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December 31st, 2011
10:18 am - 2011 retrospective
I was talking to my sister the other day and she said that she doesn't want to cling to memories but to let life slip easily through her fingers. I feel the same. I don't like to spend too much time remembering things, and I don't want photos or video clips. Nevertheless year end seems a good time to look back.
This was the year I became fifty, and my life has been an exhausting flux. And in the wide world everything slowly began to start crashing down. As Charlie Brooker said, 'Osama Bin Laden was killed - I bet you had forgotten' because so many things have happened since. And we are not thinking 'Phew that was a tough year, hope 2012 is a bit easier', because we know it won't be.
My good friend Fred died this year.  happytune had a new baby, and my brother became a father for the fifth time. The charity I work with got a third of a million pounds from the National Lottery - a real success story for us, ensuring our continuing survival.
I lost my job in a now-defunct quango, and got a new one teaching at a University. The new one hasn't worked out as well as I hoped - not enough hours - so I am still looking. One book sold 20,000 copies, another book was written and submitted to the publisher, and a new book proposal was accepted. So, the conveyor belt of my minuscule writing career is functioning. I was hoping that part time teaching+writing would earn me enough to get by, but with two kids at University it's not enough. In 2012 I will need to either find full time work, or move to a smaller house, so one way or another there will be a big change.
It's strange that this life - a job I am (fairly) good at, writing that sells (a bit), a family that love me - represents a failure, and yet I am a failure, just because I don't make enough money to support my children. I wish it were not so, but our society is mediated by money, so it has been tough to lose a full time income. I have an interview or two coming up, so we shall see.
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I do find it rather odd that not having enough money to support your children at university is deemed failure. My own parents could not have supported me to stay in education past 18 (to be truthful, they struggled to keep me past 16). I was fortunate to be born at a time and in a place where the state paid.
Me too, but they are both clever and I must get them through it somehow. As I say, my plan B is to sell this house and move in somewhere smaller. ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/42357008/4625841) | | From: | zornhau |
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| Date: | January 1st, 2012 12:53 am (UTC) |
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We do the best we can. I enjoy your LJ. Happy New Year. Thanks zornhau, what a kind comment. Since I posted that I have developed an ear infection (I am sitting up now nursing myself). I think that was affecting my mood today without me even realising it. | | From: | zornhau |
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| Date: | January 1st, 2012 01:06 am (UTC) |
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You're almost exctly a decade ahead of me. I shall watch your progress with interest.... ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/101464773/904887) | | From: | tehomet |
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| Date: | January 12th, 2012 10:29 pm (UTC) |
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It's strange that this life - a job I am (fairly) good at, writing that sells (a bit), a family that love me - represents a failure, and yet I am a failure, just because I don't make enough money to support my children.
It's sad that that's the view of some folks, although not mine. And you do support them, just not through huge uni fees. |
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