The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1874 by Angharad Copyright © 2012 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

It seemed that in no time at all I was tarting myself up to drive to Bristol. Tom had taken the girls to school and I was going to drop Phoebe off on my way out. I wore the YSL suit, with a red blouse and red shoes, although I was going to drive in a pair of flats I keep in the car to avoid rubbing the backs of the heels of my courts. It doesn’t matter whether you pay fifty pence in a charity shop or hundreds for a designer pair, the heels will rub while you drive and you end up with tatty looking shoes, which somewhat spoils the effect.

I took great care with my makeup, and used a good squirt of Coco eau de toilet, then it was a bit of jewellery, collect my bag and my computer bag and an umbrella, then we were off.

“I wish I was coming to Bristol with you,” said Phoebe as I pulled out of the drive.

“Why?”

“I’d like to hear you speak–you know talk to an audience.”

“What are you doing in college?”

“Not much, they’re doing the biology of skin and hair and there’s only so much they can teach me about keratin.”

“I suppose so.” I pulled into a lay-by and took out my mobile phone and dialled a number. Phoebe looked at me with curiosity. “Hello, yes it’s Phoebe’s guardian, Lady Cameron, I’m afraid I’ve got to take her to Bristol to deal with some urgent business that’s cropped up. Yes, she’ll be there tomorrow, thank you.”

She looked at me and smirked. Then with astonishment as I pulled the car round in a circle and turned back into the drive. “You have five minutes to put on something tidy,” I said pulling up alongside the house. She dashed out of the car and through the back door like lightning.

Ten minutes later she turned up in a skirt and top with shoes instead of the Ug boots she’d started out with. I nodded as she got back into the car and for the second time we set off.

“Mummy, I’ve been thinking.”

“Nah, you can’t do that until you’ve been to university.”

“Eh?”

I chuckled to myself and indicated she should tell me what she’d been thinking about.

“On Sunday, you know, when I went off to talk with my mum.”

“Uh huh,”

“I felt as if I’d been under some heavy weight, ever since she died.”

“Interesting,” I said showing I could listen and drive at the same time.

“Yeah, like this heavy weight was squashing me down or stopping me from being me. Then, I like, went to talk to her and then we had that little talk, an’ well I feel so much better now.”

“Good, I’m glad,” I had ideas of what she was describing to me, but in the interest of allowing her to unburden herself, I said nothing except to indicate I was listening actively.

She told me how she was missing her mother and her old life, but that she’d started a new life and how lucky she’d been to have me as a replacement, and to have such support from her sisters and brother. I nodded my understanding and told her that we were lucky to have her come to live with us.

She gave me a puzzled look, “But all I do is give you trouble, how can that be lucky?”

“Because you’re a lovely young lady who’ll help me keep the others on the straight and narrow. I know they’re all really fond of you and would have been bitterly disappointed if you’d gone to live with someone else–unless it was Brad Pitt or Ewan McGregor. Then we’d all have been jealous.”

She laughed at my silliness and put her hand on my leg, “Thank you for making me feel so welcome.”

“My pleasure,” I said smiling back.

We drove into drizzle and the journey became less pleasant. I switched on the radio and we listened to Radio 4 as the drizzle became low cloud and in turn became fog. The traffic speed dropped accordingly.

“What time is your talk?”

“Two o’clock, but I was hoping to get one or two photos of the place first.”

“Why?”

“I want to use them for my talk.”

“What for?”

“Wait and see.”

We got to Bristol a little after midday and stopped at Morrison’s supermarket where we had a snack lunch and I filled up the car with diesel. Afterwards it was on to school, where Phoebe followed me around as I took pictures of walls and guttering and the roof. Then we went back to car and I downloaded them onto the computer.

She watched me shaking her head. “You doing a talk on architecture or what they need to repair or clean up, Mummy?”

“Not quite, kiddo. What time is it?”

“Half one, Mummy.”

“Okay, let’s let them know we’re here.” I changed my shoes for the stilettos and clicked my way across the yard from the drive accompanied by my latest daughter. The secretary’s office had moved from where it had been in my day, but we eventually spotted it and she let the headmaster know I was there.

“I believe you’re an ex-pupil of this place?” he said.

“Yes, some while ago.”

“Yes, Mr Chalmers told me you were one of the first girls here.”

“Yes, a bit of a pioneer, I suppose, but we’re not here to reminisce are we? I’m here to try and get them interested in ecology, and how to run a biological survey.”

“Quite,” he took me through to the hall and Phoebe helped me set up, her nimble fingers sorted out the connections to the projector quicker than mine would and she loaded the program as well.

By this time we could hear kids in the corridor and while the headmaster went up to unlock the door and let them in, I quickly checked my hair and makeup, they were fine.

We waited while the hundred or so of them got themselves seated and stopped chattering or poking each other. It felt really strange being in a room where the last time I’d been here I was sitting in the hall not up on the stage. It was quite surreal.

Then we were off, the headmaster called for quiet and introduced me as Dr Cathy Watts, from Portsmouth University and, Phoebe as my assistant. I stood up and thanked the headmaster for inviting me and told the kids they would all be bored to death for the next four hours. There were groans and other noises. Then I told them, we’d have a break then before I did the remaining two hours. I heard the headmaster chuckle behind me.

“Ecology and ecological surveys are deadly serious. My own special area is the study of the dormouse, which most of you won’t appreciate, is very dangerous work.” I then clicked the computer and showed them a few minutes of clips of the juggling act with Spike and falling over logs and Alan being chased by the owl. They were all laughing by the time we finished. “I take my work very seriously, but I don’t take myself quite so seriously. There is a difference.”

“Absolutely,” agreed the headmaster muttering to himself.

“Ecology is the study of the biological systems that operate in various habitats, they can be clear cut or they can overlap and be very complex. They might pertain to a single species or many...” In defining a system, I showed them the picture I’d taken of a wall and then pointed out the plants growing on it, how the system developed and how it could be monitored. I stated the obvious in that I told them there’d be no obvious mammals there, but birds could be involved and mice could burrow in at the bottom of the wall, but mainly it would be about plants and invertebrates and I showed them a few pictures of creepy crawlies that might inhabit a wall.

Next I went on to talk about the principles of a survey and how we’d set up the mammal one. Then to lighten things again, I showed them pictures of a variety of mammals people claimed to have seen and sent in records. That had them laughing again.

I ended up reminding them that we all had a responsibility to look after this planet and finished with a photoshopped image of Spike pointing at them a la Lord Kitchener, with the tag line, ‘Your country needs you.’

Judging by the applause, it went down well and we took questions for another half an hour. I handed the headmaster a bunch of fliers about the courses we ran at Portsmouth–well, advertising is always good, isn’t it?

We finally got back in the car at four o’clock and the headmaster thanked me effusively. “It’s always a joy to have someone who loves their subject.”

“He was right wasn’t he, Mummy?” said Phoebe as I reversed out of the car park.

“Who was?”

“The head master, your enthusiasm is contagious and they all enjoyed your schoolgirl humour.”

“What about you? Now you’ve seen me in action.”

“I thought you were brilliant, but then I knew that anyway.” She kissed me on the cheek and I nearly bumped into a tree. “Oops.”