The Invisible Woman

Rather disturbed to read in the paper a couple of weeks ago that women feel they become invisible at the age of 46. Which leaves me about 3 and a half months before something I have oft suspected to be true about myself actually happens for real.

When walking in our local town, I regularly find myself becoming invisible, so I can only assume that the disappearing process has already begun. I am starting to fade in and out of visibility rather like Kenneth Williams as Orlando in 'Carry On Screaming' when his battery runs out and he has to plug himself into the mains electricity to recharge himself. People stop suddenly without warning so I have to swerve around them. People barge in front of me in queues; they reach across me to get something off a shelf. They drop doors in my face, and if I hold a door open for them, they breeze through without so much as a 'ta very much'. Oh, hang on a minute...is that me being invisible or people being VERY RUDE??!!

Then there's school. As a teacher you are often invisible to students especially when you are asking them where their coursework/ homework is, or to stop throwing shards of rulers or blunt pencils at each other. You become viewed as another boring, moany weirdo with odd taste in clothes who's 'JUST LIKE MY MUM.' However, if you make an error of any sort, then you suddenly become VERY visible. 'Guess what Miss thought Justin Bieber was called? Justin Beeble!! Ahahahahahahaaaaaa!!!! What a loser!!'

But then I got to thinking. What if the invisibility doesn't relate at all to the fading talents and beauty of the female form, to the growing inadequacies of the mid-life crisis menopausal depression that inflicts us all, to the empty-nest-family-needs-us-no-more-syndrome? What if it means that we ACTUALLY develop the ability to become physically INVISIBLE??

Cor!!

Now that IS something to look forward to. Just imagine...

'Where's Mum?'
'I don't know...she must be around somewhere because the kitchen bin has been emptied and there's a fresh loo roll on the holder.'
'Yeah, and someone's been shopping but got the wrong crisp AGAIN...'
'Can't smell any dinner being cooked though...'
'P'raps we're having takeaway....Mum!!!! Are we having takeaway???? Mum????'

Meanwhile, woman, aged 46, is curled up in the corner of the sofa with a Jane Austen, a mug of tea and packet of all-butter shortbread biscuits. She has upon her person the TV remote control, having previously taken the precaution of 'disabling' the manual TV controls and blaming their malfunction on a cat running wild with a screwdriver.

Of course, I have no intention of succumbing to invisibilty on my 46th birthday. That would be crazy. On rare occasions when I try foster an air of invisibility, usually by having what I call a 'quiet' day, people assume I am ill or something is wrong.

'What's the matter?' they say. 'Why are you being so quiet? Why aren't you ranting about something? Why aren't you entertaining us with witty stories and endless cake?'

'Nothing is wrong,' I say. 'I'm just being quiet,' I say. 'Reflective. At one with the Universe. In the zone.'

These excuses are usually met with looks of confusion, then uncertain laughter, like I am having a joke or something.

Is being invisible such a bad thing? Sometimes I think it has its advantages. Sometimes it's important to be able to vanish into your own world, do a bit of mind dusting, re-arrange the creative furniture. And surreptitiously hide the remote control.

Big Bangs and Invisibility

A couple of nights ago there was a loud bang, somewhere in or around the vicinity of Much Malarkey Manor. And because I was being entranced by the smiles my grand-daughter was directing directly at me, yes me, her Granny, like she was saying 'Hello Granny! I know who you are...smile, smile!', and Andy was being entranced by a jammy flapjack, the bang went uninvestigated. I think we both figured that as no car/bus/lorry/ yob in low slung joggy bottoms had come bursting through the front wall of the house, then we were, as a little family community, safe for the time being.

Later, after grand-daughter had gone home and jammy flapjack had been consumed, Andy went to investigate the source of the bang.
'It's okay,' he said. 'It was the lid blowing off the dandelion wine brew. I've cleaned the resultant mushed raisin concoction from the bathroom walls as best I can.'

Yes, it's that time of year again, when the bath is decommissioned as a place of private ablution and becomes a place for storing barrels of fermenting alcoholic beverage. Dandelion wine this year. Andy is also keeping an eye on the imminent emergence of local elderflower as he is determined to have another shot at elderflower champagne, only this time he says he won't add extra yeast.

Meanwhile, I've been infected by a touch of invisibility this week. Twice I have nearly been runover. Five times, adults at work have asked me a question, or engaged me in conversation and then walked off mid-response or mid-sentence, leaving me open-mouthed and looking a bit idiotic, like I'm Cary Grant talking to Harvey, the Invisible Rabbit. Hundreds of times I've been ignored in the class whilst I am trying to teach, by children who have far more important things to discuss, like what's on telly tonight, or who said what about whom (the bitch).

Which got me a bit worried. Not about the who said what about whom, because teenagers these days always seem more interested in interfering in business that doesn't concern them, rather than interfering in business that does concern them like gaining good skills in the English language. I wasn't even concerned about my near-death pedestrian versus maniac-in-a-car experiences because God knows I am way to busy to be summoned to Heaven just as this moment. No, it was the invisibility to adults thing that bothered me. I mean, do I need to work on my personality? Am I that boring that people have to wander off mid-conversation for fear of falling into a Denise-induced coma?

I thought, but they started the conversations. They asked me a question. Surely, SURELY, they should finish what they started? But no. Apparently not. One of the worst experiences was when I was dumped, and yes I do mean dumped, with five interviewees one break time. I avoided showing my displeasure at having my lesson prep time disrupted (break times don't mean tea and a biscuit to me - they mean trying to get ahead for the next lesson), and became hostess with the mostest, sorting out coffee, and asking how their interview day had gone so far. And in the middle of me talking to one of the younger applicants about the lesson she had just taught as part of the interview process, she actually GOT OUT HER MOBILE PHONE AND STARTED TEXTING!!!

I thought, I'll just stop talking then, shall I? I'd hate to interrupt your texting frenzy with my clearly banal interest in your fledgling teaching career. But what I really wanted to do was slap the mobile from her hand (and probably stomp on it for good measure) and tell her how rude she was being.

Ah well. It's all down to manners, I suppose. I was taught to listen to someone when they were talking to me, to show interest no matter how boring or irrelevant the subject matter might be. If I was reading, I was to put down my book and pay attention. One did not interrupt, especially if the person you were talking to was older. Oh, what was it called? Ah, that's right - social interaction!

Mind you, they teach social skills in schools these days. Which is sad in some ways. But not so surprising in many others.