Caught

Tingirl got a laptop for Christmas, and has been on it virtually non-stop on the kitchen ever since. She was on it on Sunday when Mrs Tin walked into the kitchen (I’ve just looked up at the title and the way this story seems to be heading, but don’t worry, it’s nothing like that). I was in the next room watching somebody beat somebody else by ten or twenty runs, or points, or goals, or possibly even doubles (the cricket/rugby/football/darts I’ve watched over the last five days has all become a bit blurred) so I wasn’t paying too much attention till I heard Mrs Tin exclaim “how did you do that?”.

“I didn’t,” replied Tingirl, “I think it might have been Dad.”

Now, all I’d done with her laptop (after all, her brothers had set it up, they know far more than I do) was show her how to find You-Tube, where, to our eternal shame (and quite possibly our eternal damnation) we continued my weekend of sport by watching the Pope being rugby-tackled. Therefore I had no idea what they were talking about until the next sentence, which was Tingirl giggling and saying “look, it talks about Tingirl. And Tinsons.”

With the words “Oh” and “Shit” now taking up so much of my mind that I’m surprised I’d enough brainpower left to actually walk, I made by way to the kitchen.

Apparently, one of Tingirl’s friends had told her that if she typed “Bray School Project” into Google Images she’d find a picture of herself aged about four. So she did, and found this picture. Not only that, but she then clicked into the link, and found this post, about her last day at that school.

And not only not only that, but she’s told her brothers, so now they all know about my blog.

In fairness, I’ve never actually hidden the fact. For example, the little bag that we all got at the Irish Blog Awards last year is hanging over the back of one of the chairs in the kitchen, as I use it to keep things like the link for my camera and my iPod where I can find them. They all knew that I wrote stuff on the internet, but this was the first time they realised that sometimes it’s about them.

I know that Jo’s been wanting me to tell them about it for ages, and on the one hand I’m quite pleased, and I hope they read it, and enjoy it. But the problem with the phrase “on the one hand” is that, unless you’re Captain Hook, the phrase “on the other hand” is generally in hot pursuit.

And on the other hand… not everything in this blog is happy. I’m not sure how I feel about them knowing that I have a history of depression, a psychiatrist and a strange obsession with Yelena Isinbayeva.

Imagine Tingirl, who’s just 13, reading about, say, the days when I was just too down to go to work, and realising that I’m not the wonderful strong man she thinks I am (worse still, imagine her reading that last sentence, rolling her eyes and saying “ohmygod, like, what an idiot. He thinks I think he’s wonderful”).

I’ve thought about it for two days, and all I can do is keep going as I have been. I’ve another appointment with the shrink coming up soon, & I’ll write about it just as I did before. If I start to change it to hide stuff from them, I might as well give it up. So I’ll just carry on as before.

Which is bad news for Tinson2, as today’s original post was to feature a picture of him at the age of eight, and that has just been deferred until tomorrow.