I seem to be surrounded by couples who constantly compete. They seem to be trying to prove who has the most miserable life. Who is suffering more, working harder, is more stressed. There’s no understanding, appreciation or empathy between the two people who should be working to make life easier for each other. The husband goes to work, the wife stays at home and takes care of the children. The husband thinks the wife spends all day having coffee and chatting with other mums at lovely playgroups. The wife thinks the husband spends all day sitting at a desk. The husband has no idea what it’s like to look after two pre-school children all day every day. The wife has no idea what the husband’s job actually is.

The husband would like the wife to spend all day cleaning, cooking, washing, keeping the house stocked with food, attending to bills and other household management AND playing meaningfully with the children. The wife would like the husband to spend all day in a mad frenzy of work, the equivalent of performing brain surgery whilst ordering the invasion of an army AND getting home in time for dinner. The husband thinks there’s no way on earth the wife could cope with five minutes of his day. The wife thinks the husband would wave a white flag after five minutes of her day. They are probably both right.

Where does it start? How do two people who are supposed to provide each other with more support and appreciation than anyone else come to this? The division of labour in relationships is so often like this. It’s a fact of nature that’s hard to overcome. None of my friends would swap places with their other half. So why can’t they be happy for each other? Why can’t they accept the differences in their roles and support each other?

Competition is something that doesn’t really happen in my house. Simon would love it if I spent the day messing about with the girls and drinking coffee with my friends. I love it when he has an easy day. Maybe we’re just not the competitive types. Maybe we’ve been together so long that we just don’t care about stuff like that any more. Maybe we just don’t take life that seriously. Whatever the reason, it helps us to keep life simple. Life can’t be simple when the leading characters are making everything so complicated.

If you’ve read some of our earlier posts, you’ll know what a mess we’ve been in financially. Though our escape was easy compared to some, at the depths of our debt there were times I could see no way out. Life was consumed with consuming because we were in so deep a little more didn’t seem to make much difference. I lost sleep, couldn’t open post and didn’t answer the phone. I tell myself now that the experience did have a positive side in that it has made me scared to death of ever spending too much again. As we are poised on the brink of a little spare cash, I hope that it really did.

Since paying off our debt we have bought relatively little. In fact, we have gone out of our way to rid ourselves of the booty that got us into the mess in the first place and we no longer own anything we don’t really need or use. But I’m acutely aware that we aren’t as good as I’d like us to be at always being careful and the very idea that there’s finally some money coming from all our hard work makes me wonder if we can pretend we still don’t have any. Can we resist just having a quick look in that nice shop in town that we always walk past? Can we still make the most economic decisions and spend time checking we’re getting the best deal?

Minimalism is easy if you don’t have anything. With spare cash comes temptation. I love our simpler life not just because I fear debt but because all that stuff never actually made us happy. I look back at us just a few years ago and the difference is astounding. I sometimes can’t believe it was me who spent £200 on yet another bag without thinking. Being in debt doesn’t make you scared of spending money. Being free of debt is what gives you the healthy respect you need to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

As people began to own more than one television and computers came on the scene, this focus was lost. Whatever your feelings on television, time spent in front of it used to be family time. Television ownership, video and on-demand services fragmented this shared culture in the same way that fast food, take-aways and longer working hours eroded the family mealtime.

We’ve been careful to ensure that our family mealtimes remain sacred. More specifically, our evening meal. For one reason or other we can’t always be together at lunchtime, or even breakfast. But we do try very hard to make sure that every evening, at roughly the same time, we sit down to enjoy a meal together. We always cook our own meals (an important part of the ritual for us) and sometimes we’ve even cooked them together (as much as cooking with a two- and four-year old can be considered “teamwork”). The time, attention and care all matters.

The pace of social fragmentation is gathering. The web, social networks, mobile devices and a general globalisation of relationships has made it as likely we’ll spend the day talking to someone on the other side of the planet as someone in our own city. And the positives of this are obvious. Sharing culture globally is a good thing for so many reasons. But what does it mean for our local relationships? And, more importantly, what does it mean for our families?

We can’t answer that question for everyone, but we’ve definitely found our hub. It’s not the television, or a piano (albeit through a lack of talent rather than interest). It’s not even something primeval like a fire. But eating is still a basic human need, and one that is better enjoyed together. What connects you?

The “few things”, apart from the nagging voice in both our heads telling us life isn’t all wrapped up and decided now, were a speech given by JK Rowling and a film starring George Clooney. I know these two are not the people you’d necessarily expect to be an inspiration to major life changes but both touched something in me that brought that ugly head rearing up and slightly flipped my stomach.

JK Rowling was giving the Harvard commencement speech. I’ve never really been a fan of Harry Potter but her speech was simple, honest, down to earth and amazing. The words that hit home were about failure: “It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you’ve failed by default”. Gulp.

The film was called “Up In the Air” and starred George Clooney. It was about a man who is a loner – works alone, lives alone, no complicated relationships, travels light, keeps a minimally furnished apartment. His main job is firing people but on the side he gives talks and runs workshops called “what’s in your backpack”. These talks exemplify a life free from the clutter of belongings and relationships. He thinks he’s entering into an uncomplicated relationship but finds himself falling in love and starts to question his way of life and his backpack theories.

If I look in my backpack it’s pretty full. It’s full of stuff and people that keep us tied to where we live. Family, friends, routine, house, work. We’ve lived here for two years now and much as we like it it’s an easy place. By easy I mean we don’t have to think much. It’s not challenging. It’s a bit boring if I’m honest. Is that what we want for our girls? For us? Well no, not really. But deciding what we do want involves changing routines we have established, uprooting the girls, maybe learning a new language, the effort of starting again somewhere new. In just two years we have filled a backpack and it’s a heavy load.

I could have a go at lightening my backpack for a bit though. I know I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t give something a try. I tell Simon that this big adventure, whatever it turns out to be, is for me like going for a long run. The thought of it is daunting but with a bit of determination (and some gentle nagging, or sometimes some aggressive bullying!) by the end I feel pretty elated.

Still, my first morning in the office since mid-December and I’m going to spend a little time organising myself and reviewing where I’m at with printing and other projects. Doing all this just makes me think about how I go about organising myself though and I’m going to waste just a bit more time writing about it rather than doing it……

I’m pretty new to blogging and all things associated with it but so far it has helped me to really focus my ideas about life and connect with some great people who are interested in the same things. It has also helped me make some really important decisions about what I want and perhaps more crucially what I don’t want (I want more experiences from life and less stuff – sounds so simple and it is). What it hasn’t done is help me find a way to get there. A way to stay organised, focused, move my projects forward, keep my life flowing in the right direction, not get distracted. In fact, the sheer amount of advice and information has been, at times, more baffling than it has been helpful.

Clearly different things work for different people, but I guess I just don’t respond well to being told that this particular way is the way to do something. I imagine I share a preferred way of learning with at least some other people out there, but the direct, “this is the way” one ain’t it. Blogs that present information in this way are so often contradictory, even within themselves on occasion. I’ve learned, for example, to make a list, not to make a list, to prioritise, not to prioritise, to de-clutter, of course not to de-clutter, to organise, and yes, you guessed it, not to organise (the argument here being that if you have stuff to organise, you have too much stuff….). I’ve learned the importance of setting myself goals that I must achieve in order to be productive, and then to forget the rules, not to set goals for fear of failing. To digitise everything but of course not to constantly be at the beck and call of digital devices but to switch off from the world. Blogs that set out bizarre systems seemingly for the sake of having a system.

I don’t ever seem to manage to follow a particular system either. I read a very good book recently which set out a whole approach to life. It works, apparently, and on the face of it it certainly seemed to offer solutions to all the things I want to achieve. A system for keeping notes, having a clear desk, not forgetting stuff, moving forward on projects, being productive, achieving. But it fundamentally goes against my instinctive way of organising myself. It requires constant attention. It’s like a machine that needs to be fed otherwise it goes crazy and sends your world into disarray. I have a more ad-hoc approach. I have limited time in the office and two small children who require my attention (and to whom I’d much rather give it!). I can’t devote enough of my brain capacity to such a system. I’m not organised enough to be organised!

So how do I learn? Well I’ve found out over the years that my learning style is much less direct. I learn from other people’s stories. My favourite blogs are those which offer someone else’s experiences for me to share. No right or wrong implied, no direction given, take from it what you will. I wonder if people are essentially unchangeable. If we can tweek our ways and methods but major change just isn’t possible. Or is it just me? Our mothers advise us girls that we can’t change the men in our lives and to try is just a recipe for heartbreak. Maybe that goes for me too. I can’t seem to adopt another person’s system. Interesting though they are to read, those lists of ten ways to do whatever just don’t work. I have to find my own way. It would be great though, if a list like that did work. So quick, no effort required, just tick them off and away you go.

Right then, where’s that piece of paper….

The two weeks from her death to my birthday gave me lots to think about. Firstly the obvious one about living life to the full. My Grandmother lived so much longer than anyone expected. She had been unwell in her 5o’s and suffered heart problems most of her life. While we all expected my Grandad to outlive her he actually died nearly 20 years ago. As a catholic she had been visited by a priest at her bedside four times and each time until now had woken up and wondered why all her children were gathered around. My parents have been called in the middle of the night to be at her side many times and she has described out of body experiences, white lights and all that. But she kept on going. She found a new companion to share her life with at 80! I guess we never know how long we have and most of the time we take that to mean our life may be cut short, but it can also mean we might just keep on going and going and in some ways that makes it even more vital to make the most of life. Imagine not getting on with it and finding you’d wasted 20 years you didn’t think you were going to have.

Secondly is family – extended family. As a child I spent a lot of time with my cousins, aunts and uncles. Now I only see them at weddings and funerals. My children didn’t come to the funeral but they did come to the bit afterwards and it was the first time they had met most of my extended family. With my Grandmother gone a whole generation has now disappeared. My cousins, my sister and I promised we would meet up once a year. I hope we do.

As my dad and his siblings clear my Grandmother’s flat it is a reminder too about stuff. She had loads of it. Crammed into cupboards and drawers that were all falling apart from the pressure of linens she collected and never used. Thimbles, religious trinkets, soft toys, ornaments. We are all going to choose something to keep. For me, a paperweight. But the rest goes to charity shops. None of it matters after you have gone. What we remember is her. Her elegance and gentleness, her thoughtfulness, her waving goodbye as if for the last time for the past 20 years.

So, on to making the most of time. I am hoping for an uneventful December. I have a series of prints waiting to be finished. My first ones. I’m a little nervous about showing my work to anyone for the first time in a very long time. However they turn out, even with the ink still wet, my Grandmother would have wasted no time in telling everyone and anyone that her Grandaughter is a printmaker.

Nearly all my female friends have changed direction, some quite dramatically, since having children. They have found that their pre-baby life just doesn’t work any more. The very idea of disappearing to an office five days a week is totally un-manageable. Some have developed their own businesses, one became a baby masseur, one is considering starting child-minding, another has just decided not to work at all for now. Others have taken part-time work, anything really, that fits with school and childcare. It doesn’t matter if it’s totally below their skill level. In many cases it’s just something “for now”.

I don’t want something temporary though. For me, this has become an opportunity to get back to basics and think about what I really want from the rest of my life. For the past 15 years I have worked for arts organisations of one kind or another. I have done admin, management, project development, fundraising and recruitment. Since running our own creative consultancy I have worked in lots of other people’s organisations too. And as much as I’ve enjoyed it I’ve realised that I don’t want the same things any more. It isn’t that I just want something that fits around my children. I want something inherently different for me.

It’s taken a long time to come to any conclusion. I have thought about lots of different things I could do. It has taken a lot of searching and many ideas have seemed right for a while until I imagined myself doing that thing every day. Finally, the nagging thing, the thing I have been trying to push aside for lack of practicality or security has finally made it to the number one spot. What I have found I miss is doing my own creative work and the sense of fulfillment it gives me. I did go to art school a very long time ago but over time my own practice has just disappeared. I dug out some old sketchbooks recently and was hit by memories of visits to exhibitions and galleries. Time spent drawing, developing ideas. And I felt such a rush of excitement I just knew I had found my calling again.

A trip to London took me to the V&A, where I spent a whole morning looking and drawing. I came away filled with ideas but I got home and dithered about for a few weeks until Simon said “look, just DO something!”. So I went on ebay and bought myself a table, ordered some printing inks and set myself up a small corner of the office as a studio. And there it waits, until tomorrow, when I start my new life. I have no idea if I’m still any good. I have no idea if anyone will be interested in what I’m making. But I have to give it a try. I hope that at some point in the not-too-distant future someone will ask me what I do and I will confidently be able to reply.

Naomi may not have spent too much time deliberating over selling her guitar but I’ve got to the point now where I’m having to actually list my turntables on ebay. In more confident moments I’ve taken photos of them and thought about shipping options. In times of doubt I’ve gone back to my records and thought about throwing myself back into the world of shopping for vinyl and DJing at friends’ parties.

But here’s the thing: it really is a world. Almost every hobby or leisure pursuit is its own little ecosystem. It has magazines dedicated to it. You can meet other like-mined people on the internet. There’s the right way to do everything and the way that brings you scorn (woe-betide anyone who tries to open the plastic wrapper on a new record without having first frantically rubbed the edge on their jeans). And, of course, with that world comes even more stuff. It spreads from your single pursuit until every room has some element of it.

Maybe it only happens to a certain type of person but I’ve had my fair share of obsessions over the years. From playing music to making it. Mountain biking. Rock climbing. Watches. They all spread. So, much of what I’ve been selling these past few months is the fallout from these little obsessions (some not so little) and there’s been a natural order. We’re down to the brass tacks now. Will I do these things again or has the time past?

For me the time has past as far as superstar DJ status goes. That’s not to say that I feel to old to do it or that I don’t think I’m that good at it. What it does mean is that I don’t have the time or drive to obsess over it anymore and the stuff that goes with it is just going to waste. Someone else could fire their passion with it.

Having a family makes us really focused on time and my family is my biggest obsession. After that comes my work and then after that comes my interests. With so much demanding, and deserving attention, my interests need to be really important to me. I have to decide, where I have a choice, what I’m going to obsess over. Well, I’ve done that now. The decision is made. I can get rid of the reminders of previous flirtations with a clean conscience and get on with throwing myself into the things I really care about. It’s quite liberating. Although I have, recently, been thinking I might like to try my hand at surfing…

So here I am 20 years later and with two children. Looking after ourselves seems to get more and more important. Our de-cluttered, more focused lives would seem incomplete without attention paid to our very beings. It dawned on me recently that when my children are my age I will be nearly 80. And I want to still be around and be healthy and fit and able to play with any grandchildren we may have. What would the point in all this thoughtful living be if we didn’t apply it to ourselves as well?

But there’s the hard part. What amounts to a healthy life? How do we draw up the rules? What about our vices? We have plenty of those and compared to giving up buying stuff we don’t need (which we’ve found pretty easy), giving up eating stuff we don’t need is really really hard. And some mornings, getting out of bed to go running in the rain is pretty much impossible. In fact, just yesterday I missed my run. I ran today though, two days or more without a run and the routine starts to slip. I start to convince myself I will “go tomorrow”. We slip into bad habits so easily. We have started to give our children some of the foods we always swore we would never buy. Cocoa Pops, for example, have become a staple at our breakfast table. It’s easy.

A little effort, or sometimes actually a lot of effort, really brings such great rewards. I really enjoy my run and making the effort to get out there and do it has such a huge impact on the rest of my life. I feel better, all day, am more awake, refreshed. Making the effort to make porridge or fruit salad or eggs for breakfast makes everyone feel better, all day. Making time for these things is so essential. It seems too hard sometimes but when you think about what it means, literally a longer, healthier life, what could be more important?

The programme showed up a few interesting things. Firstly, and most interestingly, that almost anything can be learnt through the in-depth pursuit of a single subject. It makes me wonder just how far learning could go along this route. It also highlighted how far away this approach was from the way that we’re all normally taught. Lastly, it was interesting to see a teacher (I think he was a chemistry teacher) embarking on a journey himself.

The web is changing learning. There is almost an unlimited range of knowledge at children’s fingertips now and this shift has the potential to cause a leap from the old, compartmentalised way of learning to a new, complex system that allows for boundless exploration. But what is this educational future going to look like?

A couple of years ago I studied, for a short while, with a graphic designer who had gone to art school in Leipzig, Germany. He had spent a whole year of his education drawing, and re-drawing all the letters of a single typeface. What seems like a ridiculously narrow focus was, according to him, an incredible learning experience. Through this activity he had developed craft and learnt about all the important elements of design like composition, contrast and line.

This way of learning contrasts sharply with the self-driven, “surfing” education that the internet might draw us into, if we’re not careful. What we need in the face of such educational possibilities is a sense of purpose, a singularity of vision. And here is where things can really change for the better. My school experiences seem to share a lot with Naomi’s. After all, we did go to school at about the same time. I imagine, however, that our experiences are pretty similar to most people’s. The idea of school seems to be that there is a basic set of Things We Need to Know.

Things We Need to Know seems to have an unspoken hierarchy. At the top we have maths and science, followed by languages and humanities and then any kind of artistic pursuit. If you can know a bit of all of these then the school’s job is done. Most importantly, you don’t need to know why you need to know these things. I know that Naomi had a terrible time trying to get to the bottom of why she needed to learn calculus. It’s actually pretty useful if you want to be an economist or a physicist, but it’s not that relevant to most things.

So this is where my school went wrong. It’s not very useful for children to be told that they need to know certain things because that’s just the way it is. How is anyone supposed to inspire children when they can’t even get across the fact that algebra helps you to work out things you don’t know? This is the purpose of algebra. It seems logical, then, to demand a school system that removes the barriers between subjects, that gets across why it’s good to learn things, and that uses exciting, real-world projects (like the fireworks one) as a framework for the infinitely complex learning experiences that are available to us. Perhaps teachers will learn something too.