I have a Magical Cloak. Those of you familiar with Harry Potter will recognize it as the Cloak of Invisibility. Once wrapped in it, you can go about your business undetected. It’s handy for creeping into libraries, breaking into wizard’s workshops, for eavesdropping on Slytherins and tiptoeing past the Whomping Willow.
I must have forgotten to take mine off again this week as I have been able to go about my daily routine being completely ignored. Mine has an additional magical property – it renders my voice silent as well. No matter how many times I have called upstairs asking for a hand for tables to be set, dishwashers to be emptied or dogs to be fed, the sound just gets stuck somewhere on the landing.
When did I start to feel invisible? Ah yes, I remember now. When I decided to have children. That was when my identity changed, and I no longer had an actual name. Of-course, I expected my own children to call me ‘Mum’ or ‘Mummy,’ but wasn’t prepared for everyone else to also communicate with me that way. The instant the boys were born, from the midwife to teachers, from doctors to sport’s coaches - I became simply ‘Mum’. I am ‘So and So’s Mum’, or ‘Your Mum’ or even more frustratingly, referred to in the third person even when I am present. ‘Is Mum going to be able to come?’ ‘Assume that time is good for you, Mum?’ ‘What does Mummy want to eat?’ ‘What does Mum think?’
Mum thinks you should address me by my actual name please, Doc.
I have felt rather irritable this week. A very short fuse, probably the combination of the full moon, my hormones, the clocks springing forward stealing another precious hour off my life, and the fact I literally have been repeating myself over and over again. It is a Catch 22 situation. The crosser I get, the more determined the boys are to stay out of my way. The more the boys stay out of my way and ignore my crossness, the crosser I get. To top it all, the dog has taken to barking randomly at the pigeons every single time I let her into the garden for a wee - which is somewhat irritating - and unless I open the fridge to nibble on a bit of cheese, she has also taken to completely ignoring me as well.
Everything I seem to do or say at the moment is met with an eye-roll. I feel I am saying the wrong things at least 30 times a day. I hear mumisms escape out of my mouth, things I vowed I would never say creep into conversations. ‘In my day.’ ‘Call this music?’ ‘We never had mobiles you know.’ ‘Tiktok – aren’t they mints?’ The boys exchange glances when I say annoying phrases like surfing the Interweb and googling T’internet, and I cringe inwardly as the words just pour out. They often remind me I am repeating myself – sometimes the polite way, ‘yes, yes, you said’ other times just tutting in unison ‘we knowwwwwww.’ They also get cross when I genuinely just get it a bit wrong, like calling them each by the dog’s name, or not realising that Yoda is in fact a Jedi, and that Star Wars has The Millennium Falcon, Star Trek has The Enterprise. S.O.R.R.Y
I never thought I was ever cool and certainly not prudish but wasn’t prepared to be picked up so quickly when I muddle myself up with what is or isn’t PC. A girl in my son’s class is trans-gendering but I tiptoe around the vocab I use, pulled up if I get it wrong and refer to him as a her by accident. I exclaim loudly if I find out one of their friends is gay. I didn’t know! You didn’t say! (Mum… why would I?) And they are right. Why would they tell me? What does it matter? What business is someone’s sexuality to other people? It’s like them pre-warning me that a friend of theirs has black or blond hair. You wouldn’t ever feel the need to mention it. The boys have been brought up to be accepting, tolerant and open-minded which I am very proud of and I also like to think I have the same qualities, but sometimes if I bumble out the wrong words or stumble over a view - I feel I am being judged for being ignorant and, well, old-fashioned. Which I most definitely am not.
I feel the older I get the more I am dissolving. I was once listened to. I used to have healthy political discussions and be able to debate around a subject. I used to go on marches and stand up for what was right. I was knowledgeable and people asked my advice. I am scared I am going to just shrivel into an overlooked little old grey lady and that everyone will forget I was a Someone. I see it happen with my own mother. I still see her as the strong women she is – someone who didn’t have an easy childhood but didn’t let that stand in her way. Someone who left school without qualifications yet managed to study and qualify to be a nurse when she had three young children and a house to run, going on to have a very successful nursing career. Someone who then made the jump to follow my father to America when he followed his dreams, who then retrained as an art auctioneer in her mid 50s, became an expert in her field, and would fly from LA-New York to stand on a podium and boss an auction room around. Someone who is now back in the UK, retired - and even though she has all this wonderful past history and experience, has become invisible to people who don’t know her. Doctors talk down to her when she goes for hospital appointments. Shop assistants see a slightly grey, slightly deaf old lady and treat her as if she is stupid when she queries a receipt. Is that what happens when we get old? All the dashing, beautiful, clever, funny, resourceful men and women, their youth stolen by time, all becoming invisible as they age?
I know that most teens ignore their mums – I did for a while – and I hope I get my voice back at home. In the meantime, I’m going to just have to check my Magical Invisibility Cloak isn’t wrapped around me as often and assert some of the old me back into my life.
© The Real Tilly Fairfax