As I got older ,I learnt to stare anybody out

‘The Undateables’ – dreadful name but a great programme .

Did you watch it last night ? All of the three people who registered with the various agencies were amazing and loveable and should have a partner .But the one who really resonated with me was Mary . She was a feisty, funny ,articulate,beautiful young London woman with Achondraplasia .In so many ways she reminded me of Jane .She was very witty and expressive ,using her hands to add to her vibrant speech .Until that wretched,horrible,cruel ,Syringomyelia ,took it’s toll on Jane’s body ,she used her hands a lot and right up until she died , was one of the few people who could really make me belly-laugh …we only had to look at each other to go hysterical. Anyway , apart from the fact Mary played for ‘ The Female Dwarfs Football Team’ , I think Jane would have admired her spirit, determination and lust for life . It broke my heart when talking about finding a partner she said “When you are a little person, it feels like you are asking for more. But you are not – you’re just asking for the same as an average height person ” .Too bloody right – why does our society only feel it is the normal/attractive /successful person who gets the boy/girl .We all have the right to love and be-loved.

Mother had a photo she kept on her wall of the five of us – Mum,Dad,Richard,Jane and I .There weren’t many photos of us all together .I guess it’s probably because Richard is 9 years older than me , so by the age of 10 ( me not him !) ,he had left home .Anyway the photo that Ma treasured was the 5 of us at Land’s End .You know the type – the one with a signpost in the background – Land’s End to Norbury 297miles. I look at that photo and it makes me smile as I was oblivious to how odd we might have looked as a family .Mum and Dad around 5’9″, Richard -6’5″ish and Jane 3’11″( she swore she was 4′ ,but The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, said otherwise ) tall .All I remember was being pissed off as Jane had the nicer of the two hand-knitted poodle design jumpers ,and Richard had lost my beach-ball !

10 Replies to “As I got older ,I learnt to stare anybody out”

  1. I also watched this programme and was spellbound by Mary- she reminded so much of Jane with her personality, sense of humour and her beautiful smile. What a woman and she didn’t look 44! I do so hope she finds her “man”. A great programme- I too loved the guy with Autism too. xx

  2. That description of Mary was entirely Jane – she too was full of spirit, determination and lust for life.

    And her eyes had the biggest sparkle of anybody I know especially when she was about to launch into some wicked humour yet again.

  3. Sally , can you watch it on tinternet – it is a Channel 4 programme ?
    I know – those big brown eyes and the way her skin went almost navy-blue /brown in the sun – she was like no-one else in The Brown Family .When we went to corfu ,one English woman told us ,she used to lie as closest to possible as jane on the beach ,as Jane had the best tan – and the irony was she didn’t even try . Were you there ,when we set the paracending (?) photo up ?

  4. Yes! That was hysterical. Even Alastair remembers that and how little was he. I loved that she wanted to scare the daylights out of Joan with that pic.

    That tan was phenomenal – I was always envious of it, given all I seemed to do was burn to a lobster red 🙂

  5. I found the programme online but it’s not able to be accessed from the colonies – guess they want to see if one of our networks might buy it, rather than give it away to the whole world. Will look out for it though. Agree the title is ghastly….

  6. While clearing out dad’s home over the weekend I came across the letters I sent to my parents while living in the uk and traveling in europe. Strangely enough the first one I plucked randomly from the pile last night to read before sleep was from Corfu describing our time with you guys and Jane. That struck me as quite a coincidence given your question about the photo set up just an hour prior! Do you remember that dinner we had the evening we drove up into the hills away from the tourist mecca. I think I have a photo of that- I’ll dig it out too.

  7. While clearing out dad’s home over the weekend I came across the letters I sent to my parents while living in the uk and traveling in europe. Strangely enough the first one I plucked randomly from the pile last night to read before sleep was from Corfu describing our time with you guys and Jane. That struck me as quite a coincidence given your question about the photo set up just an hour prior! Do you remember that dinner we had the evening we drove up into the hills away from the tourist mecca. I think I have a photo of that- I’ll dig it out too.

  8. Yes I do ..it was beautiful . I also remember you three sleeping in the back of your van – makes our VW look like The Hilton !

  9. Yes, you definitely have the five star version, compared to ours! amazing what you can get used to; can’t believed we lived in it for all those months.

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