Women are from Venus and men have vision problems

Last saturday I had to take Holly to gymnastics so Rob had the job of taking our middle son to his first soccer grading morning.

Rob had a hangover which he did his best to pretend didn’t exist (10 of out of 10 for your stellar performance by the way, Rob) .. and I hurried off and left the boys still in their pjs with instructions of where to go, what time and what Charlie had to wear.

As I drove off I felt so sorry for Rob because he obviously felt dreadful but I was a bit nervous leaving him with such limited instructions and a muddled beer brain because left to his own devices in circumstances like that, things always go wrong. Usually because of his selective hearing problem. Like the swimming incident of 2014.

On the way back from gymnastics I figured the boys would still be at soccer so Holly and I stopped in to watch the end of it. My heart started racing when I couldn’t find them at first, thinking he’d forgotten or he’d gone to the wrong field, etc. you never really know what you’re going to get in these situations.

I breathed a huge sigh of relief when I saw Rob’s face in the crowd and felt a huge goosh of love that he’d gotten it right and I wandered over and took one look at Charlie and had to do a double take.

There he was standing in full school uniform. Even though it was a saturday and he isn’t even playing for his school, it’s a local club.

“Why on earth is he in his uniform?”

“Um, he wanted to wear it”. Rob told me and I could tell from his facial expression he was at around Defcon 2 panic mode.

Now I know that isn’t true. No boy wants to look different when they are at soccer trials. They all want to look like David Beckham.

He looked nothing like David Beckham. Especially when I looked down to his feet and saw he was wearing his big brother’s football boots that are about 3 sizes too large.

“WHY ISN’T HE WEARING HIS OWN BOOTS? BLOODY HELL, ROB. SERIOUSLY”.

“Steph I couldn’t find them, I turned the house upside down looking for them. They are absolutely nowhere in that house. I don’t know what you’ve done with them”.

Me “He had them on all afternoon yesterday and I bet you fifteen million dollars I find them within 7 seconds of walking inside”.

Now that is a very safe bet because there have been approximately forty hundred instances over the 15 years we’ve been together where Rob has stood at the fridge and said “Where’s the milk / butter / eggs / [insert anything you can think of here], I can’t seem to find it”. And I will always reply with “I know it’s there, do not make me get up and look for it because it’s right in front of you”. Which it always is.

It’s a bit like when you send them to the supermarket for 20 things and you’re lucky if you get 5 on the list because “Um, I couldn’t find it, they’d run out of them”.

Anyway back to soccer. I should add here we were standing with my friend, Sarah, who watched on in amusement and I could tell she’d seen all this before, most likely in her own house with her own husband.

So she said “Ah but was it a Mummy search? In our house that’s what we call it because if it’s not a mummy search then it’s not a proper one”. She has a valid point.

So there stood poor Charlie in his school uniform and enormous shoes looking, well quite frankly he looked RIDICULOUS. My heart bled for him as he stood there looking as far from a mini David Beckham as humanly possible and my visions of having a Posh Spice daughter in law faded away.

So after much eye rolling I decided to take Jude and Holly home and leave Rob and the older boys at soccer so I could go home and dedicate 7 seconds of my life to finding the mysterious missing soccer boots that Charlie had been wearing until he went to bed the previous night.

I arrived home, walked in the door and as I walked down the hallway from the door my eyes zoomed straight into the bright blue pair of shoes lying on the grass outside. Like navigational beacons shimmering in the sunlight.