I had a meeting in Cambridge last week and took Princess with me. She wasn’t invited to the meeting, it wouldn’t have been appropriate. But I asked her to come with me. At first, when I asked if she wanted to drive into Cambridge city centre with me, she was rightfully confused. Why would I bring her if she couldn’t be with me? Well, I thought it would be nice to take a trip in to Cambridge to help teach her some independence.
Princess is starting Secondary school in September and I realised that since moving out of London four years ago, she’s lived a pretty sheltered existence. Nothing wrong with that. It’s part of the reason we moved out of the city, to give her the kind of childhood I was lucky enough to have in the 80s and 90s. However although I’ve tried to give my kids a more idyllic childhood than I thought I’d be able to do if I’d stayed in Edmonton, North London, it still isn’t as ‘free’ as my own childhood was. Because of where we are located, Princess doesn’t do very much by herself. She goes out within the village to chill with her friends. She might pop to the corner shop for me when I run out of milk. But that’s it. When I was her age, I was cycling all around London (on the bike paths!) with a sandwich in my backpack and money for a Happy Meal. Making myself sound proper old now, aren’t I?
In order to get to secondary school, Princess will have to get the school bus. She’ll have to feel comfortable in an entirely different town than where she’s used to. We’ve been trying to get her used to the idea of having extra responsibilities and being comfortable with her independence during the summer. That’s everything from making her own meals to being responsible for her timekeeping. I took it to a new level and left her in Cambridge last week.
OK so I didn’t leave, leave her. I left her in the library, with her mobile phone and her purse. The rules were she could leave the library and do some shopping as long as she stayed within the Grand Arcade shopping centre. No going out to wander around the market square or anywhere else in Cambridge. I knew it was unlikely for me to be longer than an hour and I made it clear that she could call me if she needed me.
I was gone for an hour. She’s got a good head on her shoulders so I wasn’t particularly concerned. But when I finished my meeting and called her. This child, hmm. She didn’t answer the phone on my first call. She didn’t answer it on the second or third time I tried to call her either. I tried not to panic. Princess has a problem with not answering her phone, so whilst I was a little annoyed, I wasn’t too worried. She phoned back a few minutes later, having bought up half of Flying Tiger. She’d done some back to school shopping and bought herself some lunch too.
Honestly, I was so proud of her. I think it was more about me being comfortable with my daughter going away for secondary school. Missy was walking around full of confidence and not fussed with having been let loose in Cambridge. To celebrate, we went for a walk around Cambridge, checked out the university building and rounded off the trip with some ramen and her first taste of an authentic seaweed salad.
With only a couple of weeks to go before the start of her first term of secondary school, I think she’s ready. Princess is a responsible, kind and confident young woman. As Tiffany would say, “she ready!”
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