Sunday September 1st. 2013. 23:07
There was a plan this weekend for me to have Chloe to stay overnight an extra weekend. This was so that her Mother could go out for the evening. Always keen to spend more time with her, I agreed to cancel my plans for the evening and have her to stay. It's hardly a chore, and Chloe's mum deserves a night out.
The other week Chloe'd also mentioned that she'd like to have some curry, my Mum and Dad had suggested that we order some take-away and let Chloe try different types of curry. Chloe seemed really up for this.
I left work on Saturday, did some shopping. Aware that Chloe had already had a disagreement with her Mum because she had wanted to cycle all the way up to mine on her own. We'd reasoned that this wasn't particularly a good idea. She's never cycled that far on her own, and actually hasn't cycled from home to my flat at any point. It's also been a couple of years since the last time she cycled the route to my old flat (which is just down the road) - and we did that together.
After finishing work, I'd considered that one option was for her to take the bike to the train station, and meet up with me as normal. This seemed to get lost as a viable option. I'd also gone to Halfords and had a look at bikes. I've really missed having a bike this year, and although I don't need to cycle to work any more, I would really like to have one to make getting about easier, and just for the joy of it. I went into Halfords, having a look at what bikes they had. I thought that perhaps I could kill two birds with one stone. A solution being that I bought a bike, and met Chloe at some point and we cycled together back to my flat.
All of this consideration, and arrangement, the pleasant prospect of a nice family curry went for nought when I received a rather terse and dismissive text from her saying that she wasn't coming to mine and that she was staying at home. She'd decided that with it being the last weekend of the summer holidays she wanted to spend Saturday evening at home. Personally I think it had more to do with her being pissed that her Mother and I had organised between ourselves for her to stay over an extra night at mine, and that she couldn't come here in the method that she wanted to. The other possibility being that she wanted to 'punish' her mother some how for wanting to go out and have a nice evening out for a change.
As I'd gone shopping after work, I had caught a train straight from Havant, near where I work to Fratton, instead of coming home I'd gone straight into town to meet Chloe for the journey back to mine. Hanging around the train station in the last of the glorious summer sun, reading a book whilst the drama and tantrum played itself out.
Having been stood up by my daughter, I came back home, and went round my Mum and Dad's as arranged. When they didn't answer their front door bell, I assumed that they were perhaps in the garden or something. Having a key I decided to let myself in. This of course meant that I rapidly discovered they had gone out, actually to walk to the train station to meet up with me, and by entering the house had set off their burglar alarm. I was able to call them amongst the screeching of their alarm and find out what I needed to do to shut the bloody thing off.
We decided the abandon the curry idea until another time.
I decided not to heed my own advise to Chloe's mum, which was to not let Chloe's tantrum or 'teenage moment' prevent her from going out. I kept my evening free, in case she changed her mind.
She did not.
In the morning, having been burned by the unnecessary purchase of train tickets for both her and myself, I texted her to make sure which train she was getting. I got no response initially. Eventually I was informed that she would not be coming up to mine today either.
Chloe's fourteen, and old enough to decide if she does or does not want to come and see me. I was however a bit annoyed, to say the least for being mucked around in this way, and being dismissed so rudely.
Not a situation I am going to be able to convey to her by text or telephone. It would just provoke another argument, this time with me. I sent her a message saying I was here if she needed to speak to me. It's not what part of me wanted to say, but I managed to get my head to be the bit of me in charge of the typing.
This left me with a Sunday free. Which I then spent sitting around watching television, going on the internet, doing two lots of washing, watching the Stephen Brown videos we were meant to review and vacuuming the flat. I had food that I'd purchased to make roast dinner for Chloe and I, which otherwise was going to go to waste, so I cooked it anyway, and saved the rest for tomorrow.
Rock and roll eh ?
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