Note to Gramps : Fruit Shoots are like amphetamine to the 5 year old who bounces off the walls and talks utter gibberish for an hour after consumption.

He often recalls how he taught me to swim and made me swim across the width of the local pool without armbands, apparently I got to within a metre of the edge before sinking. Clearly not wanting to repeat the near drowning he has done some research this time round and Fruit Shoots aside the 5 year old is loving it.

Three weeks in and she always comes home with a new tale … “Did you know that Gramps used to wear tights”. Yes I did, and this statement probably needs backing up by the fact he was under 10 and living in Scotland in the 1950’s.

I’m wondering whether I should also tell her that he also used to wear woolen swimming trunks on the beach as a toddler. The saggy and very soggy crotch used to trail behind him in the sand.

Next up was “Gramps told me that when you were little you pulled a cup of coffee over yourself and had to be taken to hospital” … she seems to find this tale morbidly fascinating. I have no recollection of the incident but know that I pulled piping hot coffee over myself after eating porridge and watching Open University (probably where my obsession with beards stems from) with my Dad at approximately 6am in the morning

I love that they are spending quality time together and that she is adding to her fond memories of her Gramps.

However, one memory it may be best for her to forget is this one …

I received an email from Gramps a couple of days after their latest lesson about lots of general stuff to do with Christmas presents and the like, at the end was this …

“I forgot to mention my Victor Meldrew moment in the communal changing rooms at the swimming baths. When I was trying to find my mobile phone which I thought I had lost (but in fact I’d left at home) I went back to the family changing cubicle that the 5 year old and I had used. I knocked on the door which swung open to reveal three pretty fit young ladies dressed in bikinis (possibly more a Benny Hill moment). I was rescued by the 5 year old. In the midst of my spluttering explanation she appeared and asked me if I had found my phone. I possibly avoided being banned from the baths.”

She got in the pool and after a while the instructor told her to take one of her swim rings off each arm (she started with 3) because she was doing so well and congratulated her on her breast stroke.  I swelled with pride, she cried and refused to take a ring off.

At the end of the lesson he asked everyone to put their faces in the water and blow bubbles. He told them to do as much or as little as they wanted.  She blew bubbles without her face in the water, then cried.

After the lesson she was fine, said she didn’t like putting her face in the water.  I reassured her that he wouldn’t expect her to put her whole face in the water if she didn’t want to.

So, this week we set off for swimming, she was happily babbling on about something or other in the car.  As we got nearer to swimming she got quieter, then she started weeping.

I managed to get her into the changing rooms, into her costume and to the side of the pool where her sobs got louder and louder.  With everyone staring I quietly started the bribery process.

For a month now she has been coveting a doll’s pushchair in a local shop.  At £25 I told her she’d have to save up.  We’ve been giving her money here and there for little chores and as a reward for good behaviour. Our little version of payday loans.

Pushchair of her dreams ...

I started with “Two fat golden coins towards the pushchair of her dreams” if she’d get in the pool.

She continued sobbing louder, everyone stared, all the other children were in the pool.

“Two fat coins and a big piece of Mummy’s flapjack after swimming” I proffered.

Then, she gripped onto me like a chimpanzee and I went in for the kill whilst trying to loosen her vice like grip around my neck …

“OK, I’ll buy you the pushchair tomorrow if you will get in the pool”

To my shock the final bribe didn’t work, which was when I realised any more attempts to get her in were futile.  She would not be getting in that pool then or any other time for swimming lessons.  I dragged her back to the changing rooms.

I was annoyed.  Annoyed that she wouldn’t get in.  Annoyed that my confident girl had bought a ticket to Sobland and couldn’t give me a reasonable explanation for why she didn’t want to get in the pool.  Annoyed that I’d spent £40 on swimming lessons that were never going to be used and wouldn’t be refunded. Most of all I was annoyed that I’d tried to bribe her to do something she quite clearly didn’t want to do.

I told her I wouldn’t make her come again.  I also told her that her get out of jail free card had been used. She would still be going to Rainbows every week … and of course school every day.  At this news she was ecstatic and reverted back to my happy go lucky sing song girl. We went home and had a scooter ride with the dog.

At bedtime, she told me she was sorry for being naughty at swimming and making me cross.  I felt bad.  Awash with mother’s guilt* I gave her a cuddle and told her I wasn’t cross with her, that she hadn’t been naughty and that Grandpa would teach her to swim instead (Sorry Grandpa).

The good news is that I have managed to get the 3 year old lessons in place of the 5 year old so the money isn’t wasted.  Bad new is that because he’s under 5 I have to get in with him.

Now, where can I get one of those burkinis?

As a side note, I would like to add that at the point of leaving the changing room to take the 5 year old to the pool I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror.  Before leaving the house I had dryed my hair in a rushed fashion.  What I saw in the mirror staring back was an Afghan Hound, not dissimilar to this one.

* I decided this week that Mother’s Guilt should be bottled and inflicted on the bad people of this world thrice daily.

During aerobics classes or anything requiring me to follow another persons movements I am the one at the back doing the opposite and getting in a bluster.

The kids both start swimming lessons in September. Swimming I can do. In fact I tried aqua aerobics and loved it. Under all that water no one can see your uncoordinated flailing.

Dancing? Not unless I’ve drunk the best part of a bottle of vodka and then I probably dance like my Dad, though I can’t remember … vodka has that effect. Plus, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen my Dad dance.

I still have horrifying flashbacks to our wedding party which was held the day after our wedding in a bar. We had a wonderful 6 piece latin american style band and right at the beginning of the night they asked the husband and I to come up and dance. I was mortified. Not only was it still light outside, but due to chatting with our guests I hadn’t had the required alcohol intake not to care. It wasn’t a nice sedate number either, it was a full freestyle flamenco … I exaggerate, but it was hideous.

The husband likes to dance, he has rhythm. Friends still talk fondly of the ‘bottom dance … over handbags’ night. We’d gone out with our baby group six months after giving birth top our first babies. The ladies all put their handbags in the middle of the circle (we still do that Oop North, occasionally) and the husband shook his booty danced over all of the handbags for quite some time. At a friends wedding he got so into the groove that he grabbed the best man round the neck and swung him wildy round without a care in the world to the Happy Mondays and Step On.

Trying to give my daughter the best chance I enrolled her in freestyle dance lessons. She lasted three weeks before refusing to return. She still has nightmares about ‘the conga’. I enrolled her in ballet, thinking it would be more sedate, but no, still traumatised by the conga she clung to me. I gave up in the end and decided to let nature take it’s course. … You’ve either got it or you haven’t.

It’s something I never thought I’d say, but, let’s hope the 5 year old has inherited her father’s ‘bottom dance … over handbags’ gene.

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The women behind the counter were the doubles of Majorie Dawes and Waynetta Slob (but in uniform) and looked like they had spent the afternoon polishing their sovereign rings whilst smoking out the back.

I asked about swimming lessons, they gave me a form to fill in for each child and told me we’d be added to the extensive waiting list.  When it got to the address I explained that we were moving in a few weeks and that although I knew the house number and street name I was unsure of the postcode.

They looked at each other and  both said in shocked unison “You don’t know the postcode of your house?”.

I reiterated again that I didn’t because we hadn’t moved yet but that if it was REALLY important I could bob back tomorrow.  They raised their eyes to the ceiling then back at each other.

The one who looked like Majorie Dawes leaned in real close so I could almost feel her moustache brushing my cheek and said “No matter, we can do without”.  Then she pointed at the form and really slowly said “By the way D O B … that means date of birth”.

Then Waynetta said in an accusatory fashion “You do know what date your children were born don’t you?”

The children who had, up till this point, been running round the foyer were now stood next to me giving the ladies suspicious sideways looks.

Wanting to get away from the increasingly bizarre double act I pretended not to hear and continued to fill the forms in realising that to speak would only stoke the fires of weirdness further.  When I’d finished they scrutinised each form from top to bottom.  I can only assume they hadn’t seen joined up writing before.  Then we were dismissed.

I do hope that by the time we make it to the top of the waiting list the swimming lessons clash with Majorie and Waynetta’s shift.