has been in Ambridge for days, and has been in the company of Poppy, and has been staying at Grange Farm.
And yet she did not once wonder why they were all at Grange Farm not Greenwood Cottage? And yet Poppy (aged six) did not at any point say anything about “now we live with Granny and Granddad”?
Yeahright.
Likewise George Grundy (remember him? I don’t think that the editor does) has not been in contact with either of the two people with whom he was brought up for ten years or so, who are very nearly his age and who were as far as we know friends of his, during the time since his father gave up his job and left his house at the end of September.
Yeahright.
I too was once a sergeant attached to the Horse Marines of the Royal Swiss Navy; pull the other one, it’s got bells on.
Yes, all of that, plus I’m finding her a right mardy little mare too.
For instance, if she felt so strongly about their Ancestral Home, she might have tried visiting it once in a while to check it was still standing instead of expecting where she lived with Nic and Will to be preserved in aspic. It’s not as if anything of Mia’s was left there, Bev saw to that. She made it quite clear she wanted nothing more to do with Will and Greenwood Cottage. Fine. Live with it, dear.
Yes. My daughter clearly feels for her very strongly and repeatedly said, “But she’s only an adolescent, you have to understand, she doesn’t think the same way” – but I don’t see that this means everyone should stop where they are and never change for ten years or so until their child gets over it. And if they have children spread over more than ten years they’ll have to do nothing but pander to one or another of them for most of their adult lives. And what if two of them want different, incompatible things?
I’m trying to cut her a bit of slack because she’s an adolescent, so I see where you daughter is coming from. But Mia seems to want it all ways. She is free to shun Will and not darken the door of Greenwood Cottage, yet Will is expected to preserve it for all eternity.
Considering that she lived with Will for most of her childhood, all of the childhood that she can remember, I think, she discarded her step-father rather quickly and thoroughly. And I think some of this has to do with Bev and the way she swooped down and removed all of Mia’s belongings within days of Mia leaving Greenwood. As far as we have heard, neither Bev nor Andrew have done anything to help Mia reconcile with Will. If they don’t care about Will, they should consider that it would be in Mia’s interests not to have this bitterness about her step-father lingering on in her life.
She definitely is trying to have it both ways. She is going to have to learn that if you throw something away, it gets taken in the dustbin to a tip, and from there put onto a train and sent to Swindon, whence it leaves the country for somewhere overseas. You cannot decide to get it back six months later.
Mia walked out of Greenwood and out of her stepfather’s life on 10th May, and refused thereafter to see or speak to him, in which she was supported by Bev, Andrew and whatever-her-name-is Andrew’s new handmaiden. She condescended to speak to him again on 10th November. In between, she clearly cannot have seen, spoken to or communicated with either Poppy or George, nor Emma nor Clarrie, because any one of them would have told her what had happened.
She is a totally self-absorbed little madam in her current editorially-envisioned incarnation.
She is also very stupid not to have noticed that her step-father and half-sister are not living any more in the house she detested so much that she ran away from it, and required all her possessions to be removed from it. Why did she think they were all, her included, sleeping at Grange Farm? Even though it was inconveniently crowded?
Was the mardy one actually staying at Grange Farm? I thought she had come over, first for the post-funeral firework extravaganza, and then again yesterday to be conveniently available for Lilian’s foot-in-mouthery. To the extent that I gave it any thought at all.
And why is she permanently on the blob? They need to get that checked or she’ll be spherical with all the chocolate…
There must be a middle ground between totally indulging their every nastiness (see Pip, Helen, Kate, Elizabeth and Mia) and being brutally unfeeling and refusing to pander to a single one of their whims.
This is where you discover that I am not actually your twin after all Twellsy.
I loved the whole business of being a mother, I found it utterly fascinating watching a helpless, selfish baby develop and turn into a complete adult human, loved observing her learning about the world and becoming a complete personality, and hopefully helping her to grow into a worthwhile person. I wouldn’t have missed a minute of it.
ETA: Other people’s children are frequently revolting, otoh.
Just Janie and I both went to boarding school when our parents were posted abroad, I don’t think they had much in the way of teenage strife with us as we were so pleased to be home in the holidays, warm bedrooms, comfy beds and Mum’s cooking
Yon Bull and I always joked about boarding school for offspring
I rather suspect that we would have been the sort of parents who adored all the learning about and teaching our children
We are both the sort of person who would be determined to ensure a child was given every chance
You forget, dear LadySusan, that our parents had the pleasure of my stroppy teen years for twelve months of the year as we were home then. Having learnt from that, they wisely stayed abroad for yours.
Has anyone ever done the sums? I reckon if you really wanted your brats off your hands (and weren’t blessed with Archer-style on-tap perpetual childcare facilities) then rather than send them to a posh boarding school it could work out cheaper to enrol them in a comp at the other end of the country and stick them in a hotel.
Don’t you need to have a residence in the comp’s area? So you’re looking at that, plus some sort of live-in housekeeper/childminder, plus legal minimum food… the advantage of the boarding school is that they’ll do all the incarcerating for you.
