Oh no it isn't!

Sometimes it’s hard to work out if something is just a you thing, or a most people thing, or an everyone thing.

My son auditioned for his new secondary school’s pantomime in the first week of term. (Presumably he was swapped at birth - if you’re super confident, and confused by your trembling eleven year old, riddled with imposter syndrome, do get in touch.)

A few in his form tried out but only he and one other got a recall. It is impossible to convey how delighted he was when he received this news, but suffice to say, Oscar winners have been more low key, and made shorter speeches.

Photo by Barry Weatherall on Unsplash

A week later, he called me when he came out of school. He’s been getting the bus, and loving the independence of that, so it was unusual that he asked to be picked up. He said he was ill, and sounded it. I asked what his symptoms were, and it transpired that he was emotionally rather than physically unwell. The last lesson of the day had been Drama, and at the end, the teacher/director of the pantomime had asked the other kid who had been recalled to stay behind.

“So that’s that then,” he said, sadly.

Yes, I thought but not said. Instead – because obviously I’ve read that Philippa Perry book - I commiserated with him about how awful that must have felt, without trying to fix it. I also pointed out that we didn’t know yet. There could have been many reasons for the teacher to ask that little bastard completely innocent child to stay behind. There was even a plausible scenario where the teacher/director was gently breaking the bad news to the unsuccessful auditionees first, before informing those who had been cast. It could have been anything, I said with my mouth, while crying and dying inside for my poor brave boy, who had clearly not got a part and would never recover from this cruel blow. In the future, when I made the journey to visit him in prison in the wake of all his drug-fuelled crime rampages, I would recall this moment, as the cause.

You might not be a trainee psychotherapist like me, but I bet you know that this is what they call Catastrophising. And although it sounds vaguely feline, it’s generally seen as a negative, and not just by dog people. (As if we’d listen to them anyway lol etc etc.)

The next day, another 3.20 phone call, very different energy. No greeting, straight to the headline news: the kid who’d been asked to stay behind had forgotten his jumper.

Forgotten. His. Jumper.

I told a few friends this, and they all replied with some version of “There’s a lesson to be learned here.” Some of them added, “But let’s not bother, eh?” and those are My People, although that might not be a compliment. I long ago decided it’s better to expect the worst and be either prepared or pleasantly surprised, but I’m not sure I believe that’s true any more. Maybe it’s far preferable to not automatically assume everything is terrible, and have sleepless nights over what turn out to be knitwear related incidents, but to be hopeful instead, because it’s a nicer place to live. I was expecting all of the most devasting events that have happened to me, but being primed in advance made them no less devastating. Arguably, in fact, it made them extra painful, because I was miserable and anxious for longer than necessary. There really is a lesson to be learned here. Feels like finally time to bother. Always remember the jumper! (This is also a lesson the kid in question could use too, in a more literal sense.)

My son still doesn’t know whether he’ll be in the panto or not but rest assured, if he gets it, you will hear the screams of joy from there. Actually forget what I said above, even if he is biologically yours, you can’t have him back.