Quiet at the Back

I have lost my voice. This, some might say (especially horrid school children), is a good thing. No more ranting, no more bossy-booting, no more dodgy singing in the kitchen at 6 in the morning.

I have no idea why my voice has gone. This is the second time in 4 months it has happened; I'm thinking, perhaps I ought to go to the doctor and get him to check out my nodes in case I have some horrid, incurable disease. Of course, I know deep down that I DON'T have some horrid, incurable disease, but I'm having one of my hyponchondriac weeks where every little thing is pointing to having a horrid, incurable disease of some description.

It started on Sunday. I was able to talk at bee-keeping, and I was okay for the rest of the day. I was okay when I went to work on Monday, although I was feeling a bit scratchy-throated. And then Monday evening I was coughing like a dog with kennel cough. And then a sort of cold arrived, which didn't really feel like a proper cold, so this morning when I got up, I was in come-and-go squeaky squeaky mode. And now, after a day of trying to teach, I have come home voiceless.

The children at school thought my voice-come-voice-go efforts were hilarious. There was very little evidence of sympathy for my plight which confused me as when I did a course on human development a few years ago, I was under the impression that skills in sympathy developed in children at around eight years old and the children I taught today were at least three years older than that, some of them eight years older. And the course also said that if chicldren don't develop the ability to sympathise at eight years old, then they are lost forever and will likely become sociopathic nutcases who pull the wings off butterflies and laugh whilst they kick defenceless puppies into ponds.

So there's no hope for the youth round our way then.

My dilemma is, do I go into work tomorrow? I feel fine. I am capable of doing all non-speaking related aspects of my work. But I have to speak when I teach, even if it's only to say 'Come in, sit down and get on with your independent exploration of the wonderful world of education and development of personalised learning skills,' as teaching is called these days. If I do that, it will end up with me staring at the students whilst they stare back because they are actually incapable of independent learning and really do want me to talk at them and impart my many, many words of educational wisdom.

Oh, what to do? One of my colleagues (the one who didn't find my non-voice hilarious) reckons I have 'tracheitis' - inflammation of the trachea. She recommended gargling with salt water, or vinegar, or lemon juice. Not molten chocolate, unfortunately.

And tomorrow is the big tree chop down day, when our eucalyptus will become no more and sunlight will once again flood our tiny patch of garden. So perhaps I ought to be home to supervise that, in case any chickens are concussed in the process. (I've already had to confiscate Mrs Slocombe's copy of 'The Lumberjack Song,' because she was getting over excited at the thought of shinning up a very large tree and christening her 'My Little Chopper' kit.)

We'll see. After all, I did manage to get up last night at one in the morning and summon enough voice to yell at four foxes who were having a screaming match in the middle of the main road just outside our bedroom window.

Have you ever heard foxes screaming at each other? It's a frightening sound.

But not as frightening as I shall sound when I am once more full-voiced and telling my students exactly what I think of their non-sympathetic, embryonic sociopathic ways.