Gotham Diary:
Tidied Up, cont’d
23 October 2012
There, that’s better. For quite a while, on Sunday afternoon, it was impossible to take a step without checking out the litter of toys on the floor. Bits of Lego, matchbox cars, puzzle pieces, and, eventually, the contents of Will’s backpack, which he dumped out in an already tight spot, all contrived to give the carpet a rather different pattern. It was futile to pick up after him, but I couldn’t help myself, especially as this allowed me to keep stock of things. The “tidy” arrangement in yesterday’s photograph was composed while he fell asleep in his mother’s arms.
Kathleen is flying to London today; because she wants to be fresh in the morning for her conference, she decided against the usual night flight. When she was away, the weekend before last, visiting her ffather, I was a dynamo of domestic upkeep, but I’m good for nothing at the moment — nothing but reading, that is. Tomorrow, I’m going to tour the Museum with a friend; I expect to have the energy for that. Just to be sure, though, I’m observing a second day of idleness.
When I emptied the dishwasher this morning, there were only three or four items to put in it, and I thought, no, I’ll wash them by hand. Modified idleness.
***
All I can think about, when I’m not reading Adam Zamoyski’s Rites of Peace (I’m nearly done — and I’ve grasped everything better, especially the geopolitics, the second time round — is the difference between Miranda Hart’s sitcom and her book. I don’t know what I expected the book, Is It Just Me?, to be, but I was fairly sure that I’d be entertained, and indeed I was. A few of the jokes were recycled from the show, but context soon proved to be entirely different. Miranda is a dramatisation of what life was like for Hart before she dedicated it to becoming a “comedy actress,” as she calls herself in the book. The Miranda of the sitcom understands that she’ll never be like her schoolmates, but she can’t help trying to keep up with them. She has used an inheritance to run a “joke shop,” but has absolutely no interest in actually running a business: a dandy metaphor for the amiable pointlessness of Hart’s years as an office temp. This Miranda is still paralyzed by the unknown complications of the “thethxual.” At the same time, she is humiliated by her failure to gratify her mother’s impatience for a husband and a brood.
The Miranda who narrates the book, replete with lessons for her eighteen year-old self, is the same person with one important difference. She has discovered what she really wants to do, and is no longer beholden to anyone else’s expectations, especially including the ones that she herself built up as a schoolgirl. All she had to do was dump the conviction that she couldn’t possibly make it as a comedian. (And then work her tail off performing in grotty pubs and perfecting her routines.) A tall order, yes, but a simple one. The interesting bit about this follow-your-dream story is that doing what she wants to be doing, and doing it well, allows Hart a more extensive privacy. She is no longer betrayed by stumbles into dead ends.
A bit of Googling informs me that Miranda Hart is on a diet. I hope that she doesn’t take it too far. As she says in the book, plump people have better skin. I’ve become an admirer of her beautiful complexion.