Achilles and Athanasia — a letter of un-apology

 So this is it... Day 1 of the A–Z blogfest. When I checked this morning, 1643 people had signed up to be part of the challenge, and to be perfectly honest, I feel A for Anxiety would probably be a better place for me to start. Writing twenty-six posts around a theme frightens the be-hooey out of me. Disciplined is not my middle name. But twenty-six letters inspired by the alphabet I promised, and so twenty-six letters there shall be... plus a song each day.... and a question...

Picture me holding my nose, squinching my eyes closed and leaping off a cliff into the brain-freezing waters of uncertainty... Here we go...

My darling Achilles

 Word has reached me of your misery and anguish at finding yourself in the eternal afterlife. I accept, Archie-sweets, that you expected to be immortal like your father and me—we all did. My heart aches that my efforts and best intentions to that end failed, but my darling boy, no amount of petulant wailing and chest-beating about feeling wronged will alter your situation. You were, indeed, a man, so I’m afraid manning-up is your only option. Like it or not.

 Truly, Achilles, I did everything I could to assure you a permanent pass to Mount Olympus. Night after sleepless night I ardently devoted myself to your baptism by fire. And Zeus only knows how many of your father’s hard-earned obal I lavished on the ambrosial balm I massaged into your adored little body in my attempt to make you impermeable. It was your father who put an end to that avenue to immortality. He panicked. OK, it’s accurate to say that our six babies before you ended up as ash, but you were special. I knew that. It was your affrighted father who doubted your destiny. Not me.
 
Please appreciate how positively heartsick I am that you attribute your having been slain by that well-aimed arrow to the heel to my inadequate mothering. Of course I acknowledge that it was a pretty embarrassing way for you to die, especially after you’d kicked such serious butt at Troy. But Archie dearest, are you aware just how awkward trying to dunk an inverted baby into the River Styx is? Managing to hold you by just the one ankle was quite an accomplishment. You were a feisty tot, and a slippery little sucker, too. Perhaps you should count your lucky stars that’s all I had hold of.  

So, my darling son, it would seem that having Goddess Angelina’s Brad depict you, while an actor most famous for playing an albino elf represents your assassin Paris, is possibly your best shot at ageless acclaim. Well, that and the fact that the appellation of a particularly vulnerable and ever-so-mortal tendon guarantees athletes will fear hearing a physician utter your name ad infinitum.

Yours unapologetically in athanasia,

Màna, Thetis

ps Dad says hi.
 
 And the song for the day? Well, what else but ABC's Poison Arrow. 
OK... yes... I know it's about Cupid but cut me some slack here! 

Question of the day: When have you been inspired to un-apologise?

The Blogging from A to Z Challenge is 26 non-Sundays in April, blogging through the alphabet with a couple of thousand other crazy people..

10 Mothering Things I'm a Bit Shit At

The first time anyone told me I was fail as a mother was back when the man-child was only in Year Six. My crime was the patent child-abuse of not allowing him to have a computer or a gaming console in his bedroom. Truly. It’s a wonder there weren’t social workers beating our door down.

Nonetheless, a huge amount of angst was created when his peers declared me a fail tightarse, assuring him that they would totally own him in no time. Nice boys they were. And every one of them from a very non-fail family. Indeed, one of them was blessed with a mother who was so NOT fail that she was unfazed by the nudie pics he had chosen to plaster his room with,  because…well.. you know… boys will be boys.

But as the kids get older, I’m fail a lot more. A whole lot more.

Yesterday I was fail after devoting the day to repurposing odds and sods into one of Andie’s ‘volcanic ensembles’ from Pretty in Pink . (Today’s fundraiser at school is ‘Come as your favourite movie character or actor.’)

The day before that I was fail because the sport uniform that had not been put in the laundry was still dirty.

And the day before that I was fail because nobody else really felt like smoked chicken and spinach pasta for dinner.

So in an attempt to remind myself that there are ways I can avoid being epic fail all the time, or at everything, I thought I might just make a quick list of ten things I need to remember I’m a little bit crap at. So here goes.

I’m just a bit shit at:

1.     mind reading

2.     being in three places at once

3.     caring if the exact item of clothing required at any given second has been  ironed

4.     not getting annoyed when the dog decorates the house with slobbery fragments of the leftover lunches — both foodstuffs and wrappings—it found under the bed/in the bottom of a school bag/in the overflowing bin of someone’s bedroom

5.     realising that we have run out of a metric fuckton of things that nobody put on the shopping list

6.     remembering everyone else’s daily timetable

7.     whipping up cordon bleu meals every night

8.     having the car radio on the right station

9.     comprehending how the world can turn simultaneously around each and every teenager in the universe

10. being invisible on demand.

I’m sure there's plenty more I could add, but I reckon that will give me enough to work on for now. Wish me luck!