Host and Guest

[smokingboot]

Four days with the in-laws, pleasant enough but a little fraught. They are ardent Tory Brexiters quite unable to stop taking pops at the EU and talking up the Leave position, while trying not to directly refer to either. The result is a slow rolling avalanche of passive-aggressive context-free nonsense.

MIL:The country is overcrowded. (Code: It's the immigrants again.)
Me: 70% of Great Britain is used for agriculture. The land is not overcrowded.
MIL doesn't answer.

MIL and FIL in tandem: VAT is disgraceful, taxing necessities! We should do away with it and have a luxuries tax (code: Like the Purchase Tax we had before we joined the horrible EU)
Me: That's going to decrease tax revenue isn't it? Don't we need that for public services?
(Code: Considering that you called an ambulance out for a headache, you are the last people who should be arguing for less cash in the treasury. )
MIL: Well I am not an economist...
Me: Silence (Code: True Dat.)

FIL: Wouldn't it be wonderful to have TV programmes about apprenticeships in Britain's Industries? The Germans can't stop talking about German engineering, why shouldn't we talk about ours? (Code: People only want to be in the EU because we lack pride in our own achievements, we just need to show them how great we are.)
Me: Which Germans are these? I know quite a few and none of them ever talk about German engineering. (Code: these engineering-obsessed Germans commandeering every conversation on the subject don't actually exist, do they?)
FIL : We should be proud of British things and why shouldn't we talk them up, why shouldn't we have pride in what we can do, there's this great company that speciaises in genomes and another one that developed parachute silk... ( Code: We don't need the EU. All We Need Is Faith. )

Faith, god I am sick of faith as touted by Johnson and his cronies, the Great British Fake Off. It isn't as though we are spared trumpets of glory and reminders of greatness. Go into any supermarket and all the produce is labelled British this and British that, you can't get away from the Union Jack. It just reeks of inadequacy and desperation.

I can write. Not always here because I'm relaxed and lazy, but yes, I can write. So OK, that's twice I've mentioned it. Who needs me to mention it again? How about a scenario in which I don't keep talking about whatever talent I may/may not have, and instead just demonstrate it? When a book or play or whatever comes out, then is the judgement to be made and the reader can make it. I trust no-one needs me to keep repeating my initial claim, in fact, the more I repeat it, the less convincing it sounds. There is something so stupid in the idea that we just need to keep telling ourselves and each other how great we are and all will be well. We don't need chivvying or cheerleading into positive productivity. We need facts, not faith, and even more than this, we need people like my in-laws to stop supporting crooks in power.

I didn't have time to express this coherently because the MIL blew.

We made up of course, but it was a blot on an otherwise pleasant time; Stirling Castle in the sunshine, Edinburgh the day after and two days of very little after that. I did my best to be generous, but am still irritated that the lady, who demands no-one ever shout,lost her temper and shouted at me in my own house. I have tried to be a better host than she was a guest, and did my best to ensure they left here in good spirits. I know that they are good, honest, hard-working folk, but it is hard to avoid the impression that they are also very spoilt old pets who stay sweet-tempered provided the world around them is settled just as they like. What's laudable about that? We're all saints in such circumstances. The laudable thing is that I didn't tell them to go to hell. It may be that I need to develop more patience.

And of course, they want us to go visit them in Spring, and my husband is eager to get dates in the diary. I am reluctant. They expect the rules of good behaviour as suits their preference, but if they can't apply it to themselves as guests, I don't fancy their chances of recalling it as hosts.

It will be fine when we do it... I think... but I'll leave it for a good few months. Enough is enough.