Male Marketers, Don't Forget to Target the Single Woman

Male Marketers, Don't Forget to Target the Single Woman

BOGGLED by phone.

Having her is a long lists of firsts. That's what makes it so endlessly interesting, but this one today was a really mind-boggling one for me: it was the first time I heard her voice on the phone.

My synapses sizzled, the electrons danced in both hemispheres. What amazing thing did she say to make me reel down the street like a drunkard at eight in the morning? "Yes, I'm ok, uh,huh, mmmm, bye." Mindblowing, huh? And then, there I was, with a big grin on my face, as if I'd got a call to say I'd won the lottery.

She's the first loved one ever that I've never heard on the phone. Imagine living with an adult for two and a half years and then suddenly hearing them on the phone. I've wished and wished I could talk to her a million times when I've been in meetings and worried how she was doing. I've fantasised about her being able to call me and tell me how she is. I've heard her talk to so many others on the blower, especially my mother, but never to me.

It had been a bit of an emotional morning. We'd had a fight about getting dressed in time to go to her D- her child carer. And then when we got there and I prepared to rush off

suddenly she sobbed great heaving, stomach wracking sobs. D wasn't impressed: " she's having you on, there's no tears. Stop it young lady , you're upsetting your mum." But I was upset myself about having shouted at her, I'd been horrible, had told her I'd leave her behind if she didn't hurry up! Doors had shut firmly. So we both had a little quiet moment on the sofa while D went off and did her hair. But it wasn't a quiet moment, the sobs didn't stop and finally D had to pull her off me.

Ten minutes later, nearing the tube, I got a text saying all was fine, but there was no way I was going to be fobbed off with that: I called. No crying, D as calm as ever - mind you that woman would be calm even if there were a hundred children living in her shoe. And then she passed the phone to X. I strained to listen, over the cars revving down the Liverpool Road, and then I heard her little, grown up voice. She sounded different: more precise, much older. It was if I was hooked into a weird time-travel call from her future and she was talking to me as a teenager.

Then "bye-eee," she said childishly, suddenly bored. And then I knew she really was ok and wasn't going to cry for me all day. Not that she was really crying for me, anyway; she was crying because life at D's isn't so much fun without her best mate E, who's off on her holidays to France. Maybe I should get D to hook them both up on Skype. That would put a just- won- the -lottery smile on her face, no doubt.

HITTING THE WATER HARD

She's three. She doesn't speak the same language as anyone else, everything looks and smells different from anything she has ever known, and everyone in her new world is a stranger except the woman who came one day and took her away from everything she knew, everything that she thought was her solid, reliable world. She misses her life up till now: all her normal sights, smells, habits, the routine of the orphanage. She's been in the UK for two months now. Her life up till now was in Russia. She's three and a half and has the sweetest little elfin look, a tiny Olga Korbett with a determined jutting chin and little legs that stand wide and strong, prepared for knocks.

Can you imagine being taken away from everything you ever knew, with no warning, no understanding and beginning a new life somewhere else with no contact at all with anyone you ever knew before, and no ability to even tell anyone what you missed or how sad you are? No ability to understand what the plans are for you? No understanding of what is going on or why? No wonder kicking the water really hard is a satisfying thing to do for little N-.

She is fighting the big old woman who has taken her away from her life and now is trying to control her. She's fighting hard all the time. Sometimes with rage, sometimes with fear, sometimes with frustration but mostly to see how her opponent will act, to test her out.

Her opponent looks as if she'd also love to lie on the ground and kick. She's white-faced with exhaustion, looked as if she might keel over flat into the kiddie playpool at any moment. Of the two, little N seemed to be holding up far better. She still has energy to kick her new mum in the face when changing into her swimsuit, still has the energy to lie on the ground and kick her heels when it was time to go. Her mum says that it's likely she'll still be up, banging and kicking, into the late night.

This new mum has been punched and shouted at night and day for two months with no one to help out. She's got no experience in how to parent an easy child, let alone one with all this grief and anger. She's wrestling with some silent guilt. Logically she knows that's N's future would have been bleak but she's aware that, from N's perspective, life may have taken a downturn at the moment. Sometimes, in the middle of the night when she's sill being kicked and hasn't slept she wonders whether she's bitten off more than she can chew. Like all new mums every relationship she's ever had has just changed, and some close family are being very hurtful about her decision to be a mother: her own mother is refusing to be called grandma. She's finding relationships with close friends hard. Some are fed up that she no longer seems to have time for them. Worse are some of the apparently supportive who misunderstand and say:" isn't it great she's so independent'," when little N rushes off into a crowd without a backward look. Her new mum knows this means she still hasn't forged the first beginnings of a viable attachment. They give her ice-creams when her teeth are still rotting and it gives her a sugar hit she's never had before, causing her to bounce off the walls most off the night. They look at this new mum's attempts to give reassuring boundaries in the way of a routine as her being a bit of a boring killjoy of a mum.

X and I met N and J in a cafe. I've never met another single adopter and neither had she . I empathised with her in lots of little ways: for instance when she had a little tirade against bigger families who act as if a family of two is not even a really a valid family, to be considered as having a say in arrangements. We had a playdate in the park. X and I ran around a lot with N while her mum slumped on the rug for a short while. Later N splashed her new mummy in the face with a great slice of water that ricocheted over them both. It was unexpected. They both broke into surprised laughter. It was a good little moment, a little glint of better times to come.

Support Us - Partnerships - UNIFEM

Support Us - Partnerships - UNIFEM

Daddy, her daddy.

We were lying on the bed, sprawling, actually, in the heat, letting the warm air dry us off after our bath. It's the good bit about being 'just me and you', hanging out with X like this. She's such an undemanding friend, always happy to play with a phone or tinker with a toy while I do whatever I choose to do alongside.

I was checking emails with half an ear on a rather good programme about fathers on the on the box, charting the decline of respect for Dads since Victorian times. They played that wonderful clip from The Railway Children- Jenny Aguter running down the

platform crying:" Daddy, my daddy.' It always gets me, -well, it gets everyone, doesn't it- her a teenager letting out her plaintiff childhood cry that shows she's held her Daddy close to her heart throughout his absence. My Daddy was away at sea when I was a little girl but it was when he came home that times were often the most confusing as we'd learned to live without him in many ways while he was away and reassembling the family unit with him back in it meant all kinds of new habits. Maybe the Railway Children would have got fed up with their Daddy being there all the time, if the book hadn't ended.

'Daddy, her daddy!' X, points at the telly. 'That's her Daddy, 'X watches intently as Jenny runs to her Daddy through the steam. 'She's got a Daddy, like my friend E has and like C has,' she turns to tell me.

'That's right,' says I,' but you haven't got one, have you?' I'm interested to know if anyone crops up in her mind. Does she have a father figure?

'No,' she says cheerily, 'can you buy me one?'

WHAT'S YOUR FAVOURITE COLOUR?

This is an often asked question in our house.

My favourite colour is yellow. And my three year olds is red.

I like the fact we like yellow and red because it reminds me of a conversation I had with my sister in 1962 when I settled on yellow as my favourite colour and she settled on red. We were sitting in the back seat of our two tone green Austin waiting for my mother who had nipped into the greengrocers on Bear Flat in Bath. We were looking at a poster for Birds custard with yellow custard on a red jam tart. I remember loving the way the yellow and red swirled together. Later my sister deserted red for green and I'm ashamed to say I then had a brief flirtation with purple- because it was Donny Osmond's favourite colour and then I deserted purple for brown because it was David Cassidy's top colour. This is Information that probably only a methusula mum would know or care about but I still have my purple suede mini skirt and hope that X will wear it one day soon. It's so tiny it won't be long before she's grown out of it- lengthwise anyway.