So I decide to blog, but what? ‘Write what you know’ is the advice. What do I know? I know about unhappy childhoods, unwanted pregnancy, drug abuse and having children, I don’t know about decorating, mothers-in-law or writing.
I ask my husband ‘What shall I write about?’ He suggests ‘Wives who are sick and whose husbands don’t understand them’, a reference to our row earlier in the day when I’d stomped upstairs, slamming doors and shouting that he should stop being so selfish, and that although his job may seem important, if I was to die or ‘something happen to me’ he’d be in a, and I quote, worse bloody state than if he lost his job. ‘Mummy, you used the ‘b’ word! That’s swearing’ I hear as the door slams behind me and I flop on the bed with the latest Woman & Home magazine, taunting me with pictures of beautiful, well-kempt, ‘healthy’ mothers and wives with successful careers and tidy white houses.
I know about friendship, and the pain of betrayal. I know about love and loss, and messing up relationships and feeling unforgiven and unforgiving. Could I write something about that? Oh! I also know about mental ill-health. And tummy ache.
Do people really want to read about an angst ridden, sad and desperate housewife? Or even a faith-filled, happy and fulfilled one (and I can be that as well)?
Then again - I’m not alone - there are loads of us, living in Surrey, living quietly desperate lives as wives of successful men, and losing ourselves slowly in servitude.
So decision made - I’ll blog about being a housewife, in Surrey - bound to get some readers....don’t you think?
