Taking the 'smashing the shuttlecock' approach

April reflections (a little late but better than never)

Photo by aboodi vesakaran on Unsplash

I realise we’re rapidly approaching the end of May, but I haven’t done my April round-up yet, and I promised myself I would commit to making that a regular thing. The whole point of the reflections monthly piece was for me to pause, just for a moment, to look back, think about what I’ve been doing, and consolidate my memories.

Otherwise, life picks up pace and before I know it, I’m frazzled and struggling to remember what I had for breakfast, never mind what I did last month.

May has been hectic, really, really hectic (more about that in May’s update—I’m getting ahead of myself), so I’m looking forward to taking some time to be still and think (about April, not May, and definitely not anything else). I’ve made myself a cup of Yorkshire Decaf (in my favourite Create mug). I’m sitting at the kitchen table, and I’m delving into the archive of my mind…and my phone pictures, which is much more reliable than my brain, which is fried because of the May shenanigans, which I will tell you about later and definitely not today because today… today, we’re going back to April.

And breathe…that said, I’ve just had a panic that I didn’t write March’s update—so a quick check in my Substack archive and I realised I did. If you missed it, you can catch up here.

Anyway, where was I? April…

Well, April was a LOT of fun. I’m typing that in capital letters because April is always fun. My sister and niece both have their birthdays in April, so there’s cake for that and chocolate at Easter and the days are brighter and warmer and it’s really rather lovely.

Our celebrations start on the first of the month with my sister’s birthday—yes, April Fool’s Day. Before my sister was born, my parents told me they were having a boy, that I would have a brother and he’d be called Richard. I was so excited. But on April Fool’s Day back in 1982 when my nan rushed upstairs to tell me I had a baby sister, I pointed at the spare room, and said, ‘But that’s Richard’s room.’

It wasn’t an April Fool’s joke. At just two years and nine months old, my world as I knew it shattered. The force that is my sister had arrived and was here to stay. I cried, obviously. I’d lost a brother and gained my sister.

At that moment, my nan should have said, ‘Don’t worry, Elizabeth. There will come a time when you’ll be grateful you have a sister. She will cook Christmas dinner every year so you don’t have to and… AND she will come with you to see Chesney Hawkes. Twice.’

In fact, she didn’t just come with me to see him—she organised it too—and for that and the Christmas hosting, I will be forever grateful. I’m sure Richard, the brother I never had, would have been like my husband and drawn his line at Jason Donovan. Not my sister. She was right with me.

Two days after her birthday this year, we toddled off to Leeds to see Chesney Hawkes. We had one of the best nights ever and made amends for the drumstick disaster of 1991. If you missed last week’s piece, about us meeting Chesney Hawkes, you can read it here.

Puppy cuddles, with Chesney, my sister attacking her cake with a machete, Tour de Clumber Park, chilly in the Lakes, chocolate, a teenager in the house, birthday decorations, Belfast 7kg challenge

Also in April, the husband, niece and I took on the Tour de Clumber Park—not an event as such, just the three of us on hired bikes.

‘I haven’t been on a bike for years,’ I said, as we arrived. ‘Will I be okay?’

‘It’s like riding a bike,’ Chris said.

‘Have you been on a bike in the last year?’ the chap at the cycle hire asked.

‘I’ve been on a spin bike,’ I said. ‘But not a real bike.’

The man looked a little concerned, his face clouding.

‘She’ll be fine,’ Chris reassured him.

We cycled 20 miles around the park, stopping for lunch and then tea and flapjack (ice cream for Olivia).

On one particularly tough incline, Olivia got off. ‘My legs are cramping,’ she said, but then saw some people walking down the hill, didn’t want to embarrass herself, so got back on and pedalled.

As she reached the top, I was there, shouting and cheering encouragement—like the crowds at the top of the mountains on the Tour de France, but just me.

Olivia’s legs were turning at speed, but the bike was hardly moving.

‘Come on, Olivia. Well done! Woohoowoohooo…’

I might have been mistaken, but at this point, I’m pretty sure my niece raised her middle finger in my direction—discreetly, so discreetly I couldn’t quite be sure that’s what she’d done.

Thankfully, Chris caught it on camera. We now have photographic evidence of my number one niece giving me the finger at the top of a Clumber hill climb. We did what all sensible adults would have done in this situation and reprimanded her for her offensive behaviour—sorry, no; we laughed our socks off, then a few days later framed the picture and gave it to her as a birthday present (parenting is my sister’s job).

We thought it was the last picture we’d ever take of our niece, because after 20-miles riding the ups and downs in Clumber Park, she was so exhausted she didn’t even want to go in the gift shop. She went to the car, collapsed on the back seat, and didn’t wake until Wednesday.

‘Have we killed her?’ I asked Chris, as we stared at her sprawled out.

‘Possibly,’ he said. ‘Still, it’s been a fun day.’

It was all good training because a few weeks later, Olivia won her school Tour de Year Eight competition. Last year, she came second, so this year she was on a mission.

I reacted like she’d won Olympic gold. ‘You won! You won! I AM SO PROUD! We need to get you to a velodrome. Does Barnsley have a velodrome? Why don’t we? This girl needs a velodrome.’

‘It was just the school competition,’ Olivia said. ‘Five minutes on a spin bike.’

‘It just the start,’ I said. ‘Move over, Laura Kenney. Olivia has arrived.’

‘You’re so embarrassing, Auntie Liz.’

‘You’ve got talent,’ I told her. ‘I’ve been spinning for 20-years and haven’t reached such speeds.’

After that excitement, there was also the excitement of meeting my friend’s new puppy—a beautiful springer spaniel. There is nothing better than a puppy cuddle. It makes everything so much better.

We had a trip to the Lyceum in Sheffield to see Dear Evan Hansen, which I could have sworn my sister told me was a comedy.

‘You said it was a comedy,’ I said.

She looked horrified. ‘It’s not a comedy. It’s quite dark.’

It was.

Around Easter, Chris and I took what has become an annual spring trip to the Lake District, where we accidentally climbed a mountain, enjoyed the delights of the chocolate shop, and relaxed in the pub, listening to the rain hammering down outside.

Confession here, I had to do some writing while on holiday to meet an anthology submission deadline. Working on holiday is not ideal, but I was really passionate about the project so it had to be done.

Then, towards the end of the month, it was my niece’s birthday. She wanted a barbecue, but as her birthday was over the Easter bank holiday weekend, and as it always rains on bank holidays, we had to do an indoor-outdoor type of event.

Between the showers, we popped outside to play badminton, which is our family sport. We used to spend hours playing over the washing line when we were kids. I have yet to beat my dad in a game. He was the 1981 Barnsley badminton champion and isn’t prepared to ruin the accolade by letting his children beat him. Ever.

We’re happy that Olivia is enjoying the sport, too.

‘Do you think I can hit the shuttlecock over the house?’ she asked.

‘No!’ we all said. ‘Absolutely not. It’ll get stuck on the roof, and we’ll end up having to climb up to get it down. You can’t do that.’

‘I can,’ she said.

‘You can’t.’

‘I can.’

‘Please don’t, Olivia. It’ll get stuck.’

‘It won’t,’ she said. And with that, she picked up her racket and served. Imagine Djokovic serving for the Wimbledon final (it was just like that – but badminton). She wacked the shuttlecock, clearing the house, not once, not twice but three times, before fatigue set in and it got stuck in the gutter.

There are lessons here. I make a big thing of saying never to put boundaries around what we think is possible, to always take a ‘no limits’ approach, to never say you can’t do something. Yet, here I was, telling my niece that she couldn’t do it.

‘I’m sorry, I said that,’ I told her. ‘You can do anything.’

The lesson is to always believe you can and you will, and also, never to tell a 13-year-old they can’t do something because they will just do it anyway.

Sports psychology over, Olivia and I tried to retrieve the shuttlecock from the gutter. ‘Pick me up,’ she said.

I didn’t have the strength. ‘You pick me up,’ I said.

At which point, she put her arms around my lower body and lifted. I cleared the gutter and grabbed the shuttlecock. At five foot ten, I am a big unit and could not believe that little Olivia had the strength to lift me. She has youth and gymnastics on her side.

The incident made me re-evaluate my own strength training, which is non-existent. Now every time I make a brew, I do some kettlebell exercises. Give me a few weeks and I’ll be like She-Ra.

I finished the month with the toughest challenge of my career so far. Could I make it to Belfast for a conference with only 7kg of baggage allowance? Given I usually travel with a full library in my suitcase, it wouldn’t be easy, but I did it.

What I’ve been writing in April.

I spent a lot of the month umming and ahhing about whether to enter the Comedy Women in Print Competition. Could I do it? Would I be ready? Yes. No. I don’t know…I should have taken my niece’s ‘smashing the shuttlecock over the house approach’ and just done it. It would have saved so much mental anguish.

On a positive, I submitted one of my essays—the one I wrote on my hols in the Lakes—to an anthology, and I did a few extra Substack pieces. Here’s the link to the archive if you missed them.

So that was April. It was fun, and it’s been nice to stop and think about everything that happened. Sometimes, life is better when we hit pause, just for a while.

Liz xx

How was your month? I’d love to know. Let me know in the comments.

About me: I’m Liz Champion, a writer from Yorkshire, who is now applying the ‘smash the shuttlecock’ approach to my writing career.