persona of another character and suppress her usual inhibitions. Wearing another personality for a few hours also meant she no longer had to worry about how other people might judge her. Like any spell in the sunshine, the after-effects have lingered, giving her a rosy glow of confidence. 

The whips and scorns of time

I finally worked out who Bradley Cooper was the other day. Yes, I know - I have been living under a rock. Last Saturday, my husband and I watched him and Jennifer Lawrence in Silver Linings Playbook, a quirky rom-com about two young people with mental health issues who [spoiler alert] end up falling in love. The message we took away was that most of us harbour a little craziness, whether we paddle away mid-stream or occasionally sink beneath the flow.

"The world will break your heart ten ways to Sunday - that's guaranteed," Pat (Bradley Cooper) told us in the final scene. "I can't begin to explain that. Or the craziness inside myself and everyone else. But guess what? Sunday's my favourite day again."

"The world will break your heart ten ways to Sunday..."

Credit: Will Lam

Oddly, I found this quotation comforting. We are not alone, I thought! The idea that life is about heartbreak and disappointment, as much as fulfilment and pleasure, is not a novel one but it teaches us that we can't always expect an easy ride. We have to embrace human experience in its entirety, the rough with the smooth. 

Stop, drop and breathe

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mum

Walking Toddler comes clodhopping into my bedroom while I am still lying in bed. Her little feet are balanced precariously on my high-heeled shoes left out from the evening before. 

"Mama, we have a soo-pise for you," she shouts gleefully.

She is swiftly overtaken by Middle Child who clouts her around the back of the head with his Viking sword. "Don't give it away, stupid! It's not Mother's Day yet!" 

Walking Toddler in my shoes
© Marikeherselman | Dreamstime.com

Walking Toddler lets out an ear-splitting wail, hurls herself to the ground and proceeds to beat the wooden floor with her fists. One of my vintage heels goes flying across the room and slams into the back of the bedroom door. 

Oh my God - where to start? Stop, drop and breathe. I repeat it like a mantra, though I can hardly hear myself over the full-body tantrum going on at floor-level. Stop (close your mouth), drop (let the issue go for a moment) and breathe (deeply several times). 

May you be ordinary

I sometimes think that my life isn't really exciting enough to write a blog. Nothing ever happens, nothing happens at all (as the band Del Amitri might have put it). If I'm to write anything, I generally have to stick to my interior life. You can do some clever things with your imagination.

Safe in our bubble

When I look round at the comfortable existence I lead with my husband, our two children, the dog and the cat, I wonder if this is what we were striving for all those years ago. Hours of essay writing at university, playing office politics during our twenties, running drunk through Soho... it was all leading to up this: domestic humdrum in a Home Counties bubble.

But that is the trade-off when you have children. Any appetite for risk diminishes almost overnight. I love that scene in the Paddington film when groovy Mr Brown drives his pregnant wife to the maternity hospital on a motorbike and then picks her up the next day in a new Volvo estate. Safety first, wildly fulfilling life second. 

A new kind of alchemy

A few months ago I had the pleasure of shepherding a group of excitable seven-year olds around the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. The highlights of our trip, according to the consensus view, were Guy Fawkes' lantern, a mummified cat from ancient Egypt and the contents of our packed lunch. So when a glass case of Eastern porcelain caught my fancy, I knew I was going out on a limb. There was a typed notice inside the case that particularly intrigued me: 

East and West: a difference of opinion
In the West an object is considered more beautiful and valuable if it is in perfect and original condition. Contrast this with the Far East where imperfections and repairs can be considered to enhance the beauty and significance of ceramics. The dish [below], showing the rising moon, has been mended with gilded lacquer. The gilding draws attention to the restored area. A Western mender or restorer would have aimed to create an invisible repair.

Porcelain dish, Arita, Japan, 1600-1699 
The rim has been repaired with gilded lacquer using a technique known as maki-e

All hail the House of Winser!

People watching:
Kim Winser, OBE and founder of Winser London

So what do Yasmin Le Bon, Emma Watson and David Beckham have in common? In one way or another, they have all modelled clothes for Britain's very own queen of retail, Kim Winser. Yasmin is currently the face of Kim's newest and eponymous label, Winser London, while Emma Watson was snapped last year in a Winser trench coat (yes Winser, not Burberry!) on her way back from the Oscars. Back in 2000, when Kim was boss of Pringle, the Scottish knitwear manufacturer, David Beckham burnished the brand by choosing to don a Pringle sweater for the launch of his first book.

Yasmin Le Bon in that coat!

Many of us love poring over what the stars choose to wear, but sometimes the more interesting story is the person behind those clothes. Kim Winser, who has earned a reputation for reviving ailing brands, such as Pringle, Aquascutum and Agent Provocateur, has set herself a fresh challenge: to turn Winser London, her 2013 internet start-up, into a global brand. 

Kim founded Winser after she spotted a gap in the market. "I was passionate about an area... that was not being fulfilled, the area of fashionable clothes with a great luxurious quality but at truly amazing prices," she told me in a recent interview.

Although the brand started out two years ago as an online business, the clothes are now available in John Lewis and two of Winser's own stores in Gerrards Cross and Marlow. After running more established businesses like Pringle and Aquascutum, Kim finds she is back to being "seriously hands on" as she sets about transforming her vision into tangible success. "My whole career has been a learning curve for launching Winser London." 

A book in flight

Yesterday was a significant day for me. I sent my new novel out into the world on the wings of an email. The laptop even made that little whooshing noise to signify that my book had finally flown the nest. My domestic thriller about a woman trapped in a ruinous marriage in 1970s Jakarta was off to make its fortune... perhaps.

My new novel, The Puppet Master, is
inspired by my childhood in Indonesia

I have been writing this new novel, The Puppet Master, off and on for nearly eight years and earlier this month I decided it was finally time to send it off to a few literary agents. As I published my first novel, A Sister for Margot, independently, the decision to venture once more down the traditional route has caused some angst. Would I be able to deal with all those rejections when they come bouncing back?

Hope is my antidote. The Puppet Master has enjoyed rave reviews from my harshest critics (my husband and my mum) so I'm feeling confident... or at least I was until I pressed the 'send' icon on the email. Whoosh! and suddenly the doubts came crowding in. Should have done one more edit, should have tightened up the third chapter, should have waited a bit longer... damn it!

Princesses in the tower

When I was about 11 years old, I wrote a story about an Arab princess who escaped her home country by driving over the border to a new life. My family was living in the Middle East at the time and as a child I watched the local women, wrapped in their black abayas, with growing fascination. They would waft about Abu Dhabi's shopping malls with haughty disdain, leaving a cloud of perfume in their wake. Perhaps it was just my Western sensibilities, but I liked to imagine that one or two of them were desperate to break free from the swathes of black material.

New frontiers for women of the Middle East?

With the death last week of Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz, stories are re-emerging of real Saudi princesses locked up in palaces, unable to enjoy a normal life. According to various reports, Princesses Sahar and Jawaher have been held under house arrest in Jeddah for the last 10 years by their father, the late king. Their sisters Maha and Hala are also believed to be held at separate complexes nearby. 

The apparent crime of these young women was to speak out about human rights abuses and restrictions placed upon women in the secretive kingdom. Last March, Princess Sahar reportedly told Channel 4 News in an email, "We suffer on a daily basis... Our father said that we had no way out and that after his death our brothers will continue detaining us." The women claim that they have been starved and drugged by the regime. Princess Sahar's mother, a former wife of King Abdullah who fled to London, is campaigning for their release.

Don't need no 'sex' education...

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mum

Quiet One has sex education coming up at school. Hopefully not a demonstration of whips and fluffy handcuffs (one never knows in this post-fifty-shades-of-grey era) but more of an educational exposé of the birds and the bees. I'm told that it's all about relationships these days - understanding what's allowed and what's not cool (in parent-speak: verging on abusive).

I have always been candid with my children about sex, answering their enquiries in an age-appropriate manner (of course). So we talk about 'special hugs' and how Middle Child's magic 'seeds' will eventually turn into babies. Jack and the Beanstalk has got nothing on us.

Ploughing my way through the birds and the bees
© Spinyant | Dreamstime.com

Still, I can't help wondering if Quiet One is in good shape for her Sex Ed class. I take pride in making sure my kids are prepared for whatever life throws at them - call me a snowplough parent if you will, Mrs Farr.*

Mum's the word

Minutes before the dawn of the new year, I found myself locked in a dispute over gender. As our wineglasses glittered in the dying candlelight of 2014, my friends and I duelled over the dining table, debating whether there were innate differences between men and women and how these might determine their career choices. 

In the heat of our exchanges, there was no time to make resolutions about taking up yoga or cutting back on Facebook. There was barely enough time to rush over to the television to watch London explode in fiery delight as Big Ben tolled in the new year.

Her mum said it was okay
Credit: © Wisky | Dreamstime.com

Oblivious to the passing of the years, we had been preoccupied with the need for female role models in male-dominated professions (such as fund management or engineering) and the possible virtue of using a quota system to employ more women in these bastions of male achievement. 

We also wondered why women gravitated to professions such as primary-school teaching. Was it because women were more nurturing? Or was this simply social conditioning at work? Despite our inebriated fervour, we fell short of putting the world to rights. Time was not on our side. There were more questions than answers.