The traditional tales don’t provide a template for the real story after the marriage. The stepmother is supposed to be deliberately evil. The real father is supposed to die or be so besotted he doesn’t notice her cruelty. And the real mother should be kind, beautiful and dead. Not so in real life.
There has been some progress in the new castle. Several weeks off work has allowed me to regain strength and energy. The pictures are now up on the walls, after some months of negotiation and trial. There are new plants in the garden and a large, rogue ash sapling has been cut down. I feel a sense of emotional ownership. Walking around the house, I see evidence of my influence and it makes me feel better.
Stepson has had three weeks away on a residential holiday and with his Real Mum. One of my boys has been staying. He and Prince Charming have been spending happy times together: whisky tasting, playing darts, sharing debate about all kinds of things. We have done happy family things, like playing pooh sticks and making pizza and baking cakes. It has been fun.
Darts seem to be an important ingredient of family harmony this week. A match is quite short; it’s interesting enough to watch without being prevented from doing anything else; you can play alone to practice or have a tournament to involve everyone. And there’s a lot of social learning to be done. We are past all that taking turns business of course, but there is the whole issue of winning and losing and taking part to deal with. Three of us are competitive but gracious losers. The fourth has yet to learn to lose without feeling significant loss of face. He blames the darts, the weather, the board, the rules, the furniture, the maths and anything else that might distract from the obvious fact that he didn’t actually win.It is kind of sad and we need to show him that taking part is also important and that sharing 
time together is what actually matters.
It seems that as the rest of us grow closer and create bonds of friendship, this one is becoming the Odd One Out. We don’t want to slow down out fresh growth and relationships… but does our bonding have to leave one child behind?