I have been so moved by how many people took the time to reply to my last newsletter. If this was you, or even if it wasn’t and you’re still here - thank you. More on that below, but for now - on to jollier things, one of those being my brother.
Have I written about him before? I can’t remember. Mostly what you need to know about my brother by way of introduction is that he HATES to appear on the internet and thus will be furious I’m writing about him, but also that he is possibly one of my most favourite people in the world.
After some real life U.N. level negotiations, I was permitted to take my own children to see their cousins up near Manchester this weekend. It’s quite a long way from us, so we didn’t get there until almost bedtime on Friday night. You might expect certain scenes when you arrive somewhere at childrens bedtime. Perhaps a parent, child on lap, reading a story. Or wild pajama’d children running away from their toothbrushes.
What we found, after being let in by my youngest niece, was my brother, in his lovely new kitchen extension, balanced precariously on a stool looping a rope over the steel beams holding up the ceiling and looking for all the world like he was going to do something, how to put this delicately - irreversible.
A closer inspection reveals that the rope actually has two large wooden rings at either end. The relief! He’s NOT actually trying to hang himself in hurried advance of our imminent arrival. No no. He is actually (of COURSE he is!) ... rigging up some sort of Olympic-grade gymnastics equipment...in... the middle of his lovely new kitchen.
Right.
Because this is the thing about my bro. He has crazes. Gets a real bee in his bonnet about something or other but then – and this is an admirable quality – stops at nothing to test it out in his own life. Previous crazes have included barefoot shoes (bought for the whole family, surprisingly comfortable actually, henceforth to be known as flat-earth shoes simply to try and wind him up), taking ice baths at dawn in a specially ordered barrel in his suburban garden, modifying his walking pattern to include more lunges, and wearing truly hideous orange tinted glasses past a certain point in the evening to block out the harmful light waves of living in the modern world. That one took me by surprise last time I visited. I just looked up from my glass of wine, mid-anecdote to find I was talking to a poker-faced Ali G lookalike. He’s also begun resisting the idea of furniture, preferring to crouch down on the floor as our ancestors intended. I don’t doubt there’s probably some sense in most of this, it’s just frankly I can’t be arsed with it. Also, he is my little brother so I am bound by ancient laws to just take the piss out of every single thing he ever does. I can’t help myself. It's like a reflex.
Anyway, turns out the Olympic hanging rings are part of some new fitness experiment, possibly something about connecting our inner ape back to the feeling of swinging freely through the trees and then hanging upside down to do reverse pushups to get insanely ancestrally hench or whatever. They were a pleasing diversion for the children after hours in the car.
We settled the kids watching tv, and got to catching up. There was some chat about where the children would be sleeping, and it was during this chat that both Ali and Cathy darkly referenced “Ali’s H”
Well this sounds weird. What is his ‘H’? Some sort of new micronutrient diet? Or a gadget for removing the gluten from your face? Has he finally managed to split his soul like Voldemort and hide pieces of it in his children’s toys? WHAT is his H?
Turns out, the H was a recent endeavour inspired, like all the worst ideas, by Pinterest. Ali told us how he’d been seized by the urge to create a giant, monogram ‘mural’ (and I use the term loosely for good reason) in his daughter’s bedroom, as a rainy day project. He’d seen it online. It looked like fun! What could possibly, POSSIBLY go wrong?? Painting is easy.
First he’d had to mask out an enormous letter H on the wall. Sounds like a piece of piss right? But for reasons unknown to anyone present, what he actually did was spend the better part of a weekend sawing to knock up an H-shaped wooden frame, which required further heavy duty fixings in the wall to actually even attach it to the wall. So far, so pointless.
Next, the idea was to dab multiple vibrant paints into your carefully prepared letter H on the wall, and then – well – mix it up, to create a delightful marbled effect. Easy!
Here my sister in law took over the story to explain that where things probably went wrong was in the sheer amount and type of coloured paint my industrious brother had tried to use. What happens when you mix colours together children? The more you add, the more brown everything becomes. Having merrily splashed probably three hundred types of paint onto the wall, Ali set about smearing it all together with the predictable result that it just ended up looking like an enormous shit-brown turd on the wall. Shaped like a giant H.
Worse still, it was now a shit brown mark on the wall which was three inches thick with sticky wet paint. He didn’t even keep within the lines of the H, presumably having given up all hope at some point and just going hell for leather with the swirling in an attempt to salvage the (more colourful) H of his dreams.
So after an entire day of fannying around to create his majestic shit-brown H “mural”, he then had to patiently scrape all the paint back off, dispose of it, and wait overnight for it to dry in order to restore the room to its perfectly adequate former, blank-walled state.
Armed with a roller the next day to admit defeat and paint back over it, he told me how alarming it was to just dab the remaining H with his finger and find it was still as wet as the moment it had first been painted. Perhaps the paint DID actually house part of his soul and was refusing to die/dry.
So apparently it took even more time to paint over this doomed project than it did to do it, needing a fair few coats of pale blue paint in order to cover up chaos. It’s possible, even now, that the first remnants of brown are just lying dormant, ready to seep through the freshly repainted wall like some sort of demented, ominous bat-signal, the shadow of a huge H appearing like a fever dream as a warning whenever my brother comes up with another one of his ridiculous projects.
The moral of this story is - it is perfectly ok to constantly take the piss out of my brother. Please form an orderly queue…
Oh hai.
I wasn’t sure what I was expecting with my last newsletter. It’s somewhere I’m not very comfortable, putting how I really feel out into the world and showing that sometimes I’m not really ok. It’s very easy to hide behind stories, behind humour, and skirt the edges of the more difficult feelings. I think what I’m learning is that there can be bravery in vulnerability. That I don’t have to always have it all figured out. That people will rise to support me if I let them. So once again, thank you so much to everyone that messaged me. It really means a lot.
It’s apparent that some people who get this have made sure that Lee (who I unsubscribed) got this too. If this was you, please know that there is nothing I say in these newsletters that I wouldn’t (or haven’t already) tried to say and remedy directly with him. I have absolutely nothing to hide. I also have very legitimate, (factual!) grounds to feel the way I do. (FWIW if you know us both and want to know what these are, I’ll happily tell you in person so you can make your own mind up about whether I’m allowed to feel like I do or just some slanderous wench intent on defaming A Good Man’s character).
Anyway, thank you again for all the support and messages, I think I’ve replied to everyone now. Eyes on the horizon, onwards, upwards etc. I’m doing my best, and it helps to feel like you’re all here with me.
Here’s what’s been on my mind recently:
How much fun I had nobbing around dressed like an extra from Pride and Prejudice at Lyme Park national trust house recently. You can just dress up! And then parade around the house as if it’s yours! What JAPES! Bonus points if your idiot brother also does look quite a lot like Mr Darcy.
I did a writing course recently with Clover Stroud, author of many brilliant books, columns and features. It was organised by the very lovely Tanya of Ease Retreats, who hosts all sorts of brilliant day retreats that are well worth checking out. Clover was so generous and inspiring in what she shared about vulnerability and truth in your writing, I came away feeling a lot of big things.
After the writing thing, I went up to the White Horse at Uffington for an evening stroll, which has views for days. It feels like standing on the edge of millenia. Worth a walk to if you’re in the area.
Finally - Barbie. Saw it last night. It is BRILLIANT. Don’t think about it too much, don’t read reviews or try to ‘get’ it, just GO. And someone, please, for the love of god furnish me with THIS fleecey glorious piece of clothing IMMEDIATELY:
I AM Kenough. Thanks for reading.
About me
I’m Lindsay Butcher and I write words down for a living. [Now with added CORPORATE JOY/PAIN/EXISTENTIAL WOE!!] I’ll write for you too if you like? Commission me to be hilarious on your behalf…
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Want to read more? Check out previous newsletter editions here, or feast your brain on my blog AndOtherIdiots. It’s where I put my thoughts that are more thoughtful thoughts, not just stupid shit.
I don’t get paid to write this, but you can show your appreciation and buy me a coffee and/or just offer me free legal advice or buy me a house or whatever. Thanks.
I agree - you're bro sounds fascinating.
It seems there is something in the air, though... Lately, I have been providing sisterly support to my Spanish friend, whose husband seems to have lost his tiny mind in a most hurtful manner. Your last post summed the situation up nicely - he is acting in ways I would not have believed possible of anyone, let alone someone I once called a friend of mine. Still, my Spanish vocabulary has now expanded surprisingly and I wanted to share some lovely new words - 'Mamón' which means total tithead and 'Pipipausal' which I feel needs no explanation.
You're welcome.
Hey Linds, firstly, I love reading your musings so please do carry on, particularly if it helps with the processing of and general dealing with the shit you're going through right now. Secondly, I'm so sorry to hear your news and that it is all proving very challenging. Thirdly, we all need an I am Kenough hoody! Take care. X