That was 2018

Everyone always writes a million reviews of the year, and most years I am straight out of the starting blocks writing a few paragraphs after a few glasses of champagne on New Year’s Eve. Auld Lang Syne does that to everyone, that feeling of wistful reflection on our inability to appreciate the good times, and a vague resolution that next year, we will all live in the moment. Not waiting for something more interesting to happen, or worrying about it all crashing down, or wishing we were still 21. I may have been thin and pretty when I was 21, but I was also a self-absorbed idiot who in all seriousness was nostalgic for being 17. I was always writing about how it was all too late. Now, at least I have realised that the day it’s too late is the day I die.

Anyway, back to 2018. Notwithstanding the utter car crash of the bellicose geopolitical maelstrom we find ourselves in, I love years with babies in them. There have been three now. Unfortunately, the main effect of sleep deprivation (other than wanting to shoot everyone) is total amnesia. So I am already struggling to remember much. I stopped working in February, had a baby in April, went to Wales and Corsica in July, and once Conrad started school in September, all I seemed to do was arrive at the school gates in a sweaty mess. In December, I accidentally got a full time job via the idiocy of going to the interview “just for practice”. The total trauma of leaving the kids has obliterated any real ability or desire to write about it.

So in order to have any idea of my year, here are my supposed top tracks on Spotify, although I have no recollection of playing them:

These Days

This was on the radio continuously in March. Although the lyrivs are about breaking up with someone, I interpreted them in the light of the particular fears that pregnancy engenders:

I hope someday
We’ll sit down together
And laugh with each other
About these days, these days
All our troubles
We’ll lay to rest
And we’ll wish we could come back to these days, these days

I was on my way to fill up the car, which was quite a frequent event leading up to 40 weeks, as I wanted to be sure we would not have to stop for petrol on the way to hospital – which was a very good call in the end. I heard the refrain, and listened to the words, and cried. Those lyrics perfectly capture the hideous sense of foreshadowing that maybe everyone feels at the end of a pregnancy; the awful pile of what-ifs that come crowding in as a lie in bed. I was so aware that if anything went wrong, these might be the last carefree weeks of my life. With our second child, things went a little bit wrong for a while, and I looked back on all those “before” moments for a long time, until we learnt to accept things as they are, and not worry too much about how they might turn out, or wish it all away. He is lovely, even if as my mother pointed out when we told her, he’ll never win any races.

Anyway, in the end our little Ingrid was a cinch – had a baby at 11.36, back home for a late lunch. I don’t even remember what it was like only having two children.

Take me to Church

This is a bit of a favourite for the last two years, maybe ever since it came on when I was sitting in McDonalds having a sausage Mcmuffin before my grandmother’s funeral two years ago. Being a bit full is beneficial, as it makes you less emotional when you have to sing The Day Thou Gavest Lord has Ended. Unfortunately, nothing can prevent the tears engendered The Lord is My Shepherd, which in spite of a lack of any religious conviction, I sometimes play on my computer if I’m sad and home alone and need perspective. I played Take me to Church quite a bit in the last few weeks before I gave up commuting two hours each way to Canary Wharf.

Take me Home, Country Roads

I played this song all the time just after Ingrid was born. It was on my playlist while I as interminably in labour, and it reminded me subsequently of how special that is, and how lucky we are.

Spirit in the Sky

Richard plays this a lot because it’s on the Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack. It was therefore always on when he was doing the kids’ bath,

• Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D Major

Mozart Requiem

Getting two boisterous boys and a baby into bed without killing anyone was my biggest challenge. Richard had a period of needing to work relatively late, so I had to improve my overall skills and enthusiasm for the task. I decided that if classical music supposedly improved the behaviour of miscreants on the Tube, it might work with my kids and stop them running around the house naked and yelling. It didn’t seem to make any difference, but it made me feel better.