The Ballad of the Angel of Death
As you know I am a mother of two. As you may not know, myself and Meeestermartin are not planning to have any more. In fact Meeestermartin put himself under the knife to seal the deal. Bless him.
Apart from the obvious, this major decision has implications and one that I am delighted to report is that my association with the Angel of Death (AOD), our local Health visitor will finally be over.
I’ve got one more visit to go with her and that’s the occasion of Jnr Missy’s 4 year evaluation.
So in honour of the end of an era, I want to recount the history of me and the Angel of Death.
AOD is not married or has kids but knows everything about bringing up a kid since she learned it in a book. She is broad country Aberdeenshire and looks like a big knitted bag, that is filled with runny porridge. She has unrestrained (they must be, there’s no support in evidence) massive pendulous breasts that end somewhere around her waist. Her upper front is not so much a decolletage as mountain landslide. It’s truly remarkable. She always wears jumpers, that look like sick. I think she knits them herself as I have never seen the like in a shop anywhere. Maybe in Fraserburgh (the land that time forgot). That would make sense, she may hail from there.
On the head front, she has a haircut like a bloke, a bit like Roy Castles before the chemo. She wears those horrible Reactolite tinted specs. You know the sort; they instantly make someone look sinister. They lack the coolness factor of sunglasses and retain all the geekiness of Nashie specs with an ever changing gradient of brown insipid tint. My gran also has a pair and they make her look like Dr Strangelove.
So to our first meeting with AOD and it’s the occasion of Indy’s 2nd birthday and his 2 year assessment. We’ve just moved into the area and have not met AOD in the flesh (Ugh! AOD’s flesh….urgghghgh) yet. Of course it is the day after Indy’s birthday and I have forgotten that AOD is scheduled to come round. And of course it being Indy’s 2nd birthday and none of my friends have had kids yet, the party has consisted of Indy’s parents’ friends coming round and getting pissed. At 10am Indy and I are sitting in the debris of all yesterday’s parties eating leftover birthday cake for breakfast in our jammies. Cue scary music….
I spot the not inconsiderable frame of AOD lurching past my living room window. It’s too late to do anything about the situation. And it’s particularly sunny being May and the Reactolites are full tilt tint.
I have to let her in. She “assesses” my boy, whilst no doubt making a mental note to contact social services as soon as she leaves. And her assessment is frankly odd. For one she does not speak directly to me when Indy is in the room,. she talks through Indy like he’s some kind of parent medium. Like so,
“So has Mum started toilet training yet?”
“So is Mum thinking about enrolling you in playgroup?”
None of which I have done.
“No Mum is a lazy cow with stuff better to do than clean up turds on the carpet and hang about with brain-dead buggy pushers who only want to talk about housework, their jammy faced kids and how much their husbands earn working offshore allowing them not to have to go back to work and how sorry they feel for you having to leave their kid with ‘a stranger’.”
She also shouts at Indy the way that ignorant people shout at deaf people or foreigners. She is also broad Aberdeenshire and uses words and pronunciation that a two year old son of Weeegie west coast parents is never going to get. The boy has only just started speaking himself. Not that he utters a word to AOD; he’s too traumatised. I have to act as translator, making Indy’s head birl as he is being talked through twice. Poor kid, he’s only two.
And what’s more, she tests Indy on ridiculous things. She gets some little Thomas the Tank Engines out of her big black bag. She then asks Louis to point out which one’s “James” and which one is “Henry” etc. Now, we don’t like Thomas the Tank Engine. So Indy knows none of these characters and is unable to identify the line-up of our locomotive Ringo Star-voiced friends. And she is assessing him on this! I demand a recount. But given that I’m in mismatched jammies, reeking of Chardonnnay, unshowered, hurriedly shuffling around trying to collect what seems like hundreds of wine glasses with chocolate fudge on my face, I haven’t a leg to stand on. I just want the AOD to leave.
Fast forward to my late pregnancy with JuniorMisssy and AOD turns up to speak about an act (giving birth) with the authority of someone who has never done it but has read a book on it. Of course I’ve forgotten about her appointment and am out when she arrives. Luckily I’m having the hall wallpapered by local painter and decorator, Ian, who informs me when I returned home, “AOD was here”. He is familiar with her work, having two kids of his own. Oh shit!
Next time I remember her coming round is with a student health visitor from the Ivory Coast. Now it’s worth pointing out that neither of my kids is comfortable going near AOD, no matter how much she would like them to. Within minutes Junior Misssy is sitting on the student’s lap cuddling in. AOD looks on, with some amount of envy. Misssyjnr cowers away from her. “Get behind me Satan”.
Oh and I also remember one great example of her vernacular during this visit. it has been quite humid that day and of course we do the obligatory Scottish weather conversation but she says that she fears that we’ll have thunder and lightning. But she says it like this:
“Aye jist wait, we’ll hae Thunner and Lichhtnin‘”
Lichhtnin‘ ?????? I’ve been in this neck of the woods for twenty- eight years and I’ve never heard that!!! She is a breed apart. Ii wonder if she wears “tichhts” on her legs. If she goes on holiday to the Isle of Wicchhht? If she wears the reactolites to help her failing “sichht“?
To this day, if we hear the faintest rumble of thunder we say,
“Aye jist wait, we’ll hae Thunner and Lichhtnin‘”
So Misssyjnrs last visit with AOD was scheduled for yesterday and I forgot. I am babysitting my sisters three girls, including the bundle of cuteness that is my one year old niece, baby Spongebob (her new teeth make her look like Spongebob) so I phone AOD and rearrange the agony for next week.
So she’s got one week left to report me to social services. I’ll keep you posted on that and indeed on any other AOD gems. I wonder if i can work “Thunner and Lichtnin‘” into the conversation, just one last time…..Pray for rain next Friday.
