desperate house of commons wives

I bumped into Ffion just the other day. She and I have so much in common, Two women, both married to a William who’s very important and spends a lot of time in London, Both far from home. The politics might come between us, her husband is more interested in matters of high diplomacy but we Labour chaps like to deal with the grass roots, because, after all, the roots are all that's left of the grass after the napalm has finally burned itself out but if she wasn’t a Tory and I wasn’t so jolly well working class I’m sure we’d get on very well. Actually, I’m not quite sure what class Ffion is from as she’s welsh and they probably have their own devolved class system in Wales now so perhaps we can be chums after all.

Anyway, the reason I mention it of course is that as the jetlag finally starts to get to David Attenborough who sadly reportedly now so is identified with that gorilla scene that he starts crouching down and whispering whenever anyone so much as opens a packet of peanuts in his earshot the BBC has done a series on the rare and exotic within our own shores and in their search for working class people their researchers even visited my own village although they didn’t find anyone to be in the show as the whole population had just been moved out to make way for filming a gritty but heart warming northern drama for ITV. Milly rather reduced my chances of being interviewed on TV though as when she answered the door to the BBC she told them her mother neither worked, nor had any class, sigh.

This isn’t the first time the girl has hurt my feelings like this. Just the other day she came home from school very pleased with herself. ‘I got an A in science mummy!’ she proclaimed proudly. ‘And the teacher said I could be an engineer at Wilton or Corus when I’m older’ . My heart sank. My own daughter, going into trade, in the North! I fought back the tears. This had been a Labour Party family as far back as I could remember. We’d always stood up for the poor and powerless like Lord Sainsbury, Rupert Murdoch, Roman Abramovich (even my neighbour says poor old Roman must be feeling hard done by at the moment: I'll make a socialist out of him yet) Our family had always done proper jobs that made you proud to go to conference, jobs that were tough and dirty but had to be done; public relations civil servants, left wing playwrights, Sunday Times columnists. My daughter's announcement of an interest in commerce felt like my fountain pen being pushed through my heart.

‘But darling’ I said, choking, ‘don’t you want to write a blog like mummy when you grow up?’. Milly just didn’t understand. ‘I can still write a blog even if I have a job can't I?’, she said, quizzically. Oh, her youthful innocence! What would she write about, I wanted to ask her, Today I went to work and came home watched a bit of telly before going to bed? Tears welled up in my eyes. Didn’t she know that a really successful blog was one about other people doing stuff. My God, providing your own material for your blog? Whatever next? ‘But Milly, think of your family!’ I cried. ‘Think of your Grandfather who fought in the war!’ Milly raised her eyebrows. ‘Grandfather was born in 1947’, she said. ‘But think of your Great Grandmother who threw herself in front of the king’s horse!’ Milly sighed. ‘But it was beating the favourite Mummy, which Great Granny had bet the house on without telling Great Grandaddy’, she retorted. ‘Anyway’ continued my heart breaking daughter, ‘If I got a job I could get dooced and then my blog would be even bigger than your’s!’ I sighed a big sigh. That’s my girl...I think….and I wondered if Ffion had the kettle on...

secret sibling

Not much time to be lilting and lyrical today I'm afraid. There's trouble at mill, as they say here in the north. My eldest daughter who, rather unreasonably in my view, refused to take part in this blog, cruelly branding my normal uncommercial account of normal family life in the north as 'The Osbournes in Barbours', claims that she has been mentioned in the comments section in breach of our confidentiality agreement. Please of course don't tell her that I told you that she told me this and don't tell anyone that I told you not to tell them that I told you. It's a real shame that I'm not allowed to tell you about the row she and I had over this because it's just the kind of thing which would make a really good read. I have to go back now and find out if Hilly, which may or may not be her name, if she really exists, has indeed been mentioned on this blog and then try and glue together the spode and, if there's any glue left after that, try and piece together our mother-daughter relationship, which would, ironically, also make a really good blog entry which makes the whole affair even more tragic. As I said, I'm not allowed to mention our little tiff, which was nothing really, but if you drop by Chez Rilly in the next week or so best keep your Hunters on untill Natalia's got all the broken glass up. You couldn't make any more of a mess, which I cannot confirm that there is of course, than there is already. Well, I suppose this kind of thing happens in every normal family, which is what we are, sigh.

Tilly Elliot

Tilly, charming and delightful as always, was ever so excited as she rushed into the kitchen just as I was taking the scones out of the oven. I knew why of course, but I still pretended not to have heard the news that today was the day the film crew arrived to begin shooting the new film version of the stage musical version of Billy Elliot. ‘Whatever is it dear?’ I asked feigning lack of knowledge that Easington had now become so gentrified with all the Londoners turning the old terraced miners’ houses into weekend places because they loved the north so much they had started to shun the more picturesque villages because they kept finding everything they did reported on the internet by the many bloggers who had moved to such places in search of fresh air, fields and film deals, that the film company had to look elsewhere for their backdrop and had decided upon our village. ‘Mummy, mummy!’ began Tilly, excited, charming and delightful, ‘there are lots of men with black faces all over the village!’ Gosh, I said smiling, I’m sure it’s nothing to be concerned about dear.’ ‘But Mummy, isn't that why you and daddy wanted to move away from London?’ 'Oh silly Tilly', I reassured her ‘There's no need to worry, they’re miners!’ ‘What’s a miner?’ quizzed my daughter in her typically charming and delightful manner. ‘Well, in the olden days before you were born there were lots of miners, but they didn’t vote conservative so Maggie Thatcher had to sack them all, because that’s what happens if you’re naughty’. I beckoned Tilly to come outside with me to see that these frightening working class people were really nice and from the south like us, just like everyone else I allowed the children to speak to in our village.

I led her up to one burly blackened miner. ‘Way ay lass!’ he said by way of greeting. ‘Mummy, it’s Gandalf from Lord of the Rings!' shouted Tilly, in her charming and delightful innocence of Sir Ian Mckellen's true status, and of his ability to bring more magic to the screen in his acting than even Gandalf with all his powers. ‘Hello darlings’ said Sir Ian, ‘are you here to watch the filming?’ ‘Oh yes please!' exclaimed Tilly. Just then the director called out over the megaphone ‘CAN ALL THE SINGING MINERS PLEASE LEAVE THE SET, I JUST WANT THE DANCING MINERS!' Obviously the same director as The Producers, I thought. ‘Oh, that’s me!' said Sir Ian, ‘got to go and shoot the big tap number! See you later darlings!’and with a flourish and a ‘don’t start without me boys!' he turned to the gathered synchronised bobbing miners lamps and tap danced over to the MDF colliery wheel illuminated in the beam of the film lights. ‘Is he the star of the film mummy?’ asked Tilly, as Sir Ian theatrically tripped over a cable in his rush to begin the scene and landed in a heap next to Renee Zellweger, Billy's dance teacher in the film. 'No', I replied, smiling at my amazing ability for wry observations and dry wit, ‘it’s just a miner roll’. I must remember that one for the blog, I thought, and we all went back home and gathered around the aga for tea and scones with strawberry jam and lashings of Joanna Trollope

the prodigal papa

My husband arrived late yesterday from London. He looked ever so pleased to be up north with his family again. ‘You look ever so pleased to be up north with your family again’ I said, sharing my writer’s intuitive emotional insight with my beloved. ‘You bet!’ he said, ‘you’ll never guess who I was on my train up north with today! Only wife in the north's husband!' ‘Oh golly’ I said. 'I’ll tell you something though Rilly darling,’ he began. ‘I jolly well hope you don’t go getting ideas and telling everyone about us on the internet!’ I smiled reassuringly and lovingly at him. ‘Oh, and hope you don’t mind, brought some work home, you know my secretary, Fabio, don’t you dear?’ ‘Ciao, Signora Super’ smiled Fabio, and in the distance the hooves of an untamed stallion thundered into the northern sunset.

We’re still living in the rented house, which only has one bedroom, and one bed, but it’s so lovely when we’re all together. Last night the girls Milly and Tilly, Natalia the polish au pair, my husband, my husband’s secretary Fabio (my poor dear love, just can’t seem to leave work in London when he comes up north, he’s very important you know ) and myself all sat in the bed and waited for the embers of the fire to finally leave us in darkness so we could all put down our Catherine Cookson novels and go off to sleep. When I’m alone I find it hard to get off, but last night with my devoted husband by my side I can honestly say that I got more zeds than there are in the name of Natalia’s home village.

In the morning Milly gave me a puzzled look as I rubbed my eyes and tried to get the two cafetières that I could see before me to merge into the one that I knew was actually there. ‘Mummy’ she began hesitantly, ‘yes Milly dear’ I said. ‘Tilly and I are a bit worried about daddy.’ ‘Oh gosh girls, why ever might you be worried about him?’ I queried. ‘Well’ said Milly, ’you know how people lose their memories when they get old like you and daddy, well I think daddy’s losing his memory.’ ‘We all forget things’ I said, 'even children!' ‘Yes, but mummy, why else last night did we hear father keep asking Fabio who’s the daddy?’ ‘I expect it’s just because he’s been working late darling’ I reassured her and poured my expresso into an eggcup.

Oscar Night

My husband and I both watched the Oscars last night, although we live so far apart that if you rotated the A1 by 90 degrees he would actually be looking down Helen Mirren’s cleavage in Los Angeles. The A1 of course runs north to south and, in actual fact, there are no east-west roads in Yorkshire, which may be a legacy of the wars of the Roses but is probably because if you live in the north, why would you want to visit somewhere else that's equally north. Even though we are so many hours apart, even travelling in my publishers corporate jet, we felt very close last night and I’ll feel even closer when I read his own account on his blog Husband in the South. Unfortunately, Helen Mirren won the best actress award and I had put my money on Jan Ravens from Dead Ringers. I find gambling helps with my drink problem and with my attempts to stop smoking. 'Look Mummy!' Said young Tilly, 'It’s that woman who fixed the brakes on Diana’s car! Can I have some pocket money now I’ve given you something to write on your blog?' I remembered wistfully how I had stopped her pocket money until she said something which was childlike, charming and innocent and yet with an inadvertant hint of adult insight and sophistication that I could quote in my book, I mean on my blog about normal family life in the North, which this is, just like happens in any normal family, which we are. 'Oh, OK', I sighed, relenting. 'Sign this release and have your people call my people.' Of course last night was also the occasion of the less well reported but more widely followed up here Yorkshire Oscars, In which The Queen also did well, picking up the award for best foreign language film, but that story is for another day, and another dollar. Tootle pip, as they say up here!