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Friday 17 August 2007

I should have listened more at school

I was a girly swot at school, there is no getting away from it. I went to a tiny little primary school, which I loved, and I always did really well. Spelling, English, maths (stop laughing, those who know me - this is primary school we're talking about!). We had a little spelling test every Friday, and a little maths test the same day, and our teacher kept a graph for each child to show how they'd performed throughout the school year. Mine was always in a straight line, because I could spell, and I could do maths (then).

Comprehensive school was a lot different. It was HUGE. There were lots of kids there and they were really loud. And I was really quiet. (I've told you before, STOP LAUGHING. This was when I was little). So I stood out more, because in that sort of school, its not really cool to be a girly swot. At the end of my first year, my school report had a comment in it from the Head which said 'Could be a high flyer'. I bet she choked on that when I left school with only 2 O'Levels. Like I said, it wasn't cool to be clever, I'll tell you the rest of that story another time. I still learned a lot at school, and I've done lots of resits and further education, and now find myself in an almost respectable education position..

But I should have listened more at school.

Now, you see, there are huge gaps in my school type education. Not the sort of things that you learn in night school, or by distance learning. I went out with my son today, and we passed a birds egg on the ground. It was opaque white, shiny, about half the size of a hen's egg. My sons said 'What's that?' I told him it was a bird's egg. He asked if the bird was still in it. I didn't think so, because I could see a little crack in the egg and some gunky stuff at the side of it. Also, it was on the road, near the garages. Which is probably not its natural nesting place. I said no, and he asked where the bird was, I said it looked as though it might have died, because there was all that gunky stuff (Boys love gunky stuff, I'm not a sadist). He said it didn't look like a bird, I had to agree. Which is when I started to flap a little. Like a bird. Shouldn't it have looked like a bird? Even a little one?

On the return journey, we walked down our little path to the front door. My son stared at his flowers (snapdragons), and asked what that flying thing was in his flowers. I looked and told him it was a bee. I told him it was a good thing because it was collecting pollen. He asked me why it was a good thing that a bee was stealing pollen from his flowers to give to someone else's flowers. That's a good point, I thought. A bee is stealing from us. How can that be a good thing? I think it might be something to do with spreading pollen around, but I have no idea. What if I'm confused, and the damn bees are stealing from me? Is that why other people's flowers look better than mine? Because bees are stealing from me, because I don't know any better?

I need to go back to school and learn about birds eggs, and bees.

Or someone needs to give me the telephone number for the Bee Police.

5 comments:

Swearing Mother said...

I am sure bees etc., have something to do with er., something or other, but not quite sure what. Could it be honey?

Think I was looking out of the window across the hockey field the day we did the bit about bees. Paid more attention to birds and bees, though. Ah, if only I could turn back time.....

Rainbow said...

We didn't learn about the birds and the bees at my very proper girls' grammar school, although we did do a little bit about rabbits. Gave up biology after the 3rd year, though, in fact gave up all sciences so I'm a complete ignoramus. (Or ignoranus, as my hubby insists it is...)

Isn't it awful when your kids ask you something and you don't know the answer? We're supposed to be omnipotent. I remember when one of mine asked me why the sky was sometimes blue and sometimes grey. I felt such an idiot and mumbled something about it must be the light - which is actually not too far from the truth, so maybe I'm a natural genius after all!

The Woman who Can said...

Swearing Mother - Ithink bees do have something to do with honey, but I'm not sure what. I'm fairly sure that you wouldn't turn back time, even if you could! Maybe there's another post for you - 'What I'd Change'...

Rainbow - we are supposed to be omnipotent, Iblew this early on when my son asked me what electricity was, and I told him it was 'like magic in pipes'. There's no coming back from that.

belle said...

What? You mean electricity isn't like magic in the pipes??? You'll be telling me next that it doesn't rain because the clouds are full ... I'm off to get some more migraine drugs, can't cope with this sort of reality ...

Oh, and at my school, bees were the things you squashed and then toasted on the radiators.

The Woman who Can said...

Toasted on the radiators Belle? And tell me again how many schools you went to?