This week

Mum

has been really annoying again. It started

with me not being ready for school

even though I had

all summer

to prepare (apparently that’s why the best time to buy

Back to School is

Before School Even Stopped Last Term)

and I wasn’t even ready.

I would say I was.

I had done a special project on Rome

(at home).

I had tried fourteen new foods and that is

Actually A Record for me

in one summer.

My shoes still fit because they were from last June

but I didn’t clean them

so that wasn’t good enough

and I have the main bits in my pencil case

because I don’t think anyone ever uses the triangle things

(or very much anyway)

and I can ask if I need

probably.

Mum was annoying in the summer too in fact.

I also had to go to lots of Places

even though I didn’t want to

so I am rather tired

of

National Trust gift shops

and

Museums where the buttons don’t work

and

sitting through concerts

(especially if they are Good For Me)

but going to the cinema was ok.

This week though

Mum

insisted

that I have a hair cut

and stood and watched and it was

Most Terrible

(she always wins on the things I care about most)

I had to go and cry after that.

Then there were the Mandarin lessons after school in this club,

which I said I’d only do if I could join the football team

and have a drone

and a smart phone

and she thought she was being funny so instead she bought

a xylophone.

I hadn’t seen one since I was

learning the alphabet

and even that was only a picture.

I mean!

 

 

Turns out the metal ones

aren’t even proper

they have to be

wood

soft, singing wood

laid out ready

“would you like a go?”

I wanted a go of course

(I don’t want lessons

of course).

Mum had other plans

of course.

(On most days there are things I have to do:

gymnastics, swimming, dance or Tae Kwon Do,

and also we’re rehearsing for a show.)

She found a slot.

I told her I was tired, that I have enough, I

already want to stop.

She found a teacher.

How does she do it?

The teacher has the face of a hamster

but you would not believe the speed she can play at.

If hamsters played the xylophone they’d be pretty fast

I reckon;

have you ever seen them in a wheel?

She was faster.

Mum thinks

if I work hard I could get on to Young Musician of the Year.

I haven’t even got the right sticks yet.

Actually one is right,

one is left,

that’s the kind of thing my dad would say

but he keeps quiet on these sorts of things.

So every day this week,  I get home, shoes off,

times tables,

healthy snack,

and it’s

“Have You Done Your Xylophone Practice?”

“Mum!”