The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2197 by Angharad Copyright © 2013 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Danni was going off with Julie to the salon. Phoebe was too busy with her boyfriend to be bothered with such mundanities as working for a living, so there was room in Julie’s Smart car for her younger sister. Having said that Julie and Phoebe were just like sisters and Phoebe had fitted herself in nicely with our somewhat unorthodox family.

Danni had asked Julie if Cindy could help out as well but Julie denied the request, perhaps because she thought having three transgendered girls in one salon would be pushing the risk of discovery. However, Julie was a very attractive looking woman and the other two were probably young enough to get away looking girlish. Cindy was on hormones and probably blockers and Danni was on low dosage oestrogens which Stephanie was hoping would help her determine quite what Danni was and what she wanted.

I spent time with the other kids making special fuss of Cate who doesn’t seem at all fazed if I’m busy with Lizzie or work, providing she has Meems about to play with. The bond between them, despite the age gap of six years, is quite pronounced while Trish and Livvie are at times like Siamese twins.

Sammi had been given a date for her surgery as the twenty ninth of November which would have Danni probably asking for even more outrageous things, as she would now be the only one with remnants of masculinity.

Where Julie was attractive, Sammi was beautiful, hence the model agency wanting her to join them. Apart from being younger than me, and slightly taller, she was drop dead gorgeous whereas I’m rather nondescript, at least in my reckoning. If Sammi had a weak point it was perhaps in a lack of hips and bum, compared to my booty which seems to be a growth industry on its own. I dread asking Simon if my bum looks big in things as he’s likely to say yes.

Cate and Meems came and did some drawing or colouring with me. Meems is quite talented and has an amazing eye for colour. She and I did some drawing of a vase of sweet peas–it was a photograph, and whereas I thought I’d got a pretty close match for colour, Meems was spot on. I’d always thought I had a good eye for colour, especially carrying a colour in my mind–which comes in handy when looking for matches to clothing or furnishings. Simon has no idea, and at times I wonder if he’s partly colour blind–some forms of which are sex linked, so if any of us girls had it, we’d be in real trouble and could colour the opinions of some of the public.

Then again looking at drivers’ behaviour at traffic lights tends to suggest that large numbers of them and some cyclists are profoundly colour blind as they seem unable to recognise a red light.

After lunch, seeing as it wasn’t raining we went for a walk and took some flowers up the cemetery with Daddy. Thankfully, Trish didn’t appear to see anything or anyone, or if she did, she didn’t say anything. The walk was pleasant and for November felt quite mild. Simon was about in the afternoon because he wanted to watch the rugby, in which England beat Australia and Wales lost to South Africa. The latter was a particularly brutal game according to his nibs. Sometimes I wonder if he’d still like to be playing as he gets quite excited by it but if I asked him he’d grumble something unintelligible and finish with asking me if I’d like to ride with Laura Trott or Emma Pooley. I’d love to but they’d leave me for dead even if I trained as hard as I could.

It suddenly occurred to me that I’d complete another decade at my next birthday, OMG, as they say, I’ll be thirty. I don’t want to be thirty–that’ll seem so old. Si has already asked me what I’d like and I told him to be twenty nine again. He didn’t think it was very funny–but then I wasn’t joking.

As I head towards old age and invisibility–did you know that we older women become more invisible the older we get, until in our dotage we’ll be able to say to any unwitting enquirer, ‘I’m ninety four, you know,’ only to have one of the kids correct you by saying, ‘Mother, you’re only seventy two, stop exaggerating.’

Why am I worrying? I mean what’s worse than being a thirty year old woman? The correct answer is, a thirty year old man. So you might not agree, but for me, that was definitely the right answer. As regard my children, I suspect none of the three girls, Sammi, Julie or Trish will regret things but I’m still uncertain about Danni–though contact with Cindy or Pia seems to make her desire for girldom stronger, which I’m not sure I understand or do I? They could be egging her on, ‘come on in the water’s lovely.’

Julie arrived for tea on her own, she’d dropped off Danni at Cindy’s house as they were going to the pictures. I felt a bit cross about that until I discovered a text from Danni which I hadn’t seen as I didn’t take my phone to the cemetery, asking if she could go to Cindy’s and the flicks, as they used to call them.

I had to make the dinner as David was off for the day in his new car–so far no trees had fallen on this one–and Ingrid had seemed to be over her illness. She had some back problem after lifting something in the cottage. Hannah had gone with them wherever that was. It’s strange that my kids rarely have any contact with Hannah, she stays in doors most of the time using her computer. If I was her mum, that would worry me. Even Trish, who is very computer happy, likes to do other things and despite her supposed grumbles, she’s still playing football at school and is joint top scorer with another girl. Danni hardly ever mentions football since that episode with her old games master.

I suppose that could have put her off, she still watches it on television occasionally, especially if Chelsea are playing, but she seems to have let go of the whole thing which confuses me. When I transitioned, I don’t think I stopped any of the things I used to do in male mode, mind you most of those were relatively unisex even in those days, with the exception of tinkering with bikes–there probably aren’t too many women who build their own bikes–which reminds me, I haven’t finished building those wheels have I?

I’ve tried to encourage Danni to come and play with bikes but she grumbles she’d break her nails, something which Trish doesn’t much worry about, she just gets bored very quickly when you have to adjust this screw or that cable–but then she is still very young.

Danni arrived home at ten, dropped off in the drive by Cindy’s mum who tooted the horn as she left. Apparently they went to see, Cloudy with a chance of meat balls 2. I wished I hadn’t asked.