Revelations and Observations.

As a writer, observation plays a huge part in everything you do. What you see and hear, and quite often overhear on a daily basis, when travelling, working, reading or listening to music can have a profound effect on whatever you are writing. It can give you the inspiration to write something new, and it can give you real life situations, real life dialogue and some definite revelations.

Here are just a few things I've observed this week:

Tube Revelations

You don't realise how many sides you have, as a human, until they're all covered by other people. Until you're crammed in a tube carriage with backs, shoulders, boobs, elbows, faces, knees, thighs, abs, feet and heads pressed up against you. Believe me, hexagons and dodecahedrons have nothing on the human form. We're like the most complicated polygon with a few more curves than straight lines, but so many nooks and cradles and angles that we can actually be surrounded on approximately twenty two sides - everyone is different - which makes rush hour tube journeys an interesting lesson in anatomy, geometry, patience and the tolerance of being pressed up against strangers. 

Daffodil Revelation

They make me smile. I see a whole field of them, in a row or in circles, or even a single one pushing through to find the spring and they make me smile. Weird. Is it the yellowness? Is it that I associate them with my mum because we were always told to give daffodils to give our mum on Mother's day? Or is it because they are in fact mood altering plants and the closer you get the happier you feel, but that warm fuzzy feeling doesn't last because now you've stepped in dog turd?

Take your pick. 

Play Date Revelations

Kids are so unreasonable. They want their friends to come round and play, but they want everything on their terms. They want all games and activities to be played exactly as they are with parents or by themselves and they allow no suggestions or alterations from the guest. They spend more time fighting, arguing and storming off than actually enjoying each other's company. They bitch and moan and sulk and paddy, and threaten to end the play date. Little control freaks. They shout at and deny everything to their guest and expect them to want to come back for more. But then the guest fights back and asserts himself leading to further conflict. Then at the end of the day the child tells their parents all the bad things the guest has done whilst retaining their sun-shines-out-of, butter-wouldn't-melt type act.

Yesterday I looked after a child and his friend for a play date. Oh my. 

(Whilst playing with the playdoh) Guest: 'A thin poo is coming out.' *Laughter* 'Look it's a thin poo coming out.'

Guest: 'Do you want poo on your ice cream?' *Giggles*

Ahh, the poo stage. When's that going to end?

Guest: 'But I'm the guest and I'm not here very long.' Heard this one a few times.

(Whilst playing with the Lego) Child 1:'If you do that one more time I will never have another play date and I will cancel this one.'

Guest replies: 'You can't really cancel a play date.'

Child 1: 'Yes you can. Mummy told me how.'

(Combining playdoh 'bombs' with their Lego play.) Guest: 'You can't do this. They don't explode.'

Child 1: 'Yes they do.'

Guest: 'No. These bombs don't explode.'

Child 1: 'Yes they do. Anyway, I'm not listening to this. I don't want to play this game anymore.' *storms off* 

(Concerning lunch, which I made for them: Tomato, basil and bacon pasta.) Guest: 'What are we having for lunch?'

Me: 'Tomato and bacon pasta.'

Guest: 'With real tomatoes? Because I don't really like tomatoes.'

Me: 'It's a sauce, I've made the tomatoes into a sauce.'

Guest: 'Oh yeah, I don't really like that.'

Me: 'Well your mummy said you do, so you can try some.'

Guest: 'Oh, well actually, I only like the ones like on the high street. Not the home made kind.'

Needless to say the guest ate no pasta, just sniffed it and said 'Actually I remember I've had it before and I don't like it.' 

(Balloon football playing.) Guest: Don't forget, I've had years of practise playing this game with my dad.'

Wow, kids can be so condescending to each other. 

(Trip to the park) All the way there, guest: 'I was first. I won. I win. I beat you.' Etc. Other child understandably getting annoyed/upset. 

Guest: 'I'm going to marry Alice.'

Me: 'Is Alice in your class?'

Guest: 'Yes. I do love her. She's actually really nice.'

Me: 'What do you like about her?'

Guest: 'Well, I actually like her face. And she's really strict.'

Me: 'And you like that she's strict?'

Guest: 'Yeah. So if there's a weirdo she'll scare them away.'

And there we have it. Love is.......a liking of the face, strictness and the ability to chase off weirdos. 

Final Revelation

Cocktails, Prosecco and lots of good Italian food will cause you to fall asleep intermittently on the Overground. It will cause you to lose track of what page you're reading, cause you to read over pages again and again, and eventually cause you to give up and close the book, resting your head against the glass partition. Zzzzzzzzzzz. Luckily it also seems to keep you ticking enough to wake up at every stop to see if it's yours. Phew. 

Thanks for reading. 

Happy Friday. 

I hope your weekend is full of observations and revelations.