Total Recall

                        The house I grew up in has been put up for sale. My wife spotted the advert on the internet. Which means my mother, soon, will be moving out.

            My mother and I had a blazing row, soon after my father died, and she threw me out of that house. I’ve never been back.

            In a way, it’s a relief. There was a lot of unhappiness in that house. I feel like a curse is about to be lifted. I won’t say I never had any happiness there, but always, in the background, there was tension. The older I got, the more I came to realize that I belonged to a weird family. Alan Bennett said, about his own family, that, without it being anything special, it was utterly unlike anyone else’s. So it was with mine; the difference being that the Bennetts at least seemed to be on each other’s side.

            I feel slightly like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Total Recall, in that all my happy memories seems false. My poor dad was putting up with more than he ever let on.

            I hope that my mother will be happy, wherever she ends up, and I hope that the house’s new owner brings some happiness to it.