Ah, the September feeling: part panic, part potential. So much more New Year-y than Terrible Old January with its huge expectations and bad lighting. So. Time to gather together your back-to-life kit for Midults…
PE Kit
This is for all the classes we are going to take. Yes we really are. This is so going to happen. For the Pilates because our ‘alignment’ is so wonky that we have to warm up to get out of bed. For all the running because walking was the only good habit we picked up in lockdown and now we must be better. New kit because maybe then we can put-off wearing proper clothes for even longer and we can pretend we are active and our muscles and fat cells will hear that. They say fake it until you make it. We are listening.
A Scientific Calculator
OK. Imagine a calculator into which you can input a formula for whether or not you should go out. With numbers on how tired you are now/how shattered and resentful you are going to be afterwards/how late you can stay out/how much you can eat/drink/spend etc.. Then we would know what to do. We would be spared the agonies. We would not rely on cancellation or resentment. Invent this someone please, thank you.
Emotional Tippex
So we can go back and cover over the little brain cracks and tiny, awkward conversations we’ve just had. Just a little bit of invisible mending. For all the small embarrassing hiccups unlike the enormous fat…
….industrial-sized rubber to erase your past
You remember the ones that used to not rub out the ink? They said they would rub out the ink but the bastards didn’t, did they? And you would destroy the paper in the attempt? Well now we just want a rubber to erase EVERYTHING from the years 1992-2000 that is keeping us awake at night: all the painful break-ups and weird outbursts and the incident where we were red-wine-sick all over a stranger’s bathroom and all the times we were terrible dicks. OH GOD.
Shatterproof Ruler
Because something in your life had better be unbreakable/not shattered…
A Compass…
….to tell you where the fuck you are going and whether you are heading in the right direction. Oh wait, it’s not that kind of compass? It’s the kind that draws circles? Well we are pretty used to running around in circles so it might be perfect.
Protractor
It took us ages to remember what it was called. But it’s the angle thing. We need good angles. For the jaw etc. And also to know what the angles are. Angles is a strange word isn’t it? Angles, angles, angles…
A Functioning Uniform
Who else needs to be told exactly what to wear at all times, so that we always look nice and relevant and clever and kind and sexy and funny and brilliant and authoritative and naughty? Rather than crying in a towel in front of our wardrobes for 30 minutes before putting on our Emotional Support Cords and Therapy Jumper. Again.
Highlighters
Wouldn’t be nice to go back through your day and highlight – IN NEON – all the good stuff that happened rather than the horror? Is it time to start banking the wins because the emotional piggy bank is rattling with the equivalent of out-of-date pound coins and drachma? It is. Can we do it? We cannot.
Big Pants
Boxfresh bumper pack. Isn’t that the nicest, safest feeling? Massive ones. Huge. Big girl pants. Because we are the big girls now. Apparently.
Glue
A big bottle of glue. Hell, we need something to hold ourselves together. Or use as industrial-strength, economical face peel. Or sniff. If we get desperate.