Being the adult.

I still live at home. You might think that’s bongus at twenty-five but I have a number of very good reasons. Unfortunately I also have a number of gripes about being the mother of my household, being the only one to take action about anything ever and just being mugged over in general. Case in point: I got home on Friday (with my beautiful girlfriend) and was ready to make us a delicious meal before cracking on with my letters to agents. As I made my way into the kitchen I noticed that the doorway was covered in ants, they were everywhere, crawling across the tiles of the kitchen, up the walls, it was fucking disgusting.
‘Dad’ I called out, ‘we’ve got ants’.
‘Oh yeah, I know, just hoover them up’. I then noticed our vacuum cleaner sat in the hall ready for the next invasion.
‘Dad, that’s not the answer’ I said.
‘Well what do you expect me to do about it’.
That’s the point when my head literally exploded and I’ve thought about it a lot. I expect him to take some responsibility, it’s a constant clash between us, I love my old man more than anything but I wish he had a little more drive and initiative sometimes. It’s bad enough that neither of my brothers have a lot of savvy (or can’t be bothered) but I expected a bit more from my dad.

This is where I realise that I’m moaning on like an old wife, but that’s what it feels like, and that’s what I’ve become. Somebody had to step up and unfortunately I was preconditioned for the role. Since I was very little I’ve been the sensible one, the tidy one, the reliable one, and it has split in two directions. It has developed a kind of OCD personality where I can’t stand mess being left, and it also means that when I let go I really let go. It doesn’t happen very often because my conscious self is also wary about making a mess of myself but when it does it manages it on a big scale. The first incident that comes to mind was a leaving party in Southend where I walked through an automatic door, fell down some stairs, went missing for about twenty minutes and then fell backwards off a wall. I’m a catastrophe. My point is if you get pushed far enough one way you end up swinging with more force back the other.