Forever Autumn Forever Crepey

[cremolafoam]

The summer sun is fading as the year grows old,
and darker days are drawing near,
the winter winds will be much colder,
now you're not here.
I watch the birds fly south across the autumn sky
and one by one they disappear
I wish that I was flying with them,
now you're not here

Excellent email Rose. I went to a trendy, lefty school where we could not celebrate success as it would mean that people could be seen to fail. So we had no competitive games (they abolished sports day eventually, and our sports teams stopped competing against other schools), no house points and certainly no prize giving. The cups won in yesteryear (and a bit later) for sports, essay writing etc, languished in a cupboard with some old sports kit. They got very mediocre exam results (which was probably exactly what they wanted), and we weren't encouraged either to study or to turn up to lessons. It was fine if you did, and equally fine if you didn't. I remember skiving off school in the fifth form, when we had a nice April, to go swimming in the river, told the teacher the next day, and she just said "I bet you had a lovely afternoon."

I would like to report, in possibly tangential S&B news, that Aldi is selling rather good thick woolly 'boot' socks. I bought five pairs. Though admittedly on my mutantly small feet they are slightly flappy, as grownup socks always are....

Crikey, strops. Never mind jumping on the bin - it should be used to ram your points home, forcefully, over DH's head.

And brilliant email, Rose. They won't be doing that again!

My teaching was great! Lovely bunch of students, all women, from all manner of countries originally, who were very hardworking and diligent. I helped them do an exercise about using 'should' and 'shouldn't' in sentences, explained tricky vocab, etc, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I need to brush up on my advanced grammar, so I can tell them why something is right or wrong, but that shouldn't be a problem.

So it seems I'm entering the right career. Thank god. Bit of a waste of £9K otherwise.

Herbs, that's great!

MI, how can you buy boot socks in this weather?!

My DC take after DH on the competitive front. I don't have a problem with competitive sports when they have chosen to do the sport and know that they are trying to beat others. I do have a problem with comparing exam results = great letter Rose!

….thanks all…for the messages of support. And now….the school have put photos of all the sixth form individually, on their Facebook page…(holding their certificates…you can't see which ones say 'special award' and which are the bog standard variety ) and DS's one is so lovely. I am fighting with myself…kind of want to share it and still be the proud mummy. What to do?

Er...it's not that warm, BTM! I am forrin, remember. Beneath my Scandi-pale exterior beats the heart - and more to the point the circulation - of my south Indian foremothers. I have stashed said lovely socks upstairs, ready to break out the minute the temperature drops.

I'm quite anti-competitive trendylefty, me. Mind you I was also extremely crap at sports.

Well, I suppose it's at least 10degrees cooler in deepest, darkest Catford! It is sweaty here

Yes, I do think the trendy lefty anti-competitive sports brigade are likely to be all the ones who were crap at sport

I was crap at sports, but I don't see why those who are good at it shouldn't have a chance to shine. And it is often those who aren't going to shine in exam results, so even more important.

I'm also quite anti some aspects of academic competition too, btw. And I speak as one of the smug prizewinners. I don't think it did me any good.

I did find being publicly humiliated on sports day very wearing, though.

I don't mind people winning, just the others being humiliated. Can't sports day be voluntary? Anyone who can't do it, or hates it, can do something else, like painting a mural, or something else community-minded.

Guess what. I was crap at sport too.

Another sporting crapster here….agree with herbs re humiliation. But it's a hard one. I mean, there's nothing to be gained in life from being a sore loser. We all have to learn to fail without somehow, hating the winners. Dunno….

Herbs, it is voluntary at my DC's school - you have to actively apply to go in for it and there are heats before the big day!

I didn't, myself, come away from school PE/sports with any wish or inclination whatsoever for exercise. I don't think that was a good thing.

Me neither. Sport at our school was about being on the team, and not about enjoying it for its own sake. If you weren't on the team, the teachers pretty much ignored you, or insulted you, or made you run around the massive field for hours.

I only realised that exercise could be in any way pleasurable in my 30s. And the thought of indulging in a team sport brings me out in a cold sweat. I'd be bound to let it down, and they'd all hate me.

My 1.45 interview - for which I rearranged my day - is now an hour late. And counting. I can't really focus on anything else as she'll only ring then...

Herbs, mine was like that too, but despite being fairly rubbish, I always joined in. I couldn't understand the girls who preferred to stand around pretending they had a period every week

Sadly DD, who is very sporty, has found that it is pretty soul destroying having lessons with girls who can't be bothered It is fine for the sporty boys - DS loves all his PE lessons, but it's not the same for the girls.

I think school sport should have competitive stuff for those who like it (as it is an inherent part of some sports), and gentle stuff that also involves sunshine/chat/biscuits for those that don't. I've liked my dc' school for that. I think any physical activity conducted in a positive atmosphere is great for teens. I hated it at school, was forced to do it, and like others took years to realise it could be fun.

Think academic competition of the sort Rose has described is completely different - no rationale at all for it.

I hated it. Hated hated hated it. I get very cold. I am not good at catching things. I was clumsy and slow and hideously self-conscious. It was just an exercise in freezing humiliation for me.

I still won't go to sports days.

I wasn't 'fairly rubbish' I was stupendously bad, the sort that gets picked absolutely last.

I was so much better when we did non- team stuff. I wasn't much good but dance, keep fit, swimming, gymnastics and even cross country wasn't so awful because no one was shouting at you that you let the team down. MI I so hated fielding in rounders because I never caught the ball…even when it fell in to my lap, so to speak. 'Tis is a bit of a minefield isn't it?

I'd have quite liked dance, actually. Possibly even gymnastics. We mainly just had hockey, and once a year a terrifying 'cross country' run where you'd run like mad for 200 yards and then puff the rest wanting to die because nobody'd told you what you were supposed to do.

Never swimming, but in any case I would have been far too self-conscious to do that.

Dance was fun. In fact BFF and I joined the dance club as well, which was after school. We were the creepiest kids there. The others were all really cool girls who were really into it, and had plans to join Pan's People.We just wanted to make up routines to Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep. But they were nice to us. The teacher played Nutbush City Limits a lot. In fact its the only track I remember actually dancing to
Now you really can work out how old I am...

I actually liked Hockey - I wasn't very good but better at it than netball.....
I hated rounders or any game that involved catching something......

Keep fit or whatever was fine - I recall doing lots of routines to 'Young, gifted and black'.......

I was in the hockey team, netball team and did the 100 and 200 metres, plus 80 metres hurdles and high jump. I used to swim seriously as well. My primary school high jump record still stands. Sometimes, these days, I walk to work.