children

things I want to tell my children but might forget – having breakfast

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Having breakfast

I am going to tell you about my favourite breakfast and then see what is interesting about breakfasts.  In fact I’m going to tell you about two favourite breakfasts.  One is an everyday favourite, and one is a special day favourite.  You might wonder which one is the actual favourite, and this is in fact a revealing question, because what it shows is that sometimes what is best is not about the actual thing itself, but about how things fit together.  So, first of all, my favourite everyday breakfast is Yorkshire Gold tea with skimmed milk and multiseed bloomer freshly toasted in a Dualit toaster (set to 2) with butter (not very much) and Tiptree Orange and Tangerine marmalade.

What is yours?

A breakfast is a kind of handshake in the mouth.  When you get out of bed, you use your sense of sight, seeing your room, smell, smelling the fresh air from the window, hearing, hearing sounds from outside and touch, touching the bed clothes with your hands and the floor with your feet.  The only sense missing is taste.  It is when you drink your tea or eat your toast that the world becomes part of you (breathing air makes it become part of you, but it is not as feel-able as eating).  It is like with a person’s hand that you hold in yours for a moment, and that makes a connection point that is like a bridge to the person.

And this is why it is so important and delightful to have a breakfast you really love.  You want your first big connection to the world to be a joyful one.  And the other thing is that it should not be too much of a big event.  It should be gentle, and it should fit your day.  The favourite everyday breakfast is in many ways very ordinary – it is just toast and tea.  It fits the ordinary-ness of most days, because it is simple and calm to make and eat.  It is also a good breakfast because it requires just a little bit of waiting; waiting for the kettle to boil, and waiting for the toast to toast.  These small delays ease the pathway into the bigger events of the day.  But you might notice that it is very specific; a particular tea, and a particular marmalade and a particular toast, toasted in a particular way.  If you pay attention to tastes you will find that you like a particular kind of thing.  It is part of being a unique person.  You might not always be able to have the thing you want, but when you can, you should.  Different people like different things, and we can celebrate this at breakfast, whereas at dinner, we might like to celebrate everyone participating in the same thing.

So that was the favourite everyday breakfast and the favourite special breakfast is French baguette with butter (not very much) and soft apricot jam.  To have this breakfast we would have to teleport to France.  Have you been to France yet?

things I want to tell my children but might forget – going downstairs (and lifts and planes)

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Going downstairs

You may be surprised that stairs are considered very important.  If you watch a film like The Snowman, you will notice that it shows James going down the stairs, even though it does not really show him walking down the hall or landing.  This is because there is something special about changing levels, and it is to do with flying.  While we are thinking about this we are also going to think about lifts and planes.

Lifts

‘Going up!’  In a lift, when you hear this announcement, try jumping.  What is funny is that the floor will come up a bit to meet your legs while you are in the air.  so your landing distance will be a bit less than your taking-off distance.  This is also true the other way round.  If the lift says ‘going down’, then jump and you will land a bit lower than you took off.  This creates a funny feeling like a smile in your legs.

Planes

The same kind of inner woosh happens when you are in an aeroplane that is taking off.  To get into the sky the plane must start by going very fast along the land.  At a certain point, the plane nose will be pulled up and the plane is no longer on the ground but in the air.  There is a particular sensation at this moment which is like a gasp inside you followed by a tiny ripple going through your veins; this is because you are now flying, something that people wanted to do for centuries before we were alive because they looked at birds and wanted to be like them.  We are very lucky because at the time that we are alive, people have found a way to do this.  There are other moments that we feel this feeling and we will think about those later.

It is a strange thing that it is exciting to leave the ground, but it is also a good feeling to land.  Both feelings are good.  Being in the air feels free and wild and brave and being on the land feels solid and connected and comforting.  It is a very good thing when both two opposite kinds of feeling are enjoyable.

Going downstairs

So now you can probably see why going downstairs and upstairs is a special kind of action.  The other thing about going downstairs is that it is a transition that takes time you can notice.  Getting up is a transition that is happens in the amount of time we could call ‘the blink of an eye’.  Blink!  You’re out of bed.  Going downstairs is a transition that takes about ten seconds (unless you run, or slide on a lilo).  So you can notice it while it is happening, if you decide to pay attention.

things I want to tell my children but might forget – Introduction

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To try to make myself feel a little bit at home, I’m going to use some writing that I’ve already done, as well as some things that I will write new when I have a moment of inspiration or recognition.

This is the Introduction to a book I am trying out:

things I want to tell my children but might forget

Introduction

Well, children, I don’t know whether you will ever read this.  When will you be born?  Will you be born at all, and if you are, will you want to sit down and read things that your mother thought and wrote in the existence she had before you were alive.

I don’t know.

But what I do know is that the other mothers I know are very often busy.  They are looking after people and if I ever have the luminous delight of having children of my own, of having you arrive in my life, it is likely that I will be busy too.  I will be brushing your teeth, and telling you stories, and finding you water.  Or perhaps driving you from place to place.  And for sure I will be weaving this in between other projects too.  Things that you might not understand until you’re bigger, but you will know that mummy is at work.

So I want to tell you all my favourite things about the world.  Some you will understand straight away, some you won’t understand until afterwards.  We can’t always recognise things coming up ahead, but sometimes we recognise them with hindsight.  What I am hoping is that you will find it reassuring to know that there is always someone who has gone ahead of you, but also find exciting that you are the first you to have ever lived.  You are unique, you have wonderful company.

I’ve wanted to write this for a long time, but now that I have started, I suddenly felt a hesitation of not knowing where to start.  The world is a big place.  So what I would like you to do is to put on your explorer hat and we are going to travel through a day, but also through time and space, to childhood, to adulthood, to literature, to real life, and everywhere we will discover treasures and everywhere you will have a memento to bring home with you, and maybe to put in box or pin on a wall and know that you belong to everywhere, and everywhere you put your feet belongs to you alone, and to everyone.  We have all been here and none of us have been there.