onlyemma's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Karen Game Since descending back into normality and not a world of prospective pimps and prostitutes in London, I have once again spent a lot of time balancing on the back legs of my desk chair and drinking many cups of tea. I�ve been on a few walks with Shelley too, which has been very nice as we gave up jogging in 2006 and now only leave the house for strolls. We had a long walk on Easter Monday when it appeared that the world had stopped as no one was around. We pretended there had been an alien invasion and we were the only survivors and invented a Safety Pod in which, when people finally did emerge on the streets, everyone was escaping to. By the time we got to the Co-op we had it all planned out. Shelley and I are particularly good at pretending things. On our way back from the Co-op after terminating our make-believe game due to there being too many people on the streets and it becoming too complicated and somewhat samey (there are only so many times you can see an empty child-seat in a car and exclaim, �the baby�s been vapourised!�); we started to reminisce about our favourite make-believe childhood game, The Karen Game. When we were younger, Katie, Shelley and I used to play a game involving an invisible house which we�d conjured up on our drive and knew every inch of. We had 6 invisible children each (one of Shelley�s being called Karen � a character from the Babysitter�s Club � hence the somewhat bizarre game title) and a constantly escaping invisible dog named Biscuit. I was married to Ronan Keating from Boyzone, whilst Katie and Shell were both married to Stephen Gately, though one of them had to change their husband�s name to avoid confusion (but we all knew he looked like Stephen). We were all sisters; had lovely invisible cars; occasionally we�d drop the kids off at Gran and Grandad�s which was the lamppost at the end of the road, and Church Hill was where invisible Sainsbury�s was situated, where I�d often buy Ronan�s favourite meal: pasta � or so Top Of The Pops magazine told me. The jist of t he game was that we were designers living in a huge house together, with massive families, married to our favourite Irish pop stars. We�d tell our invisible children off a lot, moan about how much work we had to do as well as tidying the house, forget everyone�s names, and run around the streets shouting, �Biscuit! Biscuit! Here Boy!� Most days we�d also �drive� to the supermarket by walking down our road with our hands grasping an unseen steering wheel and going, �Brrrrrrrrr brrrrrrrrrrrr brrrrrrrr! Michael stop hitting your sister!� and turning round to waggle our fingers and give a good telling off to nothing in particular. Our game spanned three years, and it wasn�t just confined to the times we�d say, �oh, shall we play the Karen game?� either � we lived and breathed the Karen Game. Katie, Shelley and I would walk down to school together with our arms out and our fists clenched, pushing our invisible push chairs, and I�d have my arms spread a little wider as I had a double buggy for the twins. Every weekday before we got to school we�d drop our kids off at invisible nursery (down Church Hill, at the gate on the right). Sometimes we�d hear the whistle being blown in the playground, signalling that we should be at school and lining up to go inside, but this wouldn�t even encourage us to forget about the game or our invisible offspring; and we�d just play the game faster. We�d take our children out of their invisible prams a bit quicker and shout �Love you, darlings! Love you!� as we raced down the hill to the school gates with our long socks, pony tails and backpacks with yesterdays empty yoghurt pot and plastic spoon still jangling around inside. There was only one time when we forgot to pick our children up after school, and that was when one of us had just bought a new Boyzone sticker book and we were too absorbed. We were a bit worried when we realised the next morning and I even had a churned up stomach because of it; not dissimilar to the kind I�d had during the summer of 1995 when I left my pencil case on my desk in Mr Davis�s classroom for the 6 week holidays. You can�t say we weren�t dedicated. However once we�d got over that hurdle we had a cosy little abode and in its third year I even decided it was time to build an extension out on the pavement. I�d just adopted Geri from the Spice Girls and she needed a dance studio; so after consulting with Kate and Shell and going over a few blue prints we had the builders in for a few weeks and I made many a cup of hot invisible tea, I can tell you. When we remembered it was there; the extension went down a treat (some days we�d walk right through it) and everyone was as pleased as punch. Especially Geri, before I kicked her out. Katie and Shelley found it harder to get used to though as they never really knew exactly where it was or what it looked like, as I�d built it in my head and not theirs. However, despite the idiosyncratic differences to the extension�s imagined furniture and decor, collectively we all knew it was upstairs, and we had to stamp our feet thirteen times to get to it. 7:05 p.m. - 2008-03-26 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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