Gots dem Wave'em-off-to-Big-Skool-Blues
...I shall take the liberty of saying to you once more: children need to be wanted. Children need to be wanted. They most certainly do not need to be unwanted. They do not need to be rejected, nor do they need to be disapproved of. Children who are made to feel any of these things will grow up to believe the world is an unhappy place, that they are not loveable people, and that life is not in any way worthwhile. And you will have failed.
You will notice I said, when referring to your charges, "children". Not "your children". This is because, as you know, here at Hogarth we do not in any way encourage the belief that because you are given charge of a baby or of a child, that that baby or child becomes yours by some sort of inalienable right. Of course, you will, for a great deal of your time working within families, be expected to replace your charges' parents - which, as you quite well realise, is an enormous responsibility. You will have been invited to do so. It is in the very nature of your job. But let me remind you that when you play that role, you do so as understudies, not as leading players, which is something you must never expect to be, unless, perhaps, you get married and have children of your own.
Yeah, well. Fiction it may be, but I don't remember seeing anything half that pertinent in the Cert III or Diploma :(
Elsewise: Room Leader definitely not leaving, bah humbug. And sister, BiL and kids in Qld are okay; BiL and kids visiting this weekend. Very briefly, but at least they'll *all* know channels are open.
"You might find this difficult - quite probably impossible - to understand, Dad, but I did want children when I was married to Archie. I wanted them very badly. But now... now I don't. Now I want to look after children, and I don't mind whose."
"You don't mind whose?"
"No, of course not. Children are children."
"Little monsters, most of them."
"Well - that depends how you see them. Whether you just... see them, or whether you see what they are."
THAT. With knobs on :) dear heaven, don't tell me this means I have to list Terence Brady and Charlotte Bingham as formative influences
ETA 2: nah, still can't stand Wendy Craig.