Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it

Of course you’ll like spinach when you’re older, dear

 Of all the lies that adults tell children, the one about liking it when you’re older really takes the biscuit, or perhaps the spinach. How many of us remember sitting wretchedly in front of our mother’s latest burnt offering being told bracingly “Nonsense, dear, you can hardly taste the onions, and anyway, you’ll like them when you’re older.” Or mushrooms (slippery). Or semolina (blurgh!).

Or how about the one that goes, “You don’t know if you like it, you haven’t tried it.” Aged 6, I didn’t need to try cooked tomatoes to know they would make me retch. Just look at them. Slimy, squishy. Utterly repulsive.

“Honestly, it’s really nice, just try a spoonful.” No, it isn’t. And how ever many spoonfuls of porridge topped with honey you force down my unwilling gullet, it’s not going to be nice. Ever.

I still can’t face porridge. It isn’t really nice. Not to me. But I have to admit that some of those other adult lies weren’t lies after all. My kids don’t believe me of course, and look at me with just as much horror at the suggestion that they might ever find spinach palatable as ever I looked at my own long-suffering mother. A friend winced visibly when I requested we smother my son’s cordon-bleu offering in tomato ketchup; but at least he tried it that way. And liked it. You just have to get past that initial hump of “Oh my goodness mum that looks weird”.

Well, it doesn’t make sense, does it? Green, slippery, slimy looking stringy stuff. How could that taste good? Spinach and feta tart, that’s how; to die for, I promise you. (It’s all in the pastry, darling.)

There’s some stuff I know for sure without trying that I won’t like. Like potholing. Claustrophobia and small spaces – not a great combination. I did a tour of tunnels under a town once, and made myself go through the optional crawling detour. One should face one’s fears after all. I swear I scooted through so quick I wore holes in my jeans. And as for the time I had a CT scan – aagh.... Close eyes, clench fists, breathe deeply and think of wide open spaces. Wiiiiiide open spaces.

I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t like parachute jumping either – vertigo and jumping out of planes don’t work too well together. But I reckon the floating bit, the bird’s eye view, the sheer adrenalin would be beyond amazing. So even with vertigo, I still think wistfully of parachutes.

Some things just don’t make sense on paper. Like a school for 16 pupils in the back end of nowhere. You just have to get past that initial hump of “Oh my goodness that sounds weird.” If you don’t see it in the flesh, in the bricks and mortar, in the pupils and the teachers and it’s place in the village, you just don’t get it. It’s like spinach and feta tart, like high-level ropes courses for those with vertigo; when you see it, you understand it works.

Our third counsellor visited a few days ago, Mr James Airey. He absolutely agreed that you have to see Captain Shaw’s to understand it; paper reports just don’t do it.

So to the remaining seven members of Cabinet, who haven’t yet managed to visit, don’t knock us till you’ve tried us. We would love to welcome you to our school and community.

We’re a parachute experience, not a bowl of porridge.