The teddybear is just out of my reach. Already in 4 inch stilettoes and my arm stretched to the point where it is excruciatingly painful, I manage to go on tiptoes to see if that helps.
It doesn't.
Meanwhile, beside me a little blonde girl, aged three, sits contentedly in her buggy looking at me curiously with her big brown eyes. As I loose my balance she chuckles.
'Silly billy'.
I smile fondly at her and quickly persue with my task. This little blonde girl might just look like a little angel, but she takes after me. Don't do what she wants and she'll flip.
Right now, she wants the teddy-bear.
Don't get me wrong, if it was for her own selfish need then I would have said 'no' pretty much the same second that she suggested it. But this is a 'Mother's Day' gift. And I promised that this would go in the basket that we were making. I thought that it was really cute that she was even interested in this at all, seeing as three year olds tend to be overly ego-centrical; however, now I'm wishing that she'd kept her mouth shut.
'Got it!!' I grasp the bear in my hand and tug it down, somehow bringing down the whole shelf of the blessed things which my companion finds hilarious.
'Look!! Look!! They're flying!!'
Blushing and absoloutely mortified, I pick them all up and cram them all on the second shelf with the selections of chocolates. The store assistant glares at me. Well is it really my fault that you put the thing most desired by kids on the top shelf? Why not put the blessed chocolate there and make the fat people work for it?! Make it less of a temptation.
So now we go along to pay. We've got our various bits and bobs while this sunny child chatters contentedly to the other shoppers, some of whom smile fondly back like the old ladies, while others look stunned as this overly confident toddler strikes up a conversation with them about her future plans for the weekend and can she know theirs? They're the kind of people who probably use every kind of form of birth control known to man, they are that desperate Not to have a miniture human-being running around the house and causing chaos.
As I dump the stuff on the counter, I quickly rumage in my bag for my purse. 'Where the hell did I put it?' I mutter to myself, causing the doddery old man beside me to nearby jump out of his skin. This whole business of old people not being able to hear clearly isn't true. If I wasn't an intellegent person I would so blame the government for this secret organisation of spies who try to bring us down with hearing aids, walking sticks and dentures. Daniel Craig as 'James Bond' my ass.
'Aha!! I've found it!!' Triumphantly I pull the twenty out of my purse and hand it over to the lady at the till.
And suddenly, I am made aware that she is no longer talking to the toddler sitting in the buggy (who, on the other hand, is still very much talking to her). Instead, she is focusing all of her energy, and indeed general effort, on glaring at me. My smile begins to wane as I notice that other people in the shop have been staring too. You see, they've been looking happily at this sunny natured, just turned, three year old, while thinking: - 'Aww!!' and then they look up, just for a quick glance, at the mother. And that is when they see me. A sixteen going on seventeen year old who, quite frankly, could quite easily pass for fourteen.
Always one for awkward situations, the little one pipes up: - 'What are they staring at?'
A few of them look away, embaressed, and indeed, abashed. But the majority of them keep that same steely look in their eye. Judging her. Judging me.
'They're staring at a teenager and a toddler, Katie.' I tell her. 'They're looking, but they're not seeking.'
And with that, I wheel the buggy out, but as I pause by the door to struggle, I hear two little words. 'Tax-payers'.
It's not the first time that its happened, so I'm not annoyed at that. That just comes with the job description really. There's no avoiding it. No - what I'm annoyed at. What I hate, what I loathe above all things is the judgemental looks that I get as I walk past. My eyes say it all. I challenge them. 'Ask me then. Ask me. Go on. Do it. Just do it. Just get it over and done with then. Ask me. Ask me then.' But they never do.
And it's because of that, that I can never explain.
I don't take your money. I don't take the tax-payers money. And even if I did, is that such a crime in the circumstances that you so do believe me to have? Hmmm? I thought not. No, I have never taken any such benefits apart from the traditional child-support that I got as a kid for me, that every family in the United Kingdom gets. Got. Move onto that subject later.
I didn't sleep around to get a council flat with my 'babay' who I would then 'pimp out' with all of the government spending money. I didn't sleep around to have a baby, so that my boyfriend would love me and therefore, 'stay with me forever'. Nah. That's just not my style. I didn't even sleep around and forget to use contraception. I'm a sensible kid. I know how it works. I wasn't even raped.
That child, that child there in the buggy isn't my daughter. And yet everyone likes to assume so. She's my sister. My beautiful, gorgeous, smart and funny baby sister. I love to pieces and I try to be there as a second mum to her, I really do. That doesn't make me a scrounger off the government state benefits. That, in my eyes, makes me a pretty decent human being. My mum isn't even one of those mums who had me young and then Katie is her acceptable age one. She didn't have a menopause panic. She didn't get remarried. Katie is my full sister. Katie is also adopted. Katie was born to a family who were more interested in 'pimping' her out. Who were more concerned about having her as a possession than an actual human flesh and blood child. So that's why she is with us. Because we love her. As we should. And that means daily; 24/7 and a bit on the side. We don't think about whether or not she is convinient to have today, but nice to have tommorrow because that is when 'thingy' is around and she can be 'showed off'. We adopted her so that she could have a loving family. And yet, everytime I go out with her, I feel like I am being punished for it.
This blog is called: - 'Papa don't preach.' After the famous 'Madonna' song. But really, what I am saying is: - 'People, don't preach.'
So the next time you see a teenager and a baby, don't think: - 'Eugh, chav.' (Unless she has more make-up than a face and huge gold hoop earrings that just scream: - 'TACKY'). Don't think anything other than: - 'Awwww!! Cute baby!!' Because you don't know the whole story. You don't know if it was an accident, a regret or even a rape. You don't know for certain if it's: - 'mother', 'baby-sitter', 'friend', or even in my case, 'sister'. So the next time you see a teenager and a baby, please don't glare at her.
She could be me.
