One day...

One day I will not let it get to me when the Boys start and end the day with a whine.

One day I will stay serene and calm as the pre-breakfast energy-low hits just around the time I'm trying to persuade them that it is a good idea to let me use my icy-cold hands to smear moisturising cream into their eczema-prone skin.

(One day I'll find the right herbal lotion or potion to improve my circulation.)

One day I will ask them to put their shoes on for the school run, and they'll do it, first time. (No - that's never going to happen).

One day I will walk out of the flat for the school run cool, collected, and without the collar of my coat turned the wrong way out or hissing 'Just get up. The. Stairs!' at my sons.

One day I will drink coffee, and like it. The world of double plus plus latte's with mocha shots and fairy wings sprinkled on the top will be my oyster.

One day I will sit in elegant cafes on the King's Road, Chelsea, watching the world go by with newly-polished boots (fxck it - let's just make them new), skinny jeans that don't dig in at the waist because I just can't bear to admit I have gone up a dress-size again, fitted (but not too fitted, because that would be trashy) t-shirts from Joseph, as I talk knowledgably about World Events.

One day I will buy something from Pret a Porter.

One day it will fit.

One day I will click 'open' when my e-mail notifies me that a new piece of news has come through to me from The Financial Times.

One day I will understand the term 'sub-prime'.

One day I will be paid to write.

One day I will have something useful to write about. One day I will be able to walk away from bitchy comments left about pieces I have written on other websites in the understanding that it is not about my issues, but theirs.

One day I will groooooooooove to jazz. One day I will be able to pick a tune out of the discordant jumble of notes and not start itching every time the name Dave Brubeck is mentioned.

One day I will enjoy opera. Or at least, be able to stay awake through it.

One day the Boys won't erupt in the car on the way home from school when I say that no, they can't have a second biscuit because we are only five minutes from home and they can wait to have a sandwich there.

One day the reason there aren't any more biscuits won't be because I snaffled the rest on my way to collect them.

One day the Boys won't mutter and complain when I point out that they chose an extra ten minutes television over a second bed-time story.

One day they will choose that second bed-time story instead of the extra television.

And then, one day, they won't. Because they won't want any bed-time story.

One day, I'll miss the whining at the beginnng and the end of the day. And I'll be glad I loved it - really - whilst I was going through it.