When I'm Big...
by Gwen Boswell
I was a deep child, note
deep and not strange please. I remember
developing firm opinions and strategies for my
future from a very early age. I knew that when I
was big, measuring if I had really made it in
life would depend on two things, being able
to afford to drink Ribena and having a swinging
chair in the garden. How I moped when I asked mum
to buy some Ribena, but she never would, far too
dear. Swinging chairs smacked of summer,
relaxation and a garden big enough for the chair
to actually swing, not like our threadbare, faded
deckchair that I could never quite work out how
to get up anyway.
I must confess to getting a
bit mixed up on the job front though. I thought
that when you were big, someone – who, I was
not sure – the government, the Queen,
actually chose your job for you. I remember being
really worried in case that special job selector
person determined I should be a mountain climber
(OK, OK, I was a bit strange). I hated heights,
so I prayed that the job chosen for me would be
at the ground level of an office block, or
anything really that just meant getting the bus
to work at the start of the day rather than the
alpine ski lift.
I had very specific ideas
on fashion and I envied the teenagers all the
control they had over their appearance. My mum
insisted that for mass I should wear a little
white blouse, pink checked suit and straw hat,
but oh, how I ached to be able to wear really
lovely black fishnet tights, white patent
stilettos with a mini-skirt and pointy bra. I
knew just how I would do my make up too. I’d
have my eyes exactly like Dusty Springfield’s
and the same shiny lips as Kathy Kirby. My mum
wouldn’t let me though, she said I was too
young. But that’s not really fair is it, to
be penalised for developing a remarkable sense of
fashion at six. Mum should have recognised my
free spirit and encouraged my early development
of style, if she had I bet I wouldn’t have
ended up working for local government; a lot to
answer for does my mum.
But now I am big and there
are lots of signs that I have made it in life.
For one, I drink Ribena all the time now, so I
feel this makes me pretty important. I know my
times tables too, I was always certain that when
I was big, I’d actually remember them and I
do – even the 9’s. If a grumpy old
dinner lady insisted that I eat half a dozen
soggy sprouts, I’d tell her to nick off. I
would not force them down me, heaving my heart up
minutes later.
I promised myself when I
was big I’d stay up all night if I wanted
to, I would never go to bed at 7.00pm never,
ever, never again. Word of warning here, be
careful what you wish for, as one insomniac later
said...
But it’s good that
some things never change from when we are little
and as for me, I still want to dress like a
teenager.
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