Never have I seen such an assortment of shapes and sizes gathered in one room; I thought I had walked into a Hall of Mirrors. It’s not often I’m the slimmest, youngest and, dare I say it, the most attractive person in the room (in fact, never), but I was nailing this.
Originally cast as a grieving widow in the warm church, I was demoted to one of a hundred starving peasants in the freezing January cold outside when they saw how short I was. Hating the stain the make-up department had put on my teeth intended to make them look rotten, I’d been to the toilet and wiped it off.
I quickly realised I was not a fan of oysters, but found that if I covered them with the onion red vinegar, black pepper, Tabasco sauce and lemon, I could just about get them down. In fact, I might as well have just cut out the middle man and had the drink in the shell. In my first month in Paris, I lost three quarters of a stone consuming mainly champagne and oysters; it’s still my favourite diet of all time.
The doctor had earlier said I had “stubborn stools” as I lay patiently on my back, awaiting the great swirling movie of my bowels he encouraged me to watch in the overhead mirror. By the time the Vindaloo had done its stuff later on, they weren’t so much stubborn as eagerly trying to sell themselves on the Black Market.
I was always Gaggie Nennens to Dad, just as I would always be the little girl who was never old enough to cross the road by herself. Well into my twenties, when I went home and would venture out for, heaven forbid, a pint of milk, he would warn: “Be careful crossing the road.” When we went for a drink, after two minutes he would be wiping his eyes, as if he had never even recovered from the fact that I learned to speak.
How do people find the time to worry so much about what others are doing in their sex lives? I can barely get it together to think about whether I can be arsed to reach the remote for the telly, let alone hire a speaker system to discuss what people get up to amongst themselves. Who cares? Unless there is evidence of abuse, you can build a multi-storey in your vagina or rear end and you won’t hear any complaints from me.
Who would have thought her last words to me would be in Latin, a language she had never learned but, as with her limited French, one she resorted to when English was inadequate. Her greatest fear was losing her mind, which she never did. Being in control of her faculties was a blessing to her, but a frustration to others, not least the medical staff and carers who were powerless to make her eat, sleep, or do her physiotherapy if her favorite shows were on the TV.
Why didn’t I think of it sooner? I’m getting straight on the phone to the White House as I think I’ve found the solution to the whole wall problem. Within hours, I could bring to a halt the shutdown that is crippling America. I could be next year’s Time Magazine Person of the Year. I might get freedom of the City of Washington. I could become President Trump’s New Best Friend.
A few days ago, my comments about wanting Christmas to be over attracted considerable antagonism on Facebook. It felt like Brexit Revisited – no one being allowed to voice an opinion without the risk of entering into full scale battle.
I confess to having had a great deal of therapy before coming to terms with my trans-tall self. People always assumed that I was just a raucous Welsh dwarf who laughed too loudly and partied too much. Now, they will know the truth: I was a giant trapped in a small woman’s body, and there was just too much of me trying to contain itself in the tiny frame for which I was never meant.