I was accosted at Oscar's school yesterday. The teacher was looking a little embarassed. She said 'Does Oscar really like his cardigan?' So I said, 'well yes I hope he does'. It is a happy hand me down and it has a dog on it, a big red number 8 and a hood. Oscar has been wearing it for about the last two or three years so there is no longer any problem with the cuffs trailing in paint and nutella. 'Ah' she said, and then Oscar piped up 'I do like my cardigan Mummy'. So then the teacher said 'Well is it Oscar who always wants to put it on?' And it was then I realised. Either she thinks I don't want to explain to Oscar that he is actually growing or she thinks I am loopy enough not to have noticed it myself. Kindly I reassured her this was not the case, that he had indeed another, bigger, cardigan for the summer, but to be honest for the last seven months neither he nor I have taken off our winter woollies. So I saved her my reflections on my own wardrobe and came back thinking how wierd is that. Oscar has had a new pair of trousers every six weeks because they get huge holes in the left knee. He has a new coat, masses of new shoes. But what she picks up on is his cardigan. Is it that she is really too frightened to mention his hair? And here one realises one is a victim of one's circumstances. Oscar has golden hair which used to fall in ringlets like a cherub. The ringlets have fallen out and the hair has darkened a little. But clean and in the sunshine it is a lovely golden mop around his head. About half of the people I meet - Pierrot in the countryside, aged 75, particularly, try to tell me that short hair is part and parcel of being male, as if I might have missed this. Now I know that if Oscar's hair was mousy and straight, it would probably be short too. But no one else knows this. They just think - 'Poor demented thing, she doesn't know her child is a boy'. And now we can add 'Poor demented thing, she doesn't know he's actually growing!'