MY POOR TEENAGERS
Sometimes I feel sorry for my teenagers; yes I really do.
I live in a tiny Spanish village in the hills of Southern Spain. I am the only British person in the village. My husband is Spanish and so are my kids.
My children have grown up with their Spanish friends, and are used to seeing their Spanish mothers, who, especially after they get married are like this:
· The house spotless from top to bottom, drawers and cupboards clean and tidy.
· Clothes ironed and laid out for husband and children every day.
· Lunch, cooked from scratch and on the table at 2.30 promptly, usually comprising of two or three different things.
· Half an hour spent having coffee and a gossip twice a week between 9.30 and 10.00 (this means kids are at school and they have swept and mopped the floors beforehand).
· Alcoholic drinks with husband at weekend, 1 or 2 small botttles of beer, or a red wine and lemonade in the summer. (I have never seen a woman in my village drunk).
· Keeps chickens, kills pigs and makes sausages.
Then then there is me:
· House dusty, cupboards and drawers stuffed to the gills.
· Un-ironed clothes in various piles around the house, husband and children sort themselves out.
· Lunch cooked from scratch if they are lucky, one dish only. Otherwise it’s Pot Noodles.
· Half an hour spent cleaning floors and the rest of the day drinking coffee.
· Plenty of alcoholic drinks with husband, regularly followed by a night on the bathroom floor, with the room spinning round and round.
· Eat supermarket chickens, buy pork and cook sausages.
I say to my kids, “don’t you wish you had a Spanish mum, who does everything for you, don’t you feel different with an English mum”? They smile ruefully and pat me on the head. “We love you mum, even if you are English!”
