Second the best

2 exciting things occurred today, one of them involved an AQA physics textbook and the other involved my dearest mum.

Woke up late today, a documentary about Manny Pacquiao kept me up late enough to hear the rustling of foxes on our shared rubbish dump. And so after a rushed breakfast i stepped out of the door, a backpack full of textbooks on one shoulder and my mother’s words of encouragement ringing in my ears, not that pleasant soft ringing like a small bell, more like the high pitched ringing after a slap on the face.

3 things stood out during my 6 hour excursion in the library.

– A water bottle stuffed with a lemon, once asked what the lemon was for the owner proceeded to drone about the secret skin youthening powers of the lemon. Bonkers.

– Notorious B.I.G’s song Juicy is a fucking great revision song.

– AQA’s terrible physics jokes. ‘What is the the first electricty detective? Sherlock Ohms’

skip forwards several hours- I’m in my living room having a conversation with my Mum, our chat skips and glides through the general topics: GCSE’s, Work Experience, Girl trouble and then abruptly the mood changes, my mum pauses mid sentence composes herself then reveals to me how she feels her religious beliefs are effecting our mother son bond. This is roughly how it went.

‘I’m more understanding than you think, are there any secrets you’ve been keeping from me because you were scared of how i might react if i found out?’

‘No mum you know i wouldn’t do that’

‘Please tell me, i know you’re keeping something from me.’

‘Fine, I smoke mum. Probably a pack a week, i’m surprised you haven’t caught on already.’

‘I understand son.’

My mother is grew up in the countryside in Korea, went to church from young and married my father who is a minister. You can imagine how shocked i was by her seemingly understanding reaction to finding out her son whom she thinks of as an innocent virgin in fact pollutes his lungs with a substance which i shouldn’t really be able to buy considering my age.

Perplexed, bewildered, discombobulated.

Josh

07-04-15