There are days when Pittsburgh drives me mad and I can barely restrain myself from eating her brains.
It’s August in Dublin, so naturally, rain is pelting down outside. The number of places we can go is limited. I opt for the nearest shopping centre. If you’ve ever seen Dawn Of The Dead, you’ll know it’s where Zombies like to hang out. And it’s even better if there’s a sale on.
We get there and Pittsburgh tells me she needs to go wee-wee. When we get to the toilets (I’m in a pee panic, at this stage), she doesn’t like the look of the first cubicle, the second cubicle, the third cubicle or the fourth cubicle. There are no more cubicles. So I gently ease her into the fourth cubicle.
She points to the shiny chrome tap on the sink.
“I don’t like that.”
This is before she has even attempted to use the toilet.
“Fine”, I say. I scoop her up and transport her to another cubicle. There appears to be no issues with the tap there.
I’m relieved, but she no longer wants to relieve herself.
“Me no want to go the toilet.”
I take a break in a coffee shop. She sees yogurt on display. She wants yogurt. I purchase her favourite flavour. We sit at a table, I open the yogurt and hand her a spoon, hoping for five minutes peace as she consumes it.
Suddenly, she pushes it away.
“Me no want that one.”
“But you love raspberry!”
“Me no want it. Me want chocolate,” she says, with steely determination.
“Fine,” I say, annoyed and having no intention of giving her chocolate.
I pick up the spoon and dip it into the yogurt and then put it in my mouth. It’s not brain-flavoured, so it’s pretty disgusting. I don’t care. I’m just doing this to annoy her – to vent the frustration that’s been building up all morning.
Oh boy, do I succeed in my goal.
“That my yogurt,” she cries out, following it up with an almighty bawl. The tears flood from her eyes. The other customers in the cafe look around. I may be dead but I’m not beyond mortification.
“Okay, Pittsburgh, that’s it: we’re going.”
She turns into a devil-possessed child.
“No!” she rasps, in her most eerily disembodied voice.
I pick her up and carry her all the excruciating way back to the car.
Only 7 hours to go before the mother arrives back home. It is 7 long hours of domestic war that I think will never end.
When her mother arrives home (and, in two minutes, gets Pittsburgh to do all the things I’ve been trying to get her to do for the whole day) I’ve had enough and I am ready to go down to the local graveyard and bury myself in the ground.
Then today comes. I wake up early and think of the innumerable domestic battles that Pittsburgh and I fought yesterday. I am the unstoppable force and she is the immovable object. The end result: frustration and rage with each other.
Even though her mother is downstairs, Pittsburgh creeps into the room, looking for the early morning cuddle she loves so much. A cuddle even from me – a decaying lump of flesh. I’m quite touched.
“I wasn’t very nice to you yesterday.” I say as I give her a hug.
She then says, “Me not nice to you either.”
All of a sudden the hell of yesterday vanishes and I feel a sudden warmth welling up inside me.
“Ah, Pittsburgh” I say, despairingly, when I realise she’s just had an “accident” and that warmth is welling up on the outside – not the inside.
Never mind the cover, feel the reality.
Sometimes a balanced budget is far more appetising than a plump brain, newly ripped from the skull of an annoying politician. Which is my way of saying that I’ve just looked at our household finances for the coming year, and – staggeringly – things are not as bad as they might have been.
True, with mortgage rates set to rise, we’re on a wing and a prayer, and I have to cut down on the brain consumption (unless the local butcher starts doing a two-for-one offer) but with a little luck, we’ll just about make it through 2013.
But this has its consequences: I have to spend more time with Pittsburgh. Even worse: she has to spend more time with me.
Thanks to the government’s “free pre-school year” – it’s not free and it’s doesn’t run for a year – my daughter now spends the morning in Montesorri (a form of teaching, not – alas – a distant, isolated monastery in Spain).
I do the afternoon and early evening childcare shift, which means, because Pittsburgh is tired and cranky but won’t sleep, I absolutely positively get the hellish worst of her. For instance, any attempt to disengage her from her daily dose of television is met with the most explosive of tantrums.
Then, when the dust settles, and I finally manage to get her into the car to go on an outing, she promptly falls asleep. I just leave her there, rather than move her, for risk of detonating the bomb.
When she wakes up, at least she’s not cranky because she’s tired anymore; no, she’s cranky because she’s awake.
It’s got so bad that I’ve even started reading parenting books.
Meanwhile, Barbara is having a ball in her job. She meets loads of new, friendly people, chats away endlessly, takes lunch whenever she so desires, and loves the work she does, for which she is universally admired and praised. Every day, her boss leaves flowers and chocolates on her desk. When she enters her office, there are beaming smiles all around from every one of her workmates, who are full of respect for her and in awe of her skills.
(Okay, there may be some exaggeration in this – but surely not that much?)
Of course, if we could afford it, we would have Pittsburgh in the crèche all day long – or longer, if that were legal. Unfortunately, in this country, there are not many jobs out there for experienced and skilled Zombies. Or, for that matter, anybody else.
Which is why I am surprised that our political leader makes the cover of this month’s Time magazine – or at least its European edition.
“THE CELTIC COMEBACK: Prime Minister Enda Kenny is rebuilding his country’s economy” declares the cover.
When I saw this, I wanted to run down to the government offices, find Enda and bite into his skull.
Alas, I think nothing would come out. Except hot air.