In Perpetuity

The difference between being a writer and being a journalist is what happens to your words. You might want to argue that it's about intention, purpose. But the bottom line is whether or not you become dismissed, even by the fish'n'chip shop, after a quick glance.

And so I was rather thrilled that my eldest's first go at copy writing, aged nine, should be displayed on a very different medium, the Brighton bus. In what I thought was a brilliant promotional campaign for public transport which celebrated the richness, eccentricity and diversity of our fine city, I was invited to be one of the first to be featured.

Ok, so the truth was that I was doing my usual rant, this time to the MD of the bus company about his previous campaign which had a load of pensioners inviting us to join them on a charabanc trip rather than encouraging parents to leave the 4WDs at home and hop on board, and he called my bluff. "Come on then," he said. "You do it!"

'It'll be fun', I told the kids, as Ellie hid behind the sofa, fine-tuning the wording on that letter to Social Services she's been writing since she first could put pen to paper. LouLou, as always, was a pushover.

A couple of weeks later, we were in a photographic studio and I was holding a carpet bag while the photographer, Jerry Lebens, made LouLou and her Ellie look-a-like mate, Danielle fly. The link between Mary Poppins and getting the kids to school on the bus wasn't all that clear until the prices went up a few weeks after the campaign was launched.

Job done, Ellie was spitting. 'LouLou gets to do all the fun stuff', she sulked. 'Go on then', I goaded. 'You come up with the slogan and then your words will be as big as her face. We're on the bus....because....?' 'Dunno', she muttered. 'Because ...going to school... er.... on the bus is...mmmmm.. cool?'

Genius child.

And for three years, we pumped our little eco-message around Brighton and Hove, even though we had already left it long ago for our eco dream in the country. Until now. We have been repainted, wiped from Brighton's history in favour of this year's message - "A month's bus travel for the price of a tank of petrol". It doesn't even scan.