Home life
Words of disapproval
Alice Thomas Ellis
Disapproval has been in the air recent- ly. Mostly of me. Alfie has long detested a certain pair of white brogues which I wear — or rather used to wear — when there is any rushing round to be done. He says the ladies of King's Cross wear shoes like that to expedite their escape from police- women. He used to watch me narrow-eyed to see what I had on my feet. No longer. The other day doing a spot of tidying he threw them away in a black plastic bag and when I remonstrated with him he said his only mistake was in not ensuring that I was in them when he slung them out.
Then the fourth son arrived home for Christmas and enquired whether I was still drinking as much. When I said no he asked if I was still drinking more than anyone else he knew. I reminded him of the years I had spent carrying him around because he refused to walk more than the length of the block, but he'd forgotten. Sharper than a serpent's tooth . . . . Then he asked when I was going to get back his crash-helmet (I sold it to a friend who fancied it) and when I said I didn't want to make this friend unhappy by demanding it back he said in tones of disgust, 'Oh Mum, you're such a people-pleaser.' What a terrible appella- Lion. Much, much worse than the old- fashioned `God-botheree. I have decided, M future, to be impolite and mean, and give up alcohol. The abstinence is not because of the disapproval, which actually has the effect contrary to that intended, inclining one to leap in a butt of Malmsey and swim around in it, but because I have discovered beyond a shadow of a doubt that, while a bottle of Scotch makes you happy while you're drinking it, it makes you dreadfully sad the next day. Muslims never touch the stuff so why should I? I was perfectly happy in Alexandria with black coffee and fags, except I never want to see another bottle of 7-Up, which was the other beverage most usually on offer. I rather enjoyed Mr Anderton's words of disapproval since they were not directed at me. The Aids scare has brought to my attention practices of which I previously wotted not. I admitted this to Barry Took the other day and he asked interestedly what I thought they did. A,sort of Masonic handshake? Well, no; but some of the antics I have read about sound not merely unnatural but positively impossible. It's quite a long time since people really thumped tubs, and it is diverting to watch them getting back into practice. A few false notes as yet, but they're beginning to get the rhythm. We'll probably all be deafened soon.
Smoking, of course, unlike the above- mentioned practices has been roundly con- demned by all right-thinking people for some time. The smoker evokes no compas- sion in the liberally minded. He is univer- sally condemned for his filthy and anti- social habit and made to sit in seclusion in special areas if his vice is permitted in public at all. On some railway stations he isn't even allowed to smoke in the open. One feels like a pariah. Someone just swept a load of fag ends out from their Place of concealment under the lee of the Aga, remarking that these represented my last telephone conversation. The telephone is situated beside the Aga so one can keep warm while chatting away. Telephone chatting is another cause of disapproval and even I, the people-pleaser, get restive when family members go on doing it for hours. Other chaps' telephone conversa- tions always seem vapidly pointless perhaps because you only hear one side. Peals of laughter at some inaudible remark are particularly irritating, and those mut- tered hmmms and yes, yes, yeses. I disapprove of mild weather at this time of year myself. I was in a newspaper office the other day and there were three flies buzzing about in it, which is most unsea- s°nal; and I have just noticed what I will swear is a mosquito flitting round the vase of carnations. I disapprove of mosquitoes with whole-hearted commitment, so I'm going to blow smoke at it. It may carrying Aids, so if the smoke treatment doesn't work I'm going to hit it with a running shoe.
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