Chapter Four

I live in a strange pseudo-village in the suburbs of West London. It is an area that has confused me for years, having lived previously in the anonymity of Holloway. The neighbourhood has a strong community, so strong in fact that they achieved the rare triumph of stopping a Tesco from opening on the high street. But it also had all the negative qualities of village mentality including small-mindedness, gossip, and everyone knowing each other and hanging out since I'd had the kids I'd felt the walls closing in on me and my life becoming smaller. Living where we did was like moving to Surrey to expand your mind. It ain't gonna happen.

I was often surprised, though, by what I'd find out while talking to other women walking their kids to school. Conversations grabbed here and there, while standing around watching our kids play in the playground, or walking back from dropping them at school – the rare moments when people opened up.

While I was waiting for a bus once a woman told me how she'd lost a baby at its birth. Her husband hadn't touched her since. Every day at 1 p.m., after her lunch, she got out her vibrator. I cried when she told me that. What had happened to our lives that we were all so alone?

I used to walk past Cowboy Woman every day while out with my kids. I called her this as she wore the same pair of cowboy boots for about four years until one day, I saw she'd gone and bought herself some FitFlops. I bloody hated both of us for our self-sacrificing martyrdom. I woke up every morning and put on the same shit clothes as no one was going to fuck me anyway, so what was the point?

It wasn't only the women who were the victims of this family life, of course. Many of the men I observed seemed castrated by marriage and parenthood:

emasculated, bullied, controlled. Locked out of the house if they dared to repeat any of their former behaviour as unmarried men.

Little do we realise that when we are doing this to our partner, we are also killing the person we fell in love with. We are slowly losing the man/woman relationship and moving into some kind of asexual mother/son, brother/sister set up.

Then we wonder why we have no sex life to speak of or why it has become a purely physical act.

As I walk away following my chance meeting with Phil I know he is watching me, makingmewatch myself, making the way I walk feel like I could enter it into the ministry of silly walks, as I am so awkward and self conscious. My whole past comes alive for me again: the thrill of being desired, the excitement of attraction. And with it I have a feeling of hope – my God, it is like taking speed – my whole body is buzzing with it.

I leave my son to walk the extra five minutes to his school on his own and continue through my daughter's playground with her. As I do I passed, as always, the Persians huddled together chatting, the Eastern Europeans grouped together chatting, the PTA mums, the few loose dads focusing hard on their BlackBerries, and then the Alpha parents, eyes full of fire, ambition and hatred. But for once it doesn't fill my heart with rage, to see these posses and gangs. In fact I am smiling as I make my way through them. Have I somehow managed to miss the fact that their rage has been mirroring mine and mine is dissipating now.

I kiss my daughter goodbye, and see a different sub-group of parents on leaving – the ones who have been forced to opt out of the race. Perhaps they have children with learning difficulties and are ruled out of competition, or they've parented for long enough to run out of steam, or maybe, in rare cases, their hearts are incorruptible. I realised I was experiencing something in short supply. Sure, we all had hopes and dreams for our kids, but did we have any left for ourselves?

Was I willing to accept the sell-by-date society had handed me or was I finally seeing it for the bullshit that it was?

I felt that I could run a marathon as I make my way home, enjoying for once the chill of the morning. The thought that I might see Phil around any corner is both terrifying and thrilling. I smile at old people and babies alike as I stride on. It is only on reaching home that I realise I've forgotten to do up my body, and it is hanging down at the back outside my trousers.