Days

I’ve just dropped my daughter off at school.

I gave her a big hug and a kiss, and watched her disappear inside, wearing her waterproof mac, trackie bottoms and trainers, and carrying a luminous pink bag that weighs the same as a small hippopotamus.

It’s packed with towels and spare trainers and T-shirts and jumpers and a washbag and a torch and a spangly dress and a swimming cozzie and Bully the cuddly, soft toy bull. (Not a Bully from Jim Bowen’s Bullseye show, although if it was one of those that would be super, smashing, great).

My daughter and her classmates are piling into a minibus and heading to deepest darkest East Sussex, for three days and two nights.

It’s a PGL multi-activity holiday, and they’ll be taking part in all sorts of exciting stuff from fencing and archery to climbing and disco dancing. (I wrote about it in my previous post Intrepid).

It’s the kind of thing kids all over the country do.

It’s the kind of thing my girl does, too.

I never thought she’d be able to take part in something like this. I used to wonder whether she’d ever walk or talk. 

Days like these are ordinary and extraordinary. 

They're not perfect, though. There's always a tiny improvement that could be made. Today, for example, could have been truly sublime. If only I'd thought to hide my toddler in the luggage rack.

Video is The Kinks - Days