It’s school photo day at Shambles Manor. Which means it’s the morning I look at my child and curse myself for  not organising a hair cut. I’m not good with hair. I can’t do buns or plaits and I sometimes struggle with the basic of ponytails. Who decided I should give birth to girls? Obviously I don’t have the necessary credentials to raise daughters, especially daughters with long hair. I have suggested short hair numerous times, it suits them better it really does! I miss the cute little bobs they had when they were little, however, they are no longer going for the cute look it appears.

At the moment I am busy working on my VERY IMPORTANT blog, so Mr Shambles is in the bathroom offering suggestions on hair styles and how you can get your hair dry really quickly ‘cos you have to be at band at 8.00am. Don’t judge me people, Mr Shambles is about to escape to work, I will be left with the ensuing meltdown when the hair doesn’t look right and NOTHING we do fixes the problem!

I have tried suggesting that your hair is supposed to look awful in your school photos. It’s a rule. Just check out the perm gone awry circa 1984 above. (Not to mention the scarred eyebrow, the heavily lidded eye – what was up there – and the grimace of a grin). I also explain that even though I neglected to get us all to the hairdressers at least I’m not attempting to cut her hair myself. Yes, my mum decided my fringe was too long back in about 1979, as I was walking out the door to face the cameras  she sat me down and snipped straight across my forehead to produce a wonky heavy fringe which made me look like my head was tilted at an odd angle. Recorded for posterity for EVER.

I’m trying to offer encouraging advice that in 20 years time she will look back and laugh at the photos because that’s what you do. She’s not that interested in 20 years time.

“It’s not going right”, “I look awful” … and the time ticks away.

I show her the photo of Hippie Child with the Heidi Gone Wrong plait of Year 8 (permission to republish here refused by Heidi on the grounds her humiliation doesn’t need to be recorded on the internet WHICH IS FOREVER MUM).

The Heidi photo backfires … “that’s what I mean, I don’t want to end up looking like THAT”.

It’s wrong to be craving alcohol at 7.13am isn’t it?

I suppose we all have our vanity (above photo was put through a filter in the hope it might decrease the impact of the pimples that were a feature that year). So I guess I can’t criticise.

Looking through some of the old class shots I marvel at how young we were, how much of our life was ahead of us.

So we struggle on, in the hope we get out of the house with a hairdo that’s halfway respectable because one day in the future she needs to have the collection of year-by-year shots showing how she grew up, the kid she was, where she came from and the mates surrounding her at the time. Just so she too can sit engulfed in nostalgia while her child stresses about looking good for school photo day.