Daughter: Don’t forget to clap tonight. I would do it but my pots and pans and the utensils I use to beat those pots and pans are in the sink. You’re representing the household. Please don’t bring shame to our doorstep. Make sure you moisturise your hands before 8pm so you don’t give some dry applause.

She storms into my writing room with a bowl of Ben and Jerry’s chocolate fudge ice-cream for breakfast …

Daughter: Like it’s not bad enough that MacDonald’s and Nando’s have shut forever..

Me: What’s happened?

She leans in and points to a solitary grey hair sprouting on her young head…

Daughter: I’ll smoke crack cocaine with a starter of heroin and crystal meth for dessert before I leave this house during lockdown.

Daughter: Mum! Mum! Mum!

Me: What?!

Daughter: Can you make me a sandwich please?

Me: What’s wrong with your legs?

Daughter: Can’t find them.

Me: Don’t care

Daughter: While I’m looking for them can you make me a sandwich.

Me: No.

Daughter: Mum! Mum! Mum!

Me: What?!!

Daughter: Can’t find my legs. Can you make me a sandwich?

Got my headphones on…I’m building muscle, bearing weight, staying sane in uncertain times and shaking my booty & soul to Stormzy. I open my eyes and she’s in the doorway not understanding, no, HORRIFIED at what she’s seeing…

Daughter: Don’t you think we’ve had enough trauma? The world’s turned upside down with COVID-19 and you want to bring me more? No mother, no,  it will never be OK for you to twerk-out to Stormzy. Wasn’t OK before Corona, it isn’t now and never will be. Not ever. Never. Stop. Stop.

Me: Why have you drawn a penis the length of your forearm on your…forearm

Daughter: It’s 2020…a new decade…and I’m dreaming big…

Me: I can’t believe….I mean…I can’t…..you’re 20….20! Only yesterday you were this cheeky….shy…four year old…and now…..20! You’re 20….20

Daughter:  LET GO OF MY ANKLES AND GET OFF THE FLOOR

Me: I think it’s a stray. He’s friendly but a little temperamental

Daughter: Look at the cat. Look at it and tell me it’s not on heroin

Me: I think, if he comes to live with us, we should call him Sammy Davis Jr

Daughter: I am a motherless child. You are not my mother. I have no mother. I will not be calling it by that name. Are you crazy?

A frail elderly patient in the BBC’s Big Hospital Experiment is at last able to feed himself with the loving care of two young volunteers…He turns to them, the angels by his bed…says ‘Thank you’ with grace and a smile and I…lose it….

Daughter: Oh here we go – it’s fucking DIY SOS all over again.