Getting my Goat

There are times when it gets to you. Times when the travel, the work, the weather, the never ending child illnesses and the sheer relentlessness of parental responsibility just piles up and if you try to take a step back, a five minute breather, you’re out of the game and any, admittedly vague, semblance of control is lost. The circus now controls the Ring Master and it’s chaos. It’s the same for any parent, or any non-parent; it’s the modern world and we’re all plate spinners now.
The secret is not to add to your burden, recognise what will create extra work and just say ‘No. I don’t want it. I have enough to deal with.’ Any sane person can see that’s just logical self-preservation, right? Right? Natalie is not a sane person.
I made it very clear when we got the goats that I was dead against the idea, they would be trouble I said. Mark my words, I said, no good will come of it, I said. They are, they didn’t, it hasn’t. Maybe the length of the winter is getting to everyone; Toby, normally such a placid dog, took a chunk out of the Queen Hen Tallulah’s backside last weekend for getting too near his bone. Vespa, an affectionate cat in many ways wouldn’t let anyone go near her all week until we finally realised she had a painful tick in her ear that was so big it looked like she had a hearing aid. Her brother Flame now returns from his night-time sojourns increasingly beaten up, this week he has a cut lip to go with his split ear but rather than hide these scars he parades them like a barroom drunk pleased with his medals.
The goats though, are the worst. One of them head-butted Vespa the other day leaving her even more dazed following the traumatic tick removal but Chewbacca especially, the least sociable of the goats, is an increasing problem.
Monday is my weekend. I don’t sleep on a Saturday because of travel so I go to bed early on a Sunday night, lie in on the Monday and laze about while Natalie is at work and the boys are all at school. I don’t answer the phone or the door. It’s me time and I guard it preciously. Thérence though was unwell again this week, his cold now lasting almost as long as winter itself, so he stayed at home. Then I got a call from Samuel’s collège late morning saying that once again he had fallen over on his head, and on an old scar too(as if there are now any scar-free areas) and was complaining of dizziness. He needed to come home and as I picked him up I was tempted to swing by Maurice’s school and bring him home too as a pre-emptive measure.
Clearly my ‘weekend’ was ruined but, you know, parent stuff and all that, can’t be helped. As I got the boys back in the phone rang, which isn’t exactly unusual as for some reason we are getting about a dozen sales calls a day at the moment and so we’ve stopped answering the thing. This actually hasn’t deterred them and so the next tactic is for me to answer the phone and ‘pretend’ not to understand. This was the boys’ idea and is a little hurtful but it may work. Anyway, I ignored the phone. Samuel was gingerly laying down on the sofa and groaning, Thérence was streaming with a cold and also groaning and then the doorbell rang.
“What now?!” I yelled as the dogs went berserk at the front gate. Maybe my new suit had arrived so I allowed myself a brief moment of optimism as I went to answer the bell. It was a young man with very definite Parisian looks, maybe the sales calls had just got personal.
“Bonjour,” he said a tad warily I thought, “erm, have you lost a goat?”
I sighed heavily and let my head drop. “I don’t know,” I answered, “but it’s certainly possible.” The man had come from a neighbour, our immediate neighbour, who is an old lady of 90 plus years who values her roses even above her independence and who had instructed one of her visiting grandsons to see if I’d mislaid any livestock. I followed the man next door and there indeed was Chewbacca munching perilously close to the young rose bushes. The young man was joined by his brother who may even have been his twin and then they looked at me. As Parisians they were clearly unsuited to the task of goat recovery and in seeking help next door I think they’d expected to find a man of the soil, a handy goat man not a man in Prince of Wales check trousers, a cravat and tassled loafers.
For an hour I tried to trap that goat, an hour. I tried tempting him with food, I tried lassoing him with a dog lead, I tried shouting obscenities at him but I couldn’t get near him. At one point he ran close by and I tried to rugby tackle him, missed and hit the driveway pretty hard. I lay there for a minute to gather my thoughts.
“Are you okay?” asked one of the brothers
“No.” I said. “I think I’ve torn my trousers.”
It had all begun in standard comic fashion. We had all three of us, tried trapping Chewbacca or grabbing him as he sped past, but it had now got beyond a joke and the Parisians were seriously wondering if it would ever end and whether in fact I had any plans for catching Chewbacca at all beyond waiting for his eventual death from old age. I had no plan, that was obvious.
“Have you got a gun?” I asked, half jokingly.
“No.”They replied rapidly and in unison, not seeing the humour and seriously worrying for their Grandmother’s safety with this strangely dressed nut-job living next door. I think by this point even Chewbacca was getting bored. I couldn’t contain myself any longer, my shoes were a muddied mess, my trousers were ripped at the knee and in a fit of genuine anger I tore off my cravat, folded it into my pocket and then as the goat made another flypast I howled in primeval anger and took a flying leap at the thing. I landed on him, put my arms around him and rolled a few yards, finally coming to a stop dangerously near to the precious roses. The two men stared in disbelief, their cigarettes hanging from their open mouths.
I stood up still hugging a shocked Chewbacca. “Open the gate!”  I demanded, choosing loud orders over genuine composure. I carried Chewbacca back round to our house and fortunately he didn’t struggle in my arms or I wouldn’t have been able to hold him. I even managed to open the stable door with one arm and hold him with the other, from a short distance we must have looked like a really angry ventriloquist and his dummy. I threw him into the stable, swore at him again and locked him in.
Even after dinner that night I hadn’t calmed down. Maurice had come home from school feeling sick making the place look like a children’s ward and I was now limping after damaging my knee, which I had done I pointed out to Natalie, while ripping my trousers, while catching your bloody goat! I was laying it on thick that’s for sure, but I was very annoyed.
One by one they left the dinner table and without actually saying they were avoiding me reconvened upstairs as a group where they were playing songs on YouTube and enjoying themselves. There was laughter and happiness but I frankly wanted no part of it. I stayed at the table with the wine.
“Daddy?” It was Maurice venturing nervously halfway down the stairs.
“Yes?”
“Mummy wants to know...”
“What?”
“ Elvis Presley?”
“What about Elvis Presley?”
“Was it the top half or the bottom half they weren’t allowed to film?”
Really, is it any wonder my life is such chaos?

The book published May 6 is called - A la Mod: My So-Called Tranquil Family Life in Rural France and can be pre-ordered HERE!