AUGUST

AUGUST 1^ST 1999

I was subconsciously nibbling at my nails whilst being absorbed in my newspaper, when Jordan zoomed up to me, pushed my hand away from my mouth and gave me a stern look as if to say, “Tut tut, naughty naughty!”  He then saw a pregnant woman on TV having an ultrasound exam and he pointed at her saying, “Ahh baby, ahh baby.”

AUGUST 2^ND 1999

The Core Group coco clowns came bothering me again.  The lounge was so full that I was asked where I was going to sit; so I replied, “On the floor where I belong.”  Andrew and Shell served us tea.  The group talked such bureaucratic bunkum that I sat there thinking that it was no wonder folk need to attend temper controlling courses.  They went on about school, tests, mile-stones…. They tried to say that school is important because it not only gives you an education but it prepares you for the world of work afterwards.  Such brainwashed people!  I told them that I disagree and that my kids have natural confidence because they don’t attend school, such that they’d be able to walk into almost any work environment and cope with people of all ages and dispositions. They didn’t like it when I said, “They do it now; they can handle you lot, bring you tea, and tell you what you want to hear.  They know how to behave in front of others especially if those people happen to be important, such as you guys.  In fact you ALL commented at conference on what lovely kids I have and that you’d never seen children so well behaved.  It’s funny, though, how such favourable comments didn’t crop up on the minutes.”  I informed them that Andrew and Shell happily chat with my solicitor and help out at nursery…. I explained that a school’s only obligation is to provide lessons for a child; whether that child learns anything of value or not is up to chance.  I spoke about the growing trend and benefits of home education and referred to ‘common sense’ books on education, written by like-minded authors such as Jean Bendell and John Holt.  I asked the team why so-called ‘experts’ on education can’t be big enough to admit that someone else might have better ideas than them about learning.

Mel sat at my feet, so engrossed in her animal-sounds cloth book.  Her look of concentration was a picture.  Her eyebrows came right down and closed in as she examined the texture and listened to the various noises.  She caught me watching her and broke into a huge grin.  Then she pulled me towards her and babbled on about something.  Our visitors laughed and again commented that all my kids are always so well behaved – such “busy little bees.”  I was beginning to wonder that maybe if my kids were rowdy little troublemakers they wouldn’t be registered.  Maybe these professionals had begged their bosses for easier families to ‘assess’ because they simply couldn’t cope with the troubled ‘difficult’ kids!

In the afternoon I waltzed Shell around the clothes shops but we ended up coming back empty handed and I found myself sorting through my gear for something to give her.  I parted with two pairs of jeans, two pairs of leggings and a couple of jumpers – and she’s only nine!

On the suggestion of the Head teacher of GW’s kids’ old school, I wrote to the MP Gareth Thomas, asking for his intervention in our ‘at risk’ injustice.

AUGUST 3^RD 1999

A racing bulletin came on the TV.  Shell asked why prix is pronounced “pree.”  I said, “Dunno; stupid really cos you get laughed at if you call it grand pricks; when really it’s the folk who insist it is pronounced ‘pree’ that should be mocked.  Crazy English language – no wonder half the population is illiterate.”

AUGHUST 4^TH 1999

At 1.00 am Andrew was doubled up with stomach gripes.  He was yelling and moaning in agony.  I half suspected constipation and urged him to use the loo, but he said he couldn’t walk.  He got worse by the minute so, just to be on the safe side, I phoned the hospital and was sent an ambulance.  I called dad to hold the fort here.  Glan Clwyd were busy.  There were drunkards all over the show yelling f…. ing this and f…. ing that, and fall victims.  By 3.30 am Andrew still hadn’t seen a doctor but he managed to do number twos and felt instantaneously better.  I knew it.  We discharged ourselves and on the way back I gave him a right talking to about the importance of a healthy diet: wholemeal bread, wheat or oat cereals, fruit and veg, meat and fish.  I said that I’d got into a bad habit lately of buying biccys, cakes, crisps and sugary cereals but now it’s all going to stop.  I told him that when you eat healthy foods you have more brain-power, which means you get through your maths and science a lot quicker and your body is stronger, which means you can beat up those twits who start on you. As a sweetener [pardon the pun] I said that he and Shell could have some of the money that I’d save each week by not buying ‘junk’, as long as it is not spent on rubbish.  When we got in, Andrew immediately dumped the biccys and cakes, saying that he couldn’t bear to look at them.

All this hype about Hague’s new image!  Who give a fig?  No one cares what a politician looks like as long as he/she is honest and does the job.

AUGUST 5^TH 1999

Mr detestable was in right provocative mood at church.  He insisted he’d found a lump on Jordan, which needed attention immediately.  I reminded him that the lump was a harmless cyst, which I’d shown him about a year ago and that two doctors had said that it is nothing to worry about.  But as usual he obnoxiously insisted that three other people had felt it, that it is an emergency and that Jordan needs to be seen by a doctor NOW.  He said that since he now has parental responsibility, he’ll take Jordan to the hospital at once if I won’t.  He also insisted that he’d found another lump, but was unable to show me where.  So I was bullied into taking Jordan to emergency surgery in the morning.  In all fairness to Lorraine, she sprang to my aid telling Gareth, “It’s no wonder Sharon gets on the defensive the way you get at her and order her….”.  I hissed, “This is just another form of harassment and the parental responsibility talk is just an excuse.”  Gareth started yelling at me and being insulting and offensive.  Lorraine and a couple of the other churchgoers had to calm him down and hold him back while someone else ushered me out.

Mel fell apart trying to get to me.  She cried and reached out to me.  Jordan clung on to me in a bear hug.  Mr Awkward shouted, “Jord, come to dad.”  But pud just tightened his grip on me.

As I was preparing tea, I got a lovely perfumy whiff and the distinct impression that mum was peering over my shoulder.  I understood that to mean, “Don’t worry about the archrival and don’t get upset.”  I felt heartened, and prayed that I wouldn’t be visited by any dark spirits.  I made myself a delicious garlic and onion salad and I smiled as I thought to myself that the beauty of being single is that no one cares about the smell of my breath.

I watched a programme on Channel 4 about the Kennedy clan and their involvement in organised crime.  It revealed the scandal of America’s FBI and their so-called ‘investigations’ of Mafia bosses – men who were powerful and wealthy because they just killed anyone who got in their way.  When one gangster helped Jack Kennedy to become president, the FBI were ordered to back off.  The motto was “don’t make waves.”  It’s high time we do create a fuss and drive the truth out. The guilty hate that; and then we can set about change.  We need to get to the consciences of the half-decent Masons and other members of secret seedy groups.  Get them to start doing the right thing and to whistle blow on other members, so that such organisations are totally obliterated.  We need to get them to understand that those who break away from these ‘clubs’ and snitch on those who insist on keeping such murky places alive will be considered heroes and worthy of the title ‘man’.  God will also be pleased with them.  Whereas the ones who refuse to leave will be considered low-life cowards.

The Tonight show featured Sally Whitaker from Coronation Street fame drawing attention to the horrors of Domestic Violence and the stark disgraceful fact of it being such a common practice.  Well done, Sal.  Keep raising awareness.  The official figures are that at least twenty five percent of ALL women will experience D/V at some time in their lives.  And that is violent crime.  The stats are much higher for milder forms of domestic abuse.  The real figure of sufferers of violent crime is probably around half of all women, if not more.  Many simply won’t talk about it and others won’t do anything about it.  The State ignores it, covers up the true extent of the problem and further suppresses women.

Andrew and I got into a discussion about the world’s wars and how it is always mainly the innocents who get slaughtered and whose families suffer.  It is never those who give the orders, those who pretend to be combating terrorism or fighting ‘ethical’ wars.  There is no such thing as an ‘ethical’ war anyway.  And also, it doesn’t matter whether you are Christian, Moslem, Protestant, Catholic or any other religion…. None of it matters.  It’s what’s in your heart that’s important.  Are you good?  Do you behave righteously?  Do you abhor evil?  Right now the world is a powder keg – a rumbling volcano waiting to erupt in monstrous ways.  The fact is there will be another world war.  But it will be the one between good v evil as GOD intends and you can rest assured that God will win over Satan because the good folk will defeat the bad.  But they won’t be using the gun; they’ll do it by TRUTH AND JUSTICE. The equation is quite simply that straightforward.  The question is which side are you on?  Much of the ‘war’ will be about women rising up against male domination.

AUGUST 6^TH 1999

I dutifully took Jordan to the doctor’s where the archenemy was waiting.  The only thing concerning Jordan was the ball that he spied in the waiting room.  He ran to it shouting, “Ah tis a ball, a ball, a ball, a ball….”.  As expected, Jordan got a clean bill of health.  The doctor said he is very healthy and full of life and that the cyst is nothing sinister.  The doctor said she wouldn’t get involved in any domestic dispute and, to avoid further problems of this nature, I should sign a letter authorising the disclosure of medical records re Jord and Mel to his lordship.  On the way out, the cockroach warned, “You’d better tell me if any of my kids have to go to hospital.”  I enquired, “Why?  To give you another opportunity to bully me further?  I’m sure one of your ‘spies’ will inform you of my whereabouts.  So go suck eggs.”

After tea Jordan and Mel got engrossed in a game of ‘peek-a-boo’.  Jordan hid himself behind Mel’s high chair and kept springing out on her to go “boo.”  She was in peels.

AUGUST 7^TH 1999

The antagonist turned up in a filthy temper for Jord and Melly.  Before I could say or do anything, he was wagging a finger at me and, with a face like thunder, warned me that I’d better keep my boyfriends away from his kids.  Heaven knows where all that’d come from but I tried to diffuse the situation by saying, “Look I know we’ve had our disagreements but can we please just focus on the kids and their safety?”  I asked him to drive carefully since the roads were so badly flooded with torrential rain.  But he just bellowed, “We’re going back to court early because I want more hours.”  And with that he roughly grabbed Jordan and shoved him carelessly in the car, then came back to snatch Melly off me in a temper.  My babies sat in the back of his car looking shocked and upset, and there wasn’t a damned thing I could do about it.  He took off like a bat out of hell and screeched around the corner.  I stood watching, helpless, with tears streaming down my face.

After contact Jordy went through a spell of tears and screams; then he sat sucking on his finger.  Later he bit Shell on her hand.  It’s all because of the malign ex of mine, and there is bugger all I can do about it.  Both Jordy and Melly have bruises on their legs too.

Andrew’s pal Rob turned up for the afternoon and tea.  The two of them sat in front of the TV watching videos.  Shell helped me in the kitchen.

Just before bed I checked the bubs.  Mel is such a doll.  She was in a deep sleep, but as soon as I touched her forehead, she smiled.  I asked the little peach what she was smiling at; she grinned, took a deep breath and continued to doze.

AUGUST 8^TH 1999

Linzi dropped in on us.  She’d been for her usual workout in the pool.  We discussed how hard it is to really break free from violent controlling men and that it takes guts to make the move but that by then the bloke has usually managed to sap every bit of confidence out of the female.  We agreed that it’s not nice having to draw benefit and that [just like everyone else] we want the decent loving guy, who is a good father to the kids.  We want the happy and stable family home, but when the man turns out to be a bad influence on the kids, a crook and a tyrant, it is a mother’s duty to protect her kids and herself.  We are flabbergasted as to why courts insist that it is in a child’s best interest for him/her to have contact with a father who is: an alci, a liar, a thief, a child and female batterer and worse.  This illogical scandal just sends a message to the father that he may continue with his harmful, unlawful, negative behaviour and that the kids are encouraged to copy dad’s criminal, deceitful ways.  We progressed on to some profound ideas of stopping this trend of criminality and violence and we worked out that the poorest people are probably the easiest to change for the better since they have very little to lose.  We reckon that if ‘lower-class’ folk listen to their conscience and become clean living and can challenge wrongness in others [including their bosses], this new righteous way of living would soon progress up the social/wealth scale until those at the top are either shamed into becoming virtuous or are forced into it because their evil support systems and personal protection would gradually be chipped away.

We got nattering about our favourite subject – kids.  We decided that we hope that they grow up to be more aware than us, more intelligent, wiser and…. powerful.  We also prayed for a safer world for them.

The policewoman on the end of the line enquired if the dog had bitten anyone now.  I boomed, “Would you like it to kill someone?”  She sweetly informed me that she’d send someone to see me.  I snapped, “Don’t waste my time – go after the dog.”  She insisted that if I want to make a complaint, an officer has to come to see me.  “For chrissakes” I hissed, “there are other people around here too scared to walk out of their houses because of that thing.  What are you lot going to do about it?”  When I’d finished, Shell informed me that PC stands for “prize clown.”  Police turned up to tell me that the dog’s owner has changed his mind now about putting the dog down and that he wants to keep it and defend it in court.  Typical isn’t it, his wishes and rights come before those of the victims and many others who are terrified of his dog.  It is in everyone’s interests that this dangerous dog is dealt with, immediately.  It isn’t just my complaint.  Everyone living in and visiting this area is at risk.  Now we all have to wait for a court date, which could take months.  Meanwhile the horrible hound rules the streets.  Does a dog have more rights over a human?  What about charging the irresponsible owners with failing to control an aggressive dog?  Why isn’t the dog at least kept safe by some responsible authority and well away from its owners until a decision is made in court?  And in any case, what kind of crazy cash wasting system is this?

I gave dad a late night call.  The conversation centred on the question of hiring a hit man to sort out my problem ex – duff him up a bit.  It was so tempting that I began shaking but then I suddenly came to my senses and whispered bleakly, “We’d never get away with it.  You or I or both of us would end up in prison.  That’s what he wants.  He can get away with it but we can’t.  Don’t ask me how; but his type always do.”  Dad agreed.  He was furious about the dog debacle and said that the authorities’ failure to deal with it is pathetic.

Afterwards I began thinking that the only way to deal with problems is the lawful route, but if everyone kicked up over an injustice or complained formally where it is due, there’d soon be sweeping changes.  The large majority of people have major grudges about the same things but it is only people-power collectively who can force action. The powers that be don’t want to deal with crime – they are criminals themselves.  So they devise lengthy timewasting, drawn-out, expensive systems for those trying to get justice in a devious plan to put people off.  I used to be of the ‘leave it to someone else’ brigade, but not any more.  I kick up a stink wherever possible.  The world needs all the little fighters it can get.  It is high time that the good people started fighting the baddies with an attitude of: No let up, no compromise, no weakness.  What the authorities want is for us lot to fight between ourselves.  What is needed is for us lot to challenge them.

AUGUST 9^TH 1999

I walked into the spare bedroom that used to be Shell’s and found a mass of little black flies dotted about the walls and ceiling.  With mounting dread I began to search for the source of these unwelcome pests and soon found their breeding ground – two rotten grubby spuds that lay decomposing in a warm dormant fridge.  Stupid Shelly had used her spud gun some months ago and had casually stored her remaining ammunition in my spare fridge.  It was crawling with white grubs one centimetre long and flying insects.  I freaked and called Shell all the names under the sun.  Of course she didn’t realise what would happen to rotting potatoes and she simply forgot they were there but the sheer revulsion that I felt made me insane.  I was tempted to make her clear it all up but decided that that was not a good idea, so I sprayed the whole place with fly killer and waited until the wretched things stopped moving.

It took me almost two hours to clean them up.  At the end of it all I decided that the fridge really had to go.  There was no way now that I could put any food in there, no matter how much scrubbing I did or how many bottles of disinfectant I emptied.  Andrew helped me cart it out.

In the afternoon the coco clowns Deb and Mo turned up to harass me.  As if I haven’t got enough on my plate.  Dad sat in on the meeting.  The social workers were supposed to be here at 3.00 pm but at 3.30 pm I received a phone call to say that they’d be another fifteen minutes because an emergency had cropped up.  They were late last time too!  I showed them my fire photos and those of the aftermath and suggested that the fire couldn’t have started the way the fire dept claim but their closed response was that they’re siding with the experts.  I asked for their opinion and asked if they couldn’t just consider that the experts might just be wrong.  But the puppets remained silent.  Then they told me not to focus on the fire but on the future and on getting a ‘normal’ life.  I barked, “Yeah right, how the hell am I supposed to do that with all this injustice and intrusion?  When we get justice, then I’ll get on with being ‘normal’.”

Mo then began to blab on about Gareth phoning her to express his ‘concerns’ about Jord and Mel.  He says that they arrive for contact sessions dirty and that last Thursday Mel had only a dress on.  He says Mel often has a filthy nappy and bad nappy rash.  I belched out my rage that Gareth is not ‘concerned’, he is a vengeful and hateful, barefaced liar whose only aim is to cause me problems.  I recalled that Mel was in fact wearing shorts, t-shirt and a jumper at church on Thursday.  Mo continued to question me about more of Gareth’s ‘concerns’.  For example, that I leave Andrew and Shell alone in the house.  I admitted it but that it only rarely happened, and only just for the time it took me to walk to church and back.  Sometimes I’m too honest for my own good but if I’d lied, no doubt I’d have been caught out.  Anyway what’s he doing spying on me? 

I began asking her again if she’d contact social services in Dolgellau about their involvement with Gareth’s elder two but she said that she didn’t feel it would be useful.  No, not for her but it jolly well would be for me.  I told her that I have a right to know because two schools were sufficiently worried about those kids and one was worried about his daughter.  I told her that I’d seen GW’s son being kicked and punched all over by Gareth – suffering bruises and cuts all over his chest and back.  I told her that his teenage daughter behaved like a little mother to him fetching him pills, quilts and hot water bottles and that she’d stand outside the bathroom for ages waiting for him.  She also constantly wanted to attend to his nightly needs as if this behaviour had been the norm from the time her mother had fled the family home.  I recalled that his son had once been interviewed under police caution but was let off because of who his father is.  I also mentioned the cannabis plants that his son used to grow and that Gareth had boasted about that to me and about the fact that he takes drugs.  Gareth also told me that his son drinks heavily; so much so that he has grave financial problems.

But Maureen butted in; she didn’t want to hear any more about the schoolteachers’ concerns for Gareth’s children and how astonished they were regarding social services’ inaction and failure to ensure their safety and well being.  She didn’t care about the teachers’ incredulity that he was awarded custody and their shock that his ex wife was denied all contact.  Mo just wasn’t concerned; she preferred to concentrate on Gareth’s so-called ‘concerns’ about me being an unfit mother.  She said that since my kids are registered ‘at risk’ and the house is unsafe, it is unwise to leave them even for five minutes.  Talk about nit picking!  I told her I feel more relaxed about them being at home where they ARE safe rather than at the mercy of juvenile gangs, mad dogs, muggers…. I asked if the council would be held accountable if my kids get harmed on the streets.  Fat chance!  I told her that I have a dream whereby the world is one day ruled by the righteous and that evil of any shape, form, degree would simply cease to be and that there will be justice and equality for all.  Unphased she continued to badger me with useless questions about various aspects of my life.  In a bid to catch me out she even repeated questions that she had asked on previous visits.

Later, dad warned me to watch how I speak to the social workers.  He said that I must stop attacking the authorities because [he fears] the way I’m going I will lose all of my children.  I informed him that I’m compelled to speak out against this wrong and that I’m only telling the truth.  I reminded him that the sins of the authorities are far greater than mine.

AUGUST 10^TH 1999

At breccy Melly dropped her sludgy weetabix on the floor.  Jordan immediately sprang up, grabbed some toilet roll, picked it up and binned it [just the way he’d seen me do it.]

It was a perfectly calm day so I took possession of dad’s driveway for the afternoon and simulated the fire.  I put a half full washing powder box on top of my old kitchen worktop.  I placed a cheap kettle [similar to the one that perished in my kitchen fire] next to it on a metal pan stand.  Various part-filled plastic bottles [similar to the ones that were engulfed by flames on 20^th May] stood nearby, as were three boxes of two or three eggs.  I lit some old curtains and dropped them onto the washing powder box, which is the way the ‘experts’ say the real fire happened.  But I was surprised by the fire’s behaviour.  I let it burn for twenty minutes by which time considerable damage had been done.  All the bottles containing only water or air exploded, yet the ones in my kitchen fire had only partially melted and blackened.  The whole detergent box completely burned today, yet in the real fire only around one third of the box burned and there was a distinctive V shape scorch mark where the kettle had been leaning against it.  Today my kettle completely melted and did not explode, yet in the real fire it half exploded leaving one side completely untouched [not even slightly melted.]  The eggs and boxes were reduced to ashes today, yet on the night of the kitchen fire flames had not even licked them even though they were only inches away from the highly combustible washing powder box.  The worktop was badly burned today, yet on the night of the kitchen fire it had distinctive scorch marks only where the kettle had stood on a pan stand.  It certainly strengthened my belief that our kitchen fire was no ordinary fire. 

Dad wasn’t having any of it though and said that it proved nothing; but then he hadn’t even bothered to look at my photos of the fire debris.  Of course it wasn’t exactly comparable; today’s fire was outside and therefore there was an abundance of oxygen.  Even so I remain intrigued.  I would love to have been able to simulate the fire in exactly the same circumstances as on the night of the 20^th May…. Why didn’t any of my damp laundry need re-washing?  Thick black soot had billowed out through my hanging laundry in the porch as it escaped outside.  Smoke seeped out via the porch all night.  Why didn’t the alarms activate until after we had seen the fire and had left the room?

Every now and again I lose heart and faith and try to ignore all the bad things that are happening to us.  I feel weak and defeated and compelled to turn from God, but at such times Andrew gives me a jolt and reminds me of what needs to be done.  I couldn’t keep going without his strength.  He tells me that everyone has to be strong in character and do their bit to strive for Godly rule.  He says my bit is this journal.  I asked him if he would still feel so determined if I just suddenly dropped dead.  He replied that it would be more difficult and would take longer but that he’d get there in the end because it is God’s will.  I feel as though I’m working for God and that Andrew is my medium and supporter.

AUGUST 11^TH 1999

Like everyone else we were caught up in eclipse mania and stood in the back yard to marvel its occurrence.

Melly has developed a really tiresome habit lately.  She crams her mouth full of dinner, then, with a twinkling eye, she shares it all with us cos she loves to blow raspberries.

AUGUST 12^TH 1999

Lorraine signed a statement to confirm that Jordan and Mel always arrive at the church clean and well cared for.  It seems a necessary request but I felt as if I was asking for a sick note for my teacher!  We got yakking about home education.  I told her that even the most expensive of schools wouldn’t be good enough for me.  You just can’t beat a natural home environment for learning and a one to one teacher – pupil ratio.  We began gassing about the bible and her faith and she quoted a couple of apt verses.  I touched her on the arm and told her that she’s “a good un” and that there aren’t many true believers and even less still people who actually live ‘Godly’ lives.

Sometimes morbid thoughts plague me and I worry about what would happen to my cherished children if I became terminally ill or just dropped dead.  If mum was alive she would welcome them all with open arms but dad would not want the burden of Andrew and Shell. Oh I know he’d raise them if he had to but he wouldn’t relish it.  It’s one thing being an occasional grandfather and quite another being a grandfather guardian.  It would clip his wings and he’d resent it and anyway he’s getting on a bit.  Andrew and Shell probably wouldn’t be overly happy at living with him either.  They get on fine as it is now but dad is of the old strict disciplinarian and rules school and is not really family minded which the kids would find rather stifling.  My beloved babies Jord and Mel would immediately find themselves under the full-time guardianship of my antagonist. The only thing I can do is place myself on God’s good humour and pray that nothing happens to me until Mel is at least eighteen years old.

Britain is in the throes of a Heroin epidemic.  Our wayward government spend millions on gimmicks such as the drive to warn all school children of the dangers of drugs.  As if a kid would pay any attention!  The most natural thing for kids to do is to rebel against anything school tries to teach.  They’d listen though if a pop star banged on about the dangers or if warnings together with graphic consequences were repeatedly filtered through the soaps.  Why oh why won’t they spend resources combating criminal drug barons and dealers instead? Is it because the big fish are too dangerous and powerful and the law-enforcement bodies too feeble and corrupt?  Or is it because, without drugs, the economy would collapse!

My social worker phoned to inform me that the psychiatric social worker would like to assess me and that she’s requesting that I visit her at the clinic.  She asks that I bring another adult to supervise my kids so that I can talk freely.  I replied that I’ve no intentions of troubling dad and that since I don’t trust anyone else, she would have to visit me here, unless of course she wishes to foot my nursery fees.  It was agreed that she’d visit me here.  Andrew and Shell reckon social workers, health visitors and the like are deadbeat dummies.  Andrew keeps threatening to ask how their strings are lately.  I warned him and Shell not to be cheeky towards them because they are the ones with the power; we have none – yet.

AUGUST 13^TH 1999

My solicitor has at last written to Amphletts solicitors requesting full details re the reports on GW’s kids.  He told Amphletts: “they may reflect strongly upon the present proceedings.”

Little missy was busying herself with my metal goblets.  She suddenly caught sight of me spying on her and then broke into a fully-fledged smile.  Precious little pearl.

AUGUST 14^TH 1999

It was a gloriously hot day.  I took Andrew and Shell fishing at Llysfaen’s fresh water pool.  They had it to themselves and were in their element dangling bits of bread and kernels of corn that they’d nicked off me.  Andrew caught two small carp.  I crashed out in the field next door with my Mail and flask of tea while nearby sheep looked on bemused.

On the way home the kids asked me about my old school days.  I recalled one incident when I was about six years old.  We were all doing craft work, I was feeling thoroughly bone idle and bored at the time so I asked my pal if she’d ask the teacher for more felt for me.  I knew my mate would be given a message telling me to politely ask for things for myself and I knew that it would be for two reasons [1] to help me get over the shyness that my teacher thought I suffered and [2] to teach me manners.  I was right.  I had to say, “Please miss, may I have some more felt.”  Her sickly sweet smile and the glint in her eye said, “I’ve succeeded in giving you the confidence to ask for what you need and I’ve taught you courtesy.”  At that tender age it bothered me that I could see right through her and predict her moves so easily – she was supposed to be my teacher; an authority figure.  Even at such tender years I knew that school stood for oppression and pretence and that pupils were just a flock of herded sheep - there to be given orders but considered ‘problematic’ if opinionated.  I nearly puked when she said in over-emphasised politeness, “Of course, Sharon, you may have some more.” 

No wonder school kids revolt.  Forcing kids to behave like robots and to be ‘good’ is abuse.  The school ethos is: don’t form an opinion, don’t rock the boat, behave like an obedient parrot and you’ll have success [of sorts.]  Society wants to rear slaves – people who will work their socks off for peanuts; unless of course they’ve been ‘star’ students, then they’ll get better jobs [perhaps in an office] and a bit more money.  Society doesn’t want school kids to have healthy minds, challenging attitudes and confidence.  When kids try to justifiably assert their needs and complain [usually in some form of frustrated violence, which is the only way they know how] they are branded ‘problem’ children.  The ‘experts’ don’t understand why they’re not happy, and an expensive team of social workers, psychiatrists and educational ‘experts’ then have the nerve to label them as having ‘behavioural’ problems.  Some poor kids even get prescribed ‘calming down’ pills.   The abuse that all school children suffer is magnified one hundred fold for those kids who are unhappy at home or have unsupportive or [worse] abusive parents or parents who simply don’t have the time to listen or the understanding to help. 

We then discussed academic standards.  I recollected my maths experiences and told the kids that I was as thick as two short planks in that dept until I got to the second year at school when I was twelve and it all changed because of my brilliant teacher Mr Christian.  He knew how to teach and he knew who kept up with him and the ones who didn’t pay attention because he would have us out individually in front of the class working out problems [or trying to] on the board.  My grades jumped up from E to C and by the fifth form, I was in the top group of six in maths.  But I remember us having an impromptu test not long before we took our mock ‘O’ levels and the standard was abysmally low.  I got the highest mark of thirty eight percent and the rest averaged between fifteen and thirty percent.  I managed a grade C ‘O’ level.  Nowadays standards have dropped even further, partly because the grading is easier due to continual assessment.

The kids say school is about getting silly marks for being punctual and good so that you get into the ‘good’ book and then get to stand up proudly in front of everyone.  It is about filling in the blanks on sheets of paper, being treated as a nothing…. How can a bird that is born for joy sit in a cage and sing?  The chicks in the nest don’t need a classroom to make them fly.

AUGUST 15^TH 1999

Andrew began protesting when I told him to sew up a hole that I’d spotted in his socks.  He declared that it’s “women’s work.”  So I informed him that these days men have to do a lot more of the domestic duties, particularly since more and more of the idle slobs are finding themselves booted out of the family home.  I told him he can learn how to use an iron today too.

I have to hide the door key now cos Jordan has figured out how to open locked doors.  At teatime he stuffed three bananas and was so pleased with himself.

Later on in my bedroom I could smell a lovely baby powder fragrance.  It was quite overpowering.  My door had been locked all day!

AUGUST 16^TH 1999

I began leafing through the Hutchinson encyclopaedia and came across some befitting remarks from famous men and women past and present:

Thomas Paine [1737] - English political writer says, “Government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one.”

Ma Zedong [1893] – Chinese political leader says, “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

Rosa Luxemburg [1870] – Polish born German communist says. “Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently.”

Honore do Balzac [1799] – French novelist says, “Equality may perhaps be a right, but no power on Earth can turn into a fact.”

Clement Attlee [1883] – British politician says, “Democracy means government by discussion but it is only effective if you can stop people talking.”

Ludovico Ariosto [1474] – Italian poet says, “Cruelty ever proceeds from a vile mind, and often from a cowardly heart.”

John Arbuthnot [1667] – Scottish writer says, “All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.”

Kurt Vonnegut [1922] – US writer says, “There is no reason why good cannot triumph as often as evil.  The triumph of anything is a matter of organization.  If there are such things as angels, I hope they are organized along the lines of Mafia.”

Robert Salisbury [1830] – Third Marquess of Salisbury says, “No lesson seems to be so deeply inculcated by the experience of life as that you should never trust experts.”

Georges Pompidou [1911] – French politician says, “A statesman is a politician who places himself at the service of the nation.  A politician is a statesman who places the nation at his service.”

Janet Frame [1924] – New Zealand novelist wrongly diagnosed as a schizophrenic says, “For your own good – is a persuasive argument that will eventually make man agree to his own destruction.”

AUGUST 17^TH 1999

On the news, a stupid Indonesian government spokeswoman said, “If the Aceh people intend to fight to the end – so will we.”  As if it is an equal and fair fight!  She lives in privilege and luxury in a corrupt government at the expense of the POVERTY-STRICKEN OPPRESSED PEOPLE.  They should put her and all the other no-good mouthy snooty politicians like her, who surround themselves in wealth and grandeur AT THE EXPENSE OF MASSES OF SUFFERING PEOPLE, on the battleground and let’s see her type FIGHT FOR HER LIFE.

Maureen arrived to hassle Andrew and Shell.  She gave them some forms and asked them to fill them in, write her a story and draw her some pictures for the next time that she visits.  Andrew told me he’d draw a picture of Maureen with a gun pointing at her head.  Shell said she’d make aeroplanes out of her papers and aim them at Maureen. 

Public enemy number one then pestered me with more ‘concerns’ of Gareth’s.   Apparently he had phoned her this morning bleating about the fact that Melissa had a bad nappy rash on Saturday and a filthy nappy.  He says he was worried about Andrew because he’d somehow lost me and had gone to the church looking for me, and he says that a friend of a friend saw Jordan wandering alone in my yard with no pants on.  I asked Mo, with flagging patience, why she bothers me with tales from that lying troublemaking evildoer and that she should be assisting police with prosecuting him for harassment and wasting social services’ time.  I told her to contact the church to find out if Jordan and Mel are dirty and uncared for…. To her credit she did say that she’d told Gareth that just because I’m not with Andrew and Shell it doesn’t mean that I haven’t made other arrangements and that it isn’t his business.  She also told him that Andrew had done the right thing looking for me at church and that she’d asked Gareth if he’d brought the dirty nappy problem et cetera to my attention.  But it would appear that Gareth won’t discuss anything with me because I’m the liar and I’m unreasonable and I give him verbal abuse!  Mo insists that she has to discuss Gareth’s ‘worries’ with me. 

The issue of me leaving Andrew [eleven] and Shell [nearly ten] alone in the house occasionally for the short time it takes me to drop the babies at church cropped up.  Mo is not happy about it and insists that the kids are at risk in my house.  Yet she says it is ok for them to cycle to their granddad’s in Rhos-on-sea or to go on their own to the park or beach or to the pool for an hour or so and that it was acceptable to the school and authorities last year that they used to take a bus on their own to a school three miles away.  So, on the same reasoning, they are safe spending an hour or so alone in their back yard [as long as the house doors are locked.]  Where’s the f…. ing logic in that?  I couldn’t seem to get it through to Mo that the kids face very real dangers out on the streets from loopy adults, gangs and ill-treated angry dogs.  Social services doesn’t seem to run on logic though because they seem to think that having a social worker visit me once a week for an hour or so for idle blabber [that doesn’t incidentally include any suggestion on how I can reduce the risk that I am or my home is to my children] somehow helps to make my children less at risk. 

The supremos have this idea that their professional intervention is necessary and that by putting my kids’ names on this magical ‘at risk’ piece of paper and having a group of people gather periodically to sort of discuss it will somehow solve the ‘problem’ of my children being in so-called danger.  Well bloody hooraah.  They justify wasting thousands of pounds of other people’s dosh on a fiasco of a system by saying it protects society’s children [and yet we all know that THEY looked the other way when there was overwhelming evidence of children BEING INTOLERABLY VIOLATED IN THEIR ‘CARE’.  And what about the thousands of children who are exposed to drugs and other harmful substances on a regular basis from their parents who take them to places such as rock festivals?  And what about the children of society’s ‘opt outs’?  Why aren’t the authorities concerned about those kids?  Also what are social services doing about all the teenage pregnancies?  It’s as if youngsters [even as young as ten] are encouraged to have sex.  What are social services doing to protect kids from vile paedos?  Every day kids are snatched from the streets and used as sex slaves.]   Shame on all of you who are in positions of authority; especially those of you men collecting your fat cat cheques.  And those of you barsturds who hide behind seedy secret organizations protecting YOURSELVES, whilst others [the innocent and VULNERABLE ] suffer in wretched silence. You are the biggest COWARDS on Earth – nothing but SCUM.

Lin dropped in on me, so we had a glass of wine and discussed our woes.  She’s having a hard time with her latest fella.  He’s just like her ex hubby – a violent control freak.  So I told her to bin him off but she’s worried about his threats.  I said the only thing to fear is fear itself. We got yakking about the wonder of dreams and what a heavenly escape noddyland is after a troubled day.  We reckon there is more to dreams than the human’s limited understanding and that they are not just magical thoughts about freedom, peace and happiness but that they contain the truth of a divine nature.

I told her about my battles with the heavy weight authorities and that it’s strange because not long ago I used to feel shy of and intimidated by officials, but not anymore.  Now I speak my mind and I don’t care who I say it to.  I said I’m through with bullsh. …t.  Trouble is though, they have the power to wreck my life – at the moment.  I said, “The more I argued with my oppressors at conference, the more I put them on trial, the nastier they got and the more determined they were to shut me up and cause me problems.  It was an unfair fight because there was nine of them against little old me.  My own solicitor said that it was my attitude that lands me in trouble and that even my aunty had once warned me not to complain about things like the junkies opposite or I will risk losing my children.  But if no one creates a fuss we’ll continue to be ruled by evil and it will spread until there are no good people left amongst us.  People who stand watching and do nothing are just as guilty as the perpetrators of wickedness and those who feel virtuous just because they sing in the church choir and preach the bible are no different than the sinners.”  I told her I’d naively thought Gareth would improve his behaviour once I’d left him but that he’d just got worse, which proves how weak and pathetic he is.

We started rabbiting on about politicians not doing their jobs and their love of hiding behind statistics.  We decided that no one gives a brass monkey how many millions they say they’re whacking into x,y, or z and that we want to see results – better education, good public transport, ZERO crime and NO corruption.  We’re fed up of all this political jargon: the left, the right, the middle, safe seats dangerous seats, brown seats…. What does it all mean?  NOWT - just expensive political waffle.  We have judged them to be a law unto themselves.  And for that they will meet their prosecutor when they’re dead [unless someone sorts them out first in this world.]  We now feel justified in answering only to the law of the higher realms.  We all know the government steal from us, lie to us and murder us…. so off with their heads and into hell where the real criminals belong. 

We decided that although ‘rebel’ armies and freedom fighters might be justified in their argument that they have the right to kill and maim for their cause - to protect their families et cetera, violence is not the answer.  Violence just breeds more violence and we all end up very dead and the planet ends up very destroyed.  The truth is we attract whatever we dish out, so we should send out love.  We agreed that the time has come for the ‘little’ people to take back the power that they already have but are too timid, oppressed, brainwashed and brain dead to use. Bring back the ‘flower power’ protesters and the ‘civil disobedience’ practitioners.

We got yakking about the CCTV incident.  Lin told me that when she was attacked by a bloke on Station Road, and it was caught on CCTV, officials were falling over themselves to show her the stills.  Wonder why they weren’t so obliging in my case!!!!

Then we got into a heart to heart about family.  Linda is glad that she has the support and friendship of her good-hearted brother nearby.  I told her my sadness at how my brother has turned against me yet we’d grown up together so close.  I said how Malcolm and I had felt oppressed at home at times when we were kids and that we weren’t treated fairly.  I was the rebellious child though – mum used to get angry with me and said I had an answer for everything and dad was cross at my defiance.  Malcolm was the opposite of me.  He would never answer back and just accepted everything but he suffered inwardly, was a nervous child and stammered.  Despite everything though