And the winner is?

      Hello, lovelies. 

          Is it true that once we’ve discovered what we want to do with our lives, we all work as hard as we can to achieve it? That we can all reach for the stars and the sky is the limit? Surely the glass ceiling has been smashed by now, and our destinies are in our own hands? With all our potential nothing can hold us back. But that’s not what we were drip-feed as children. Our bedtime stories told us that if we lived our true authentic selves, no matter how humble, the prince would come and sweep us off our feet. All we had to do was work without complaining, put up with domestic slavery, open our French doors and let wild animals in to help with the unending cleaning. All so that we could live our lives as small as possible and that one day someone would save us from the humdrum that we were born into. Because there was no way that we could save ourselves, right? And that only once we were chosen, we could or would be somebody, but until then we had to live at the bottom of the pile. Story books aside, have we smashed the very system that has been designed and honed to keep us all in line? Or are we all just treading water, hoping that one day our ‘Prince’ will come and make us the winner that we all are truly meant to be? 

           I have recently begun to take stock of my life, and as you can imagine, it has not been a fun task. All I seem to do is work, sleep, and pay bills. And then wash, rinse and repeat. And one would think that after all my myriads of illnesses over the past few years, that even my cancer diagnosis would slow me down a bit. Well. It didn’t. I seem to be working harder than I ever have before. I now regularly work up to fourteen hours a day as well as trying to be a mother and trying to spend any time left with the most important man in my life. I find that I am always so tired that I fall into bed as soon as I get home from work. My children are growing up so quickly, that I have hardly noticed. My son is headed off to university this September, and my youngest is just about to start her A-Levels. And where was I? At work, mostly. I thought that I could have it all. All I had to do was work as hard as I could and then one day I could sit back and reap all of my rewards. But all I get after all the hours I have put in are more bills and more heartache as I watch my life slip through my fingers. How have I got it so wrong? At 48, surely, I should be slowing down a bit. I should be spending my free time enjoying life, instead of running myself ragged. So why am I not? What am I waiting for? Do I really think that my prince charming, aka Jason Manoa, is going to ride into town, throw me over his shoulder (that would be a sight in itself) and let me ride him off into the sunset? Ha! Who am I kidding? 

              But I’m doing everything right! I’m working every hour that I can. I keep a roof over my family’s heads. We have food in the fridge. Clothes on our backs. And my children are smashing it at life. I have everything that I could need, and so much more than many others. So where have I gone so drastically wrong? 

            Last weekend I was working at my favourite job, the theatre. And the show was a delightful thirty-piece orchestra playing alongside the live-action film of the Beauty and the Beast. It was magical. What a lovely way to spend my working hours. But as I watched the film, I managed to leave the enchanting music aside and focused on the fairy tale, I began to see that although Belle wanted more, all she ended up doing was being held captive, living with Stockholm syndrome, and putting her own life in danger so that she could help the beast learn his life-changing lesson, all while she moved from living with and taking care of her father to living with the beast and taking care of him. When would her life begin? She wanted more, but all she got was a change of location. Okay. So, I probably would have done the same to get that library. Who wouldn’t? But that was it for poor old Belle. All her dreams were gone, as now she had the beast to look after. The same goes for Cinderella. She worked in domestic servitude, found her fairy godmother, who granted her one wish, to go to the Ball, but even that had a caveat. Poor Cinderella was so beaten down by life that the one thing that she could wish for was to go to a party and not have to do the cleanup afterwards. After all the dancing and hiding from her step-sisters, her so-called prince charming didn’t recognise her without making every woman in the land try on a glass slipper. As if no one had the same foot size as Cinders. And while I’m on the subject, glass slipper? What man came up with that idea? No woman, who has been on her feet all day, would choose to put on very light and delicate glass slippers. Think of the blisters! But once she found her man, all that changed was her location, and her life would have been filled with serving and pleasing her husband as he ruled over the land. What was in it for her? No more glass slippers, that’s for sure. And don’t get me started on Snow White. She was only valued for her beauty. Was sent to be murdered and ended up cleaning up after seven men. She couldn’t even eat a healthy diet without some crazy old lady poisoning her apple. Sleeping Beauty was cursed at birth, never to be allowed to live her life and kept hidden, not even allowed to pursue her hobby, knitting, as a brush with a wool spinner sent her into a hundred-year nap. Until she had her most precious sleep disturbed by an unknown man kissing her without consent. For her then to be claimed by her abuser who whisks her off and marries her. Is that all she could expect from her life? Waiting to be rescued?

           Yes, I know that these are all silly childish stories that are there to tell a good tale, nothing more. When we grow up, we can see that although it would be nice to be recused by a knight in shining armour, there will always be housework, fewer glass slippers, and almost no pumpkins. But I saw so many little girls all dressed as princesses hoping that one day their prince would come. I never wanted to be a princess. I’d much rather be the old witch, living in the forest, reading all say, growing my food. Eating a healthy diet and making jewellery from all the interesting rocks I’d find in the woods. And chatting with the local wildlife as I tried to coax them in so that they could lend a hand with the housework.

           So, have I failed at life? As I am still waiting for someone to swoop in and lift me from the saga that is my life. Or is it about time that I saved myself? For far too long I have allowed others to dictate the terms of my life. I have worked so hard to give my children everything I didn’t have growing up. But in doing so, I have done exactly the same as my mother did before me. She worked every hour that God sent, trying to save herself, but she worked herself to death, and I am in very great danger of doing the very same thing. Yes, my children will always need something or other. And I do love shopping, but I have to save myself from worrying that I am not enough. I need to walk away from my fear that I am never going to achieve anything without someone else saving me first. I have never been and will never be a princess. For I am a warrior queen. And I no longer need anyone to save me. I am enough. I am the winner of my own life.