And nothing happened

Do you sometimes experience those moments with your children when they totally defy your predictions and expectations? Those moments when your very words are there to prove the opposite is true?

Like you declare, Oh yes! My little Moonbeam loves Sindy! and there right behind you is Moonbeam pinning Sindy down with a pickle fork and stabbing her through the right eye with a kebab skewer? Or when you are foolish enough to say smugly to the waiter, No problem! Moonbeam yesterday wolfed down her spinach surprise! Then one second later you sit there humiliated and considering silent self harming because Moonbeam is yelling to the entire restaurant that she hates spinach and yesterday you forced her to eat spinach. Then, as a finale, she uses the word crap in an apposite place and says from now on she will only ever ever eat pizza and no cheese.

Today is that moment for Grit and the Gritlets. Here is Grit, having escaped Pontins for ever, out sharpish at 9am this morning never to return, singing and dancing with joy, and landing with smug pleasure at the ecotech centre where, thanks to the wonderful capabilities of our group leader, we have a trip up the wind turbine and a workshop in how to generate electricity without destroying planet earth. On the way, Shark has been maintaining a constant monotone whine of 'she did it it is all her fault it is horrible having sisters' blah blah blah about everything; Tiger is simmering like a pressure cooker about to explode, while Squirrel is suffering from Squirrel Grump, which is to have a bad mood about anything living and dead. And then did I mention the only thing left to eat in the car are three broken cream crackers and a moulding orange? From this I can predict only one outcome. Carnage.

On seeing the wind turbine at our arrival with its 300-plus steps, Grit takes all of one second to visualise the scenario of three kids up a wobbly ladder having a fight. I refuse to go. I don't think even the fire brigade's super-extended version lift ladder could resolve swinging punches half way to the stratosphere. I declare Dig is a scientist so he has to go and be a supervising adult, the type we call a referee.

Well blow me down but 45 minutes later, after waiting down below and telling myself tales of doom and disaster at 80 metres skyward, out from the bottom of that turbine pops Dig, Shark, Squirrel and Tiger, scampering behind. 'It was OK!' whispers Dig, because if he speaks it out loud everything will go wrong and everyone will die. 'What?' I ask. 'You mean up the wind turbine there was no fighting and no one got hurt?' 'That's right!' exclaims Dig. 'And the most fuss we had was when Squirrel and Shark got a badge, and Tiger didn't want one!'

And that, folks, is one heck of a confounded expectation.

Wondering which way the wind is blowing today.

The Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board does a very good thing

Sing out for the Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board!

Just eye-ball this sand!


Not only is that silky sand butt free, this beach has lifeguards! Not that the Gritlets need them today, because thanks to the fine efforts of the Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board, on this beach there are no dogs.

NO DOGS! No dogs at all in these magical summer months when the little Gritlets rush to build Norman motte and bailey sandcastles with ditched earthworks! Did you know the Gritlets are terrified of dogs? We would chuck ourselves into the North Sea if, from fifty metres away, we witness some fat pampered mutt padding along the pavement sniffing piss. This sight, if you are Shark, Squirrel and Tiger, is terrifying. In fact it is so terrifying that death by herring is preferable. And the ultimate dog horror? Being licked. Squirrel has confided this in me, and I am blabbing it to planet Internet. A dog might lick her leg. And to avoid that she would throw herself off a pier and need a lifeguard.

But that disaster is averted today thanks to the wise and great offices of the Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board!

Yet clean beaches are not the only thing they tell me about! Did I mention the wall? Not any old wall, but a medieval wall which is one of the most complete in England.


This wall dates from the late 1300s. Eleven of the sixteen watchtowers along the wall still survive, which is pretty impressive by anyone's book. Grit has to slobber against that wall because, as you know, history is her thing, and walls are special in this girl's world. Thank you Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board for giving me information about your wall.

Then there are the Row houses.


I'd like to give a big hug to those fellas that saved these beauties from demolition. One house has a ceiling dating from 1600s. But despite the fancy plastering and warm timber paneling there is no bathroom. Well it must have got way too smelly. The rich folks slowly moved out and left the houses to be subdivided by poor folk. We work out that at one time there were 15 people living in three rooms, so they would need to like crowds. But this is history come alive at the stroke of those lovely timbers. And guess what? Free lollipops! Free lollipops for completing the trail that is so easy we could do that with our eyes shut! Except, Squirrel, we'd fall downstairs, so don't take that literally. You see how everything in Great Yarmouth is so accessible? Well done Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board!

If this were not enough, there is the Hippodrome, which us outgoing home educators visit in the evening. Well this is a fantastic building, even though appalling town planning leaves it fronted by an amusement arcade. The Hippodrome, according to The Theatres Trust, is A building of outstanding importance. There are only two purpose-built permanent circuses in Britain still in full working order and probably only four or five operational pre-1950 circuses in the world. And here's one in Great Yarmouth! Howabout that! And not only that, this amazing building has a circus ring that converts into a swimming pool! And thank you Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board for bringing this wonderful building to our attention!


But this is not all we can fit into a day. We spend several hours in the Time and Tide Museum, which is so good we are slipping back disguised as simple fisherfolk to see if we can live here for the week. Then we could listen to every audio, watch every video, and read every panel of information about how herring were strung up and smoked here and sent off in crates to mostly everywhere, and especially Italy.



After this lot, the hell that is Pontins can be forgot! A splendid, educational day out! Thank you Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board!

Of course this shameless promotion of Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board has nothing to do with the fact that Squirrel and Shark are collared during the tour of the museum for promotional tourist shots. Strangely I become ridiculously proud of little Squirrel for being so good with the photographer and not once kicking his shins or making smart lippy comments. She may indeed possibly become the next icon for the Greater Yarmouth Tourist Board, with her amazing ability to look both wise and cute, albeit a little inflated about the cheek area.

The Gritlets are now available for chip promotional work.
Obviously in exchange for free chips.

Holiday fun

Tiger declares hunger strike.
Tiger refuses to eat. She wants to go home and she wants to go now. Starvation is the only way to get there. She alighted on starvation after everyone ignored her rolling around the sofa yelling I hate this place! I'm never coming here ever again! I hate Norfolk! I hate it because Pontins is here! Tiger, we all ignored you because inside, we were all there with you, rolling around screaming.

But we are not leaving. Because in the last 24 hours I have convinced myself that this is good for your education about British society. So lump it. I know your first experience of a night away from familiar surroundings and your own bed were the private rooms of the converted stables at the Great Park at Windsor, the Queen's estate. Here there were real sheets and blankets, and none of those fancy foreign continental quilts. There were corridors where entire rooms were given over just for playing table tennis and chess, and there were servants and a chef who came to ask if your coloured rice was orange enough while you were in the midst of a full dinner in gracious surroundings. Well Tiger, you know what? For most people, That's not normal.

And yes, I know Pontins stinks. Literally. The beds are like rocks. The carpet is walking around holding up its new disease so we all get to admire it. The kitchen has e-coli. But do you know what? I am not giving up.

OK, I admit I have to bite my lip and not yell I agree! For God's sake let's get out of here! Because Tiger, living on a run down council estate is part of how we must understand Britain today and the people in it, and believe me, there is worse to come. So I do not shout You have yet to walk through an underpass in Middlesbrough! No. I remain calm and say 'Tiger, there is PGL on this site because Pontins have subcontracted all amusement to them for a price, so do you want to go on the zip wire and quad bikes this afternoon? For that, and for you, money is no object. Good. Now eat your Shreddies'.

Tiger shouts obscenities through the window,
while Shark regards the advancing bedroom carpet.

Shark and Squirrel go swimming.
Shark says the pool is so cold she is looking for penguins. Squirrel says can she get out. I observe that if we are forced into a corner and have to tackle the lifeguard to escape, we will win. Easily. He's aged twelve. I wouldn't trust him to buy a ticket on a bus safely, let alone save my daughter's life in sixty centimetres of ice.

Grit observes the ladeez.
I don't have enough tattoos. I don't have a cigarette butt dangling from my lower lip. At size 12 on a good day, and size 14 on a fat arse day, I am still a willowing sylph. The minimum size you have to be is Planet Jupiter. Now I am not against fat as such, of course not, because it is good for a cuddle and I have enough of it padding round my rear end to insulate a small house over winter, but there is a point when it is too much. This morning I have watched it stagger from doorway to railing, wobbling blue and red and pimply, covered in home-made tattoos, then the owner lolls a lardy roll of it over a railing where it hangs there while another part of its blob sends out a hacking cough to all the inmates below, sucks on the first tobacco of the day and yells Fucking get in here! Now! Incidentally, that is possibly a chat up line.

We try the fun factory.
Do not, like us, think this is a kid's indoor playroom. This is a large darkened hall with grimy plastic chairs and tables arranged in regulation rows where you drink beer and play bingo. I would show you a picture of it, but at this point my camera covered its eyes and started screaming.

We all descend into Hell (located next to the shop).
I feel physically sick just thinking about this. In progressing from swimming pool to shop we must pass something resembling Las Vegas but without the sophistication. We cannot swiftly cross this particular circle of hell because the carpet is carefully designed so that our feet sucker to it. Slowly, but with rising nausea and developing panic attack that we may never get out alive, we make a gloop gloop progression towards clean air and daylight, sometimes feeling our way past the corpses propped up against the ping ping machines. At the entrance to this foul and stinking hole, one of the ladeez leans, feeding a slot machine with coins. She is there at 10am this morning. She is still there at 8pm this evening. She is no longer blinking. God help us all.

The family sticks together.
Tiger is zooming round on her quad bike. Shark and Squirrel are watching, and waving. Tiger suddenly crashes into the tyres bordering the track, which is pretty impressive because she ends up at a 45 degree angle, upwards. Nick, the instructor in charge of the bikes, sets her back on course and jocularly calls over to Shark and Squirrel 'Oi! Don't put her off!' Squirrel is inflamed with indignity and righteousness. Putting her off?! She was supporting her sister! YOU ASKED FOR IT. Squirrel grabs a handful of gravel and threatens to chuck it in the direction of Nick. Pebble dashing his face would be good. Shark flips her back on him and starts kicking up her foot to send up a meteor shower of gravel at his head. Nick, wisely, immediately surrenders with two outstretched palms that he cowers behind, then runs off. I apologise, and enter in the spirit of Pontins by offering to clip them both around the ear later. Quietly I think, yup, these three can rip each other apart, call each other all the worst names they know from all the universe, but you suggest in public they might not support each other and you are a dead man walking, matey. That is called sibling loyalty.

Blood is thicker than water. As we are about to find out.

But Dig may save us!
Pontins brings out the British officer class in Dig. He's taking all this with a lot of stiff upper lip. He has grown a handlebar moustache and was found earlier today at the back of the mini golf circuit shuffling soil about his feet.

Pontins, Hemsby

We won't think about the drive over here, filled with tension and fear.

Not from Dig. Nor from Shark, Squirrel and Tiger, happy at the thought of a new adventure, and in perfect good humour, strapped right next to each other in the Kidmobile for nearly four hours. Four hours!

Four hours is an achievement. Sometimes I have driven all of no minutes before ripping the key out of the ignition and declaring Right! That's it! I can take no more of this! then fleeing to the sanctuary of the kitchen where no-one can hear me scream. And, bad mother that I am, I leave my warrior women out there, in the car, the entire metal box rocking from side to side until all ten rounds are done; when Tiger is victorious and Shark is conquered. Experience teaches me not to go back out to that car again until the screaming has stopped and the blows have all worn out and everyone is quiet, or at least when Shark, Squirrel and Tiger are no longer mortal enemies about to rip each other's faces apart over something of enormous consequence and importance, like the colour pink, a threat to the planet so huge that Al Gore should include it in his next video.

Well it wasn't Dig, Shark, Squirrel or Tiger who became so bolshy and dreadful that the title Bitch Monster from Hell should be bestowed, complete with dagger and iron club. It was Grit.

I am ashamed to say that by the time we arrived at the happy family outing location known as Dino Park, I was so utterly and forlornly miserable I could have strung myself up from the brontosaurus and cared not a jot about the toddlers crying beneath my swaying corpse. But people who are miserable tend to treat others miserably, for which I am ashamed, and guilty, and so even more miserable. Seriously, Dig did not, at that moment, deserve a cup of tea launched at his head for, you know, speaking. He did not deserve that, he really did not. If it was not for Dig's loyalty and constancy I do not think I would be sitting here now, alive, and that deserves better than a half pint of green tea aimed at the back of the head. And it was such a stupid waste of tea.

And worse, I am not sure why. Apart from the general feeling that it has all gone wrong before it has begun, that Pontins in the drizzle is not the best place to put a marriage on track, that everything is hopeless and we are all doomed, that the overwhelming pressure to have fun is gathering on me like a storm cloud rising, that armed with an autumn timetable the educational responsibility is growing, that after this week Dig is preparing to leave for several months to Korea and India and who knows where, that there is something along the lines of last chance saloon about us, and yet for all of this woe I cannot even blame the kids.

We finally do arrive at Pontins, and I am chanting under my breath oh my God like some deity might help me, any deity right now would do. Because first of all we see the perimeter fence which in a forceful shock reminds me of growing up around Nottingham Prison in the 1960s. That, and the way the guard in Teflon uniform stands at the barrier and quizzically looks at us, like, we're trying to get in? I'm barely able to stay in my seat, because my whole body is wanting to jump out of that car, grab him pleadingly by the ankles and demand assurances that we can leave the minute we want to; that we can go free and unimpeded and I do not have to stay incarcerated here for twenty years or have my clothes confiscated or be bodysearched or chained up with a bag on my head. Because, right now, looking at that concrete bunker of a reception block ahead of me, all these situations seem genuinely possible.

And it wasn't just this which made me want to jump out the car and run off. It was really the thought that somehow with this gathering Grit gloom I am throwing more at this marriage than it can take. It may have survived that weekend when, in a fit of spite, I painted the bathroom neon orange. It may have survived the Grit hissy fits, walking out the door threatening never to come back before reappearing a few hours later to slam more doors. It may have survived forgotten birthdays, ruined years, cold shoulders, silent Christmases, a non-speaking July, everything we could throw at it, even unexpected triplets. But it may not survive Pontins.

For a start, the clientele don't help. I am standing at reception picking up the keys and there is a man at my elbow eyeing me with disbelief. He says 'Just arrived?' and I nod, glumly. He shakes his head and gives a hollow laugh, then confides this is the worst place he's ever seen and he's off to a B&B in Great Yarmouth. He says the room was so filthy his wife was about to catch a hideous disease, so they complained, were given another one which was exactly the same with extra grease in the sink and added ketchup on the cutlery. It is difficult to look sympathetic while really you want to retch.

Of course I wasn't expecting Pugin wallpaper, pile carpets and silk lined curtains but I probably wasn't expecting the stale stench of cigarette smoke, sweat and chip fat billowing at me from Cell 132. It's fair to say I had a warning, apart from the unhappy holidaymaker at reception. The door itself looked like someone had attempted to stab it, with mysterious looking skewer marks, particularly around the lock. Outside the door in a puddle of its own water was a rotting bedsheet. It had clearly been there some days because it was turning green and had become a hostel for wildlife, probably those that had moved out of Cell 132, unable to bear the state of the carpet. The moment I saw that beauty, I resolved that not one part of my human body should touch it in case I withered and died. I would keep my shoes on, even in bed if necessary.

Bed? I think I have a bed, do I? Of course you do not, Grit. This is a Pontins holiday camp. Naively I turn to Dig and say 'There are only two bedrooms'. Shark, Squirrel and Tiger are already squabbling over who gets which bed in what room. Stupidly, I go round the bedrooms, looking under beds, opening wardrobe doors, in case a third bedroom is hidden somewhere, and I just can't see it. There is an awful dawning moment when I realise our increasingly frail marriage must survive four nights on a pull out bed under the grimy sofa. Yes. The sofa covered in felt tip stains, a layer of smeared grease from last week's fish supper and an oblique stain which I do not want to think may be fluid from some part of a human body.

Meanwhile Tiger and Squirrel are all but coming to blows over what they are both calling the best bedroom. The best bedroom, like the best room, has a cupboard door wrenched off, and a grime layer of debris layered over the carpet. Under the bed are some yogurt pots, and I swear we didn't bring them. In this 'best bedroom', we discover the entry door doesn't fit at all. We discover this when Tiger tries to slam it to keep out Squirrel and she discovers it's too large all the way round to fit into the doorhole. This novelty, with consequent discussion about what might have happened to all the doors around here, stops the wars and diverts the entire family for a good while, which gives me time to wash the cutlery, hide the waste bin with a plastic bag so I don't have to look at it, and wipe down the plastic chairs. The application of soap and water to the chairs is pointless because the grime is ingrained so deep I could use a pressure hose and a vat of caustic soda and they would look the same.

And Dig, the much abused, maligned, green tea Dig. I am so grateful to Dig, because even though I am torturing him once more in the pursuit of that wild and maverick character we call home education, he stands by me loyally. Stoically he reminds me that it is not the worst place we have ever stayed in, because he says, Do you remember Hotel Rat in Panaji, India? The place with no ceilings? There was wire netting to stop the vermin falling on our heads. There was one communal tap in a drain for all the hotel guests, and do not look at the toilet, because you do not want to know. Just hold it in till Tuesday. Dig adds gently that once we would have considered a Pontins apartment to be the height of luxury and would have hotfooted it back to reception to book several more nights.

And so I end by saying Dig, I am deeply, deeply sorry for the thing that is home education in our lives and what it drags us to, and all because basically I cannot give up, no matter the hardship and misery it brings on us. But I am glad we are still married.

And sorry about the tea.

Keeping an open mind

Travel is amazing, don't you think? One minute here you are, in familiar surroundings. The next minute you are on a mountainside haggling with a man who is holding a yak and trying to sell you a sharpened dagger which he swears on his mother's life is a souvenir and not a murder weapon. And, at that moment, with the sun shining, the yak lowing, and the two-foot blade only the price of a loaf of bread back home, it actually looks like a reasonable deal and surely the airport staff will be delighted and say No problem! Just pop the scimitar in the cabin baggage!

Of course the experience could go badly wrong and you could journey home wounded, humiliated, mugged, broke, or with post traumatic stress disorder, but the one thing that travel to distant lands never fails to instill in me is hope. Hope that on the mountainside it might not be raining, so you can actually see the yak and the view. And hope that as you travel on, you will discover new places in the world, new people, and surprising new experiences in yourself too; opinions, values, understandings, compassions, beliefs.

I have believed that home education is our travelling. Everyday. And best of all, for these most precious of insights we don't travel further than our own backyard. Here we meet those people whose world views, knowledges and understandings are so different from ours that I am astonished we find common areas to talk about at all, apart from the surprise that it isn't raining.

We have taken the children by the hands and led them to look at the world through the eyes of anglers, birdwatchers, miners, historians, monks (Benedictine and Buddhist), biologists; we have learned from experts in bats, lichens, trees, fish, engines; we have seen the world of miniaturists, astronomers, archaeologists, sailors, artists, farmers, engineers, Vikings, earwig enthusiasts, and zombied out drug addicts. (OK, I made the last one up, but give us time.) And as we go on, searching out these people with all their wisdoms, I hope that in each of their ways, these wonderful, significant people will lead us to new knowledges, both of the world, and of ourselves.

And this, I say to myself, and possibly Dig and the Gritlets, is exactly why we are going to Pontins. To learn about people, the world, and ourselves. So Grit, you have had your pep talk. Now get packing.

Because you see I might have done the worst thing possible for a home educator. Already made up my mind. Over the last 24 hours I have, possibly alongside Dig's quiet show of no enthusiasm, convinced myself that the Pontins experience will be like Cell Block H without the fun.

For my huge lack of enthusiasm about this project - possibly now so large I could pour into a double decker bus only a fraction of this hopeless doomed gloom - I could, of course, blame the weather. Because the sky at five this evening looks like the sky at seven this morning. Leaden grey. With a bit more rain. Nevertheless, with merely hours to go before departure time, some preparation for this journey has to be done. So at nine this evening I do not so much pack, more throw into a couple of holdalls an assortment of possessions, some wrenched directly from the washing pile, and then tip a jumble of different sized shoes into a plastic bag, and hope that when they all disgorge at the other end, some will match.

Of course I do not allow Shark, Squirrel and Tiger to catch me morosely packing with a face like I might be holidaying to meet the bluecoat daughter of death in the Pontins pit of hell. No, to them I say every new experience is like a wonderful gift, because you never know where it will lead, who you will meet, and what you will learn.

And silently, I tell myself, what I should learn must not be I will never do this ever ever ever again.

When things are going badly, take to the fields

Things have gone quiet in the Grit and Dig household. In fact I may have miscalculated. Booking four days at a down-beat, dead-end holiday camp, the only review of which I find describes it as a complete nightmare, is now sounding as good an idea as blowing a chill wind or hammering the final nail in the coffin.

Dig, for one, is not jumping up and down squawking for joy at the thought of being locked up on a Pontin's holiday prison somewhere east of Norwich instead of in a five star hotel somewhere west of Paris.

Admittedly I say to him, a Great Yarmouth Pontin's holiday camp may be something akin to a deprived council estate. Except because this is Pontins and not the council deprivation and social problem zone, we will be attacked by bluecoats, bad singing and sequined suits, all in a beer soddened working men's club stinking of chip fat and Silk Cut. So what? It gives the children the possibility of learning about life in all its hideous glory, and they may get to see that not everyone in this country lives with four bathrooms.

Shark, Squirrel and Tiger are remaining cautious. They have not exactly heard about Butlins and Pontins and I am encouraging them to keep an open mind. This requires not telling anybody about where they are going and saying it will be a surprise when we get there. We can even visit the Dinosaur Park at Lenwade on the way. Shark says she doesn't want to go to that either because the noises sound real. But look Shark! I say, the brochure reads, What better way could there be than to spend a day out with your family at Norfolk's top family attraction? Shark says there are plenty better ways and some of them do not seem to involve any of us at all, but do involve several parrot fish and an octopus.

I just cannot win.

There is only one solution. Go where everything feels normal and well adjusted.

I get everyone in the car and drive to a field at the back of Newport Pagnell. Seriously. They're not just a motorway stop you know, they're actually a medieval town. And they are having an open day for their ancient common land. And when the locals open up their fields and shout Come and look at our old field! then Grit and the Gritlets are there.

Wondering about the exact location of those civil war earthworks.

Hi de hi!

Dig! Do you remember sweeping me off my feet and transporting me to Cairo, all in a sparkling moment? Do you remember how amazing that was? And how, when we there touching 40C, you whispered to me 'Let's find the spice market! I think it's just down there!' then led me blindly round the streets of the abattoir in the afternoon sun for three hours, putting me a whisker away from a coma! Do you remember that?

Well, sexy wife Grit says it's time to repay your romantic gesture!

Because, darling Dig, so accustomed are you to first class travel and business lounges all around the globe that I think you need a change of place, a new scene, a fresh outlook to spur you on. And just as you lifted me from my life in fields, or covered in paint and glue and arguing about wiggly eyes, then I must transport you away from the first class lounge where there is free wine and free food!

But forgive me, because my circumstances are a little more constrained than yours. From my budget I have to buy lentils, yellow paint and glow-in-the-dark frogs. But we've vowed to give each other as much trouble and grief as a human being can muster, and all for the rest of our lives, so I think I'd better get on with it and let you have it.

Because I have booked a four day stay, for all of us, with a bunch of home educators in Norfolk. At Pontins.