I can't sleep and...

i am wishing that i didn't have to live life in chronological order. imagine if you woke up every day not knowing what part of your life that day would come from. i could wake up with butterflies in my stomach and think "fantastic - i must be just falling in love with mr me - there will be some perfect kissing today." one day i might have lost the use of my legs, and the next day discover i was 9 again, and spend the whole day running and dancing around. i might spend a day caring for baby blue through the chicken pox and be up all night with him, and the next day be 15 again and i could give my mum a big hug of appreciation for all the time she spent caring for me instead of wishing she wouldn't embarrass me. i might work a 12 hour shift in A+E and the next day wake up to find i had retired, and spend the whole day resting, reading, walking by a lake. i might be one day a widow, and the next be back with mr me, and greet him as if we'd been separated by death for years. any day i woke up and baby blue was still a baby i would be so thrilled to hold him in my arms as he was my tiny baby again, and no matter how hard the day and night were i would treasure every second.

I suppose this idea is a little like the concept behind "The Time Traveller's Wife" - and shows the sheer joy and privilege of a single day with our loved ones. Somehow it is very hard to live in that joy when you know that tomorrow will be "just the same". But it never is exactly the same. Living in time is the enemy of valuing the moment. Anybody else fancy my idea of a mixed up life? i suppose it might be a little bit hard to ever get anything done...

The marriage meme

I stole this meme from Charlotte, who did it for Valentine's Day. I'm a bit late, but never mind. Here is the history of my marriage, without which I know I wouldn't be as happy as I am.

1. Where/how did you meet?

Technically we met at Christian festival Spring Harvest when we were both about 10 and our families were there together, but I think we first spoke when we met during sixth form. I was 16, he was 17 and we went in a big group to watch Titanic at the cinema.

2. How long have you known each other?

That was January 1998 - so ten years!!!!!!!! scarey.

3. How long after you met did you start dating?

It was nine months later in September of that year, after much shyness, flirting and discovering that we had things in common. I had decided it wasn't a good idea to date someone who didn't share my faith, and at the time he wasn't a Christian. I started to really like him in April 98, and prayed for him for the next 5 months, until he became a Christian in Sept 98.

4. How long did you date before getting engaged?

We talked about it after 1 year, then got properly engaged after 2 years.

5. How long was your engagement?

Two years until mr me finished his degree in Birmingham.

6. How long have you been married?

5 years.

7. What is your anniversary?

6th July

8. How many people came to your wedding reception?

About 120

9. What kind of cake did you serve?

One tier fruit cake, two tiers sponge cake, if I remember rightly.

10. Where was your wedding?

We were married at St Mary's Grassendale, Liverpool, which was mr me's parish church, and was very lovely. Our reception was at the Bluecoat Arts Centre in the centre of Liverpool, which had a lovely walled garden in the middle of the city.

11. What did you serve for the meal?

It was a buffet with large joints of pork and beef, and salmon.

12. How many people were in your bridal party?

Mr me had two best men - his two best friends from primary school, and I had four bridesmaids - my sister, his sister, my best friend and another very good friend I had written to through all my teenage years.

13. Are you still friends with them?

yes.

14. Did your spouse cry during the wedding ceremony?

No, but I welled up walking down the aisle and seeing so many faces.

15. Most special moment of your wedding day?

Very hard to choose just one... leaving the house with my dad ...saying our vows was pretty amazing... having time to talk in the car on the way to the reception, and realising that we really really were married.

16. Any funny moments?

One of mr me's best friends mums tried to stuff confetti down his trousers on the way out at the end, traumatising him slightly! I went rather lightheaded when the hairdressers gave me a glass of champagne when I'd been sitting under the dryer for about 2 hours.

17. Any big disasters?

Apparently the cake got knocked over, but I didn't know about it til afterwards, as they managed to restore it to its former glory.

18. Where did you honeymoon?

A cute little cottage in Cornwall. We pootled along the coast and had cream teas and paddled. It was lovely.

19. For how long?

Two weeks.

20. If you were to do your wedding over, what would you change?

I would have more money now, so I would be able to have a few of the things we had to miss out on. But it was a lot of fun doing it all on a shoestring.

21. What side of the bed do you sleep on?

The right, so I can lie on his right shoulder when he hugs me. tis the law.

22. What size is your bed?

Double - the room's not really big enough for anything else. But we have a king-size quilt.

23. Greatest strength as a couple?

We have worked out ways to communicate and negotiate, so that we hardly ever argue in a painful way any more. We have a lot of strength from our shared faith, which gives us purpose, and helps us to gradually become better and better able to lay down our lives for each other.

24. Greatest challenge as a couple?

Like Charlotte - I'd say neither of us is very practical in a DIY kind of way.

25. Who literally pays the bills?

We both handle different ones. Recently I almost got us cut off by omitting to pay the phone bill for a very long time.

26. What is your song?

"Brown Eyed Girl", Van Morrison

27. What did you dance your first dance to?

"Let's stay together" by Al Green. Mr me had sworn we could only have music if I promised we didn't have to do a first dance, so I told everybody how important it was to him. However, his best men ignored him, and organised for the band to announce it, and up we had to go. That was another very special moment for me, cos I hadn't expected to get a first dance, and it was amazing. Also thought it was a pretty good choice of song, considering we didn't ask for it.

28. Describe your wedding dress?

My housemate made it for me. It was white dupion silk, just off the shoulder with a V neck and a V waist and an A line skirt. The top was boned and had an embroidered panel down the front.

29. What kind of flowers did you have at your wedding?

White roses for the bridesmaids and I had white roses with purple other things mixed in. And pretty little ones that I think are called wax flowers in my hair.

30. Are your wedding bands engraved?

No. What a dull last question.

A very merry weekend

After a hideously busy week on the postnatal ward in which I didn't manage to wake up on time one single morning, I had a lovely Christmassy weekend, despite the foul weather. On Friday night mr me had told me we were going out for the evening, which would be my Christmas present. He took me to see the Northern Ballet Theatre performing the Nutcracker, which I loved, and was very seasonal and beautiful, and I have been doing random bits of ballet ever since. It was very special that he went with me as well, since he has about as much interest in ballet as I have in cricket. His parents also came to stay the weekend, so on Saturday we went to get our tree from Whiteley's, a garden centre, which was basically a huge land of Christmas decorations. We spent the evening in decorating the tree, drinking mulled wine and eating popcorn and watching a film. Then on Sunday evening we had our church Christmas party, which was pretty good fun - we had a rip-off X-factor competition, and it is surprising how many talented singers and songwriters are hanging around in our church. It was a lovely weekend and I think I needed it to relax in. I didn't get much work done, but I've done 200 MCQ questions this evening, so I feel a bit more in control of that now.

Best Moments #2

When I did a post on Best Moments #1 (trying to describe in detail one of the best moments of my life), mr me got a little upset that it didn't involve him. I had to explain that it was not of course my number one best moment of all time, but just the first one that I decided to describe. So I thought when trying another, it had better be one involving him. It is hard to choose from the very many beautiful and sometimes unbearably happy moments I have shared with him, even when I've excluded those that aren't really describable in public. So I decided to start with the first one ever. It is nearly 10 years ago now, which is very scarey!


I am walking the streets of Liverpool at night and the snow is falling gently. I am with mr me, but he is not mr me yet, not even my boyfriend, I have held a proper conversation with him today for the first time. It is April 1998 and we have come out of the cinema with my best friend and her then boyfriend to find it snowing totally out of the blue, so to speak. We have missed the last bus from our bus stop and had to walk more than a mile to the next. It is not a part of town we know well, and we are all enchanted to come across a snowy church and green. Our companions keep falling behind snogging and we are walking on ahead talking, and innocently amazed to find ourselves so in harmony about everything we talk of and our delight in the unexpected weather. It is not something I am used to - to talk to a boy like this, to click with him, to have him pay me tiny compliments. It has never happened to me in quite this way before. I am intoxicated and we walk on in our magical snowy world, in a glass snow dome bubble, outside of normal space and time.

football fan

In a break with my normal habits and character, I have watched a full-length football match on the last 2 consecutive evenings. Tuesday night was the cup final of the Yorkshire Christian Football League and Wednesday night I watched Liverpool v Chelsea in the pub (oh dear). Tuesday night definitely more exciting.

This is the first year our church has had a proper football team in a league, and it sometimes seems that mr me and my brother-in-law have talked about little else all year. Mr me is striker and top scorer for the team and my brother in law (or BIL, as I shall call him) is joint manager. The level of obsession could be made clear by a short conversation.

A couple of weeks back mr me stubbed his toe badly on a nail that was sticking up our of our wooden floor.
Half an hour later...
mr me: I'm a bit worried about this toe.
me: Why? What's wrong with it? (visions of toe swollen/ turning black/ falling off)
mr me: I don't know if it's going to affect my play on Saturday...

Anyway, leaving my quibbles and grievances against the team aside, (think I just miss having mr me to myself on saturday mornings), I had a great time watching the game on Tuesday. About half the church turned out to watch them - there must have been about a hundred of us there, compared to about fifteen supporters for the opposition, which made for a great atmosphere. It was a proper ground belonging to a local club, with stands and floodlights and a bar and everything. It was great to have a crowd, and a stand behind us, as it meant we could actually make a proper noise (albiet a rather high-pitched, female-dominated noise). On the few occasions I've been to watch the Saturday morning games there have been 3 or 4 WAGs on the sidelines, occasionally shouting into the wind, but giving up because clearly no-one can hear us. Unfortunately we lost the game 2-0, but everybody played well, and there was no shame in losing to the best team in the division above us really. I enjoyed watching mr me do exciting weave-the-ball-around-the-feet-of-the-defenders things. BIL kindly translated this for me into "when you did get the ball, you beat your man a few times." Tried to encourage him by saying this to him in the car on the way home, but he did seem a bit down. At least playing for the church team seems to have reduced the effect that Liverpool losing has on his mood. Think that having games that he can actually have an influence on has taken away the impact of the learned helplessness of Liverpool games.

Being a wife

On Sunday at church, one of my friends asked me whether I would be interested in a Bible study course for some married girls in the church about marriage and how we are all getting on with it. She asked me to bring the benefit of my experience, as I will be the longest married in the group. (It will be our 5th wedding anniversary this year.) Probably sounds like a bit of a cheesy idea, but I think it's a good idea to reasess these things from time to time and look at the foundations of a good marriage over again with some supportive friends. I agreed that I would like to be involved, but just thinking about it has set me off wondering how good I am at being a wife. The best book I read about marriage on our wedding preparation course was "The Mystery of Marriage" by Mike Mason. Bit highbrow, but a lot of interesting and good stuff about learning to put another person before yourself etc - can't remember all the details now - should probably buy the book and read it again. Just started thinking that I spend so much of the time at the moment being tired and a bit needy that I probably don't very often put mr me's needs first. Not helped by the fact that he is normally fairly undemanding himself. But surely I could be more creative in making him feel loved and special. To be completely honest, I normally spend more of the time thinking and daydreaming about what he might do for me, what he has and hasn't done recently to show me he loves me, rather than considering what his needs might be. We are both good at some stuff in marriage - we always have a date night once a week, we don't argue much and mostly in a non-destructive way, we are good at regular hugs and stuff. Think that this group will be good and helpful, but how much of a good example I am as a wife... I'm not sure at all.