Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?

to write. So hard to do/be.
    And the people I have hurt, the mistakes I have made, the damage to myself and others, wasn't poor judgement; it was the place where love had hardened into loss.
    I am in a taxi going out of Manchester. I have flowers. I have the address. I feel terrible. Susie calls me. ‘Where are you?’ No idea, Susie . ‘How long have you been in the cab?’ About fifty years .

    Manchester is either bling or damage. The warehouses and civic buildings have become hotels and bars or fancy apartments. The centre of Manchester is noisy, shiny, brash, successful, flaunting its money as it always did from the moment it became the engine of England.
    Travel out further, and the changing fortunes of Manchester are evident. The decent rows of solid terraces have been slum—cleared and replaced with tower blocks and cul—de—sacs, shopping compounds and gaming arcades. Indian cash—and—carry outlets seem to make a living, but most of the small shops are boarded up, lost on fast, hostile roads.
    Now and again, forlorn and marooned, there's a four—square stone building that says Mechanics’ Institute or Co—operative Society. There's a viaduct, a cluster of birch trees, a blackened stone wall; the remains of the remains. A tyre warehouse, a giant supermarket, a minicab sign, a betting shop, kids on skateboards who have never known life any other way. Old men with bewildered faces. How did we get here?
    I feel the same anger I feel when I go back to my home town twenty miles away. Who funds municipal vandalism and why? Why can decent people not live in decent environments? Why is it tarmac and metal railings, ugly housing estates and retail parks?
    I love the industrial north of England and I hate what has happened to it.
    But I know these thoughts are my own way of distracting myself. The taxi is slowing down. This is it, JW We're here.
    As I get out of the cab I feel trapped, desperate, desperately frightened and physically sick. Susie has always said to me to be in the feeling and not to push it away, however difficult.
    I have a hysterical impulse to sing ‘Cheer Up Ye Saints of God’. But no, that's the other childhood, the other mother.
    The door opens before I knock. There's a man there who does look rather like me. I know I have a half—brother so this must be him. ‘Gary?’ I say. ‘Hello, sister,’ says Gary.
    And then there's a scuffle from the kitchen and two tiny dogs appear bouncing up and down like hairy yo—yos, and from a tangle with the washing line, which at below—freezing temperatures shows true optimism, in comes my mother.
    She is small, bright—eyed, with an open smile.
    I am very pleased to see her. ‘I thought I'd get the washing done before you got here,’ is her very first line.
    It is just what I would say myself.
    Ann knows about my life. I sent her the DVD of Oranges as a kind of ‘This is what happened while you were out’. She feels distress at Winterson—world and my other mother's flamboyant craziness upsets her. ‘I'm sorry I left you. I didn't want to, you know that, don't you? I had no money and nowhere to go and Pierre wouldn't bring up another man's child.’
    I had thought as much . .. but I didn't say anything because it didn't seem fair to Gary for his new half—sister just—arrived to start laying into his deceased dad.
    I don't want her to be upset. ‘I don't mind,’ I said.
    Later, when I relay this to Susie, she decides, when she can stop laughing, that this is the world's most inadequate response. ‘I don't mind? Just put me on the step until the van with the Gospel Tent comes by. I don't mind!’
    But, it's true ... I don't mind. I certainly don't blame her. I think she did the only thing she could do. I was her message in a bottle thrown overboard.
    And I do know, really know, that Mrs W gave me what she could too — it was a dark gift but not a useless one.
    My mother is straightforward and kind. This feels odd to me. A female parent is meant to be labyrinth—like and vengeful. I have been worried about declaring the girlfriend because Ann has already asked me about a husband and children. But the girlfriend must be declared.
    ‘Do you mean you don't go with men?’ she says.
    And I suppose that is what I mean.
    ‘I have no problem with that,’ says Ann.
    ‘Me neither,’ says Gary.
    Hold on ... that's not what's supposed to happen . . . what's supposed to happen is as follows:
    I am determined to tell Mrs Winterson that I