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ELIZA CARTHY - DIARY – April 2009 When I started writing this diary my four-month-old daughter was lying on a towel and changing mat on the floor of the dressing room in Surrey, arse out to the wind to save her chapping, little feet in the air. Being as it was a small room and we were sharing with the rest of the band she was already surrounded by the detritus of a tour: trainers, discarded bits of weekend newspapers, suit bags, bottles of once sparkling mineral water now flat from the van, things like that. Anyway, it's very timely being asked to write a journal entry now, especially as her new life is very much on my mind and the decision we've made to travel as a family while I go back to work. When folk and traditional music became more to me than just something my parents did, I used to get hot under the collar about how little the average man on the street appeared to know about old English culture. I still do, I believe our lack of common music is a sadness in us that we don't always recognise, and very much hold the view that most traditional music is worth anyone’s time but these days, I like to concentrate on what is worthy and authentic alongside music which fuels the best human impulses in my opinion: what makes us cry and what makes us want to dance and have sex! When I see my child’s little body among these things, these bits of life I've been used to seeing every day for more than 20 years, with this new person suddenly in the midst of it all and her bright eyes looking up at me, I do often think about the suitability of this job, especially as it's probably a lot like the life I had growing up. People keep reassuring me that babies are adaptable and will live anywhere, that she is with us which is what counts and as long as there's love and boobs she'll be fine, but there's the new mother guilt building in me, the guilt that will no doubt grow into normal everyday mother guilt as time goes on. Hooray for that. The turning into my own mother continues with new and improved intensity, like a familiar washing powder rebranded! So, we recently made her first trip to London, where she rode in a black cab, went up and down in a lift, charmed the waitresses at the hotel and had her picture taken, onstage before the Teenage Cancer Trust gig at the Royal Albert Hall. Our next trip to the big city was a few days later, by which time of course she was an old hand at this sort of thing, when we performed at the St George’s Day party in Trafalgar Square on Saturday 25 April. She loved the lions, and watched the set from the steps of the National Portrait Gallery, watching her mammy underneath Nelson's Column. How odd, having been part of the last underground music for so long, shooting my mouth off to anyone that would listen, that it's time the establishment celebrated our hidden national music. How wonderful. I was never going to be dissuaded from doing this concert. Apart from the foreign tourists, what with all the other musicians like Kathryn Tickell and Jim Moray taking part and the big crowds, it was much like appearing at any other folk festival without that gated community feeling you sometimes get from playing to the converted. It was good to be there; I had been looking forward to showing my little girl, should any members of any far-right groups show their faces to co-opt the day as certain people from the folk scene worried, how it is possible to celebrate being 'English’ without being an ignorant little Englander. Big difference. On stage at 12.30pm we opened the day to sunshine and singing though as we were working in Hampshire that night we missed the opportunity to see her Granddad and Uncle Billy Bragg take part in the Tolpuddle Martyrs gig just round the corner, before we continued on our UK (and little bit of Ireland) tour.
Those first journeys to London were a handy experience to get out of the way. The van doesn't have the same hypnotising effect that the car does so she's awake for much longer, and frustrated because she has to be in the seat for much of the trip. All of this new regimen felt strange at first, from changing her on the table that, not so long before, we would have played cards and made cocktails on, to carrying her into a service station for the first time. As part of my job I put up with these places but why should her pure little life be marred so early on by the strip lighting and revolting scooped-out, warmed-up food, so expensive the receipts may as well have "ha ha ha" printed on them? I am a lifelong feminist, but over the last week I have suddenly appreciated why women give up work! I was sitting in a plastic chair in Burger King playing flying baby; nearly flew her into a trucker walking behind me, suddenly felt very unprepared and exposed and wanted to run back to my safe, safe sofa, where at least the beautiful, painful chaos that a new baby brings has, 4 months in, formed into something that almost makes sense. So after two weeks on the road, this is what I've learned, for anyone new to motherhood or new to being a touring musician for that matter, who might need the advice. Make a mental checklist for tomorrow and try really hard to make a mental checklist for the day after, too.
The next part of our journey from Northumberland to Suffolk involves four days away before we can go home and catch our breath and all sleep in our house again. We must set off early every day so that we can find a place to breastfeed, take her out and give her fresh air, sunshine and a change of scenery and chance to kick about and play the standing up game and risk her having slightly bandy legs when she’s 17, just like her father! Car is better than van, she'll sleep better. The car seat she stares at is black and must be covered with colourful things, perhaps her own little mirror. Musn't forget feeding pillow. Hotel pillows are small and flat and they rarely can give you any more than a couple extra. Her own bedding and bed so she sees the same things when she wakes up in the morning and wonders where she is. Small furry mates to talk to and put in her mouth, usually at the same time... We were both tired and grumpy for the first few nights but things are already much better for all three of us and wherever we travel to now, with stuff and planning and what we’ve learned, is hopefully as like a home as we can make it. Definitely want to get some of those little baby sound-cancelling earmuffs so that she and my boyfriend can hang out at the gig, not be trapped in the hotel together without dinner or mates. Went for a long walk in a conservation park the other day before the Winchester gig: this making extra time thing turns out to be good for everybody, although she couldn't tell the difference between the big giraffe that moved me to tears and the little one in her car seat. Just now as I write this she looks like a little angel in a grotto with the sun shining through the travel cot mesh. That's it really. Efficiency and home comforts are creeping back in to life. I think we may be alright. This is the family business after all.
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