Today I helped at school. At playtime, a little girl ran up to me. She was a lovely child, and she asked me if I had any tatoos. Twice. Now, I don't look like a Hell's Angel, and there's nothing that screams tatoos about me. She insisted : 'have you got any tatoos there?', while pulling her sleeve up. I thought she was going to show me one of those temporary tatoos but there was nothing on her forearm. Then she told me very proudly that her brother had a tatoo there, there an there. Forearm, top of thumb and chest. The forearm says 'jobcentre', the thumb says 'money' and he's tattooed his girlfriend's name on his chest. I was a bit miffed, given that the girl was about 6 years old. I imagined a 10 year old full of tatoos. But then she announced even more proudly that the girlfriend was pregnant. When I asked her brother's age, she said '17'. Goodness! Barely coming out the other side of puberty and embarking into fatherhood already.
I haven't seen the mum who does the school drop in her pyjamas and wellies for a while. Shame, she used to brighten my day. In the summer she used to just turn up in her pjs, no coat on, as though she'd just jumped out of bed.