It's a Dad's Life: When is a good time to teach your five-year-old how to play Monopoly? Would it be at 11pm after you have both flown New York to Dublin and arrived that morning?
She seemed keen, hyper-alert with no interest in going to bed, and I figured it was as good a time as any to work on her arithmetic and entrepreneurial skills. My willingness to go down this route at that time was an indicator of my own state of disrepair; I wasn't reading any signals right. At 3am I clawed the dice from her hands, promising there would be more property to buy tomorrow. (She was frighteningly open to engaging in what has become the national pastime.) It's now nearly midday and she snoozes on. If I don't wake her soon, there will be similar scenes tonight, but I'm enjoying the quiet. We've all been in each other's pockets for two weeks and this isolation is splendid.
You go away for a couple of weeks' family holiday knowing that it isn't really a holiday for you. It is a holiday in the sense that conventional work stops and you are physically in a different place, but so are your children and they have no interest in your welfare. If you throw in a day's travelling at either end, they have a perfect excuse to torment you for a large percentage of your so-called break.
Acceptance is key. You make your plans carefully, plot places and events close to your destination that you would like to see and draw a black line through them. Then go back over the guidebook and pick out the most overpriced, mind-numbingly commercial spots listed and tick those. If it has a corporate logo attached then you know you are in business - Disney-, Barbie- and Bratz-related products will always be welcomed. Empty your wallet and hand your credit cards to your children, it hurts less in the long run.
Adopt your best Stepford Wivessmile and convince yourself that it was always your ambition to travel halfway round the world and be kept awake all night and used as a dray horse in the swimming pool all day.
Yes, acceptance is key. My father-in-law (grizzled veteran of six daughters and many overseas campaigns) advised me at one point, "You either choose to do family holidays or you don't. If you do, the benefits are great in the long run." The implication being that they can be fun - just not for you - and hopefully your kids will grow up to be well-balanced enough to leave you alone when you're older. We were in one of those sprawling American malls at the time. He was sitting in a huge, automated massage chair being mechanically manipulated to bliss. I was chasing after four hyperactive under-nines, souped up on sugar and each other's company. When I pointed this out to him, he lay back, held up six fingers, smiled and shut his eyes.
The generations on either side of me were having a good time, I was trying to find acceptance.
And I did. As it turned out, it was a wonderful family holiday. Our little unit spent pretty much every moment together and, for the most part, revelled in each other's company. If anything good does come from these trips, it is to remind you that you are actually a family, rather than a collection of people of varying ages who happen to live in the same house and continually walk in on each other in the bathroom.
We planned our days according to the kids' desires and enjoyed their enjoyment of it all. There were many things I would have liked to have done that can wait for another time, and that's fine. Some day, when I'm old and forgetful, they can push me around a mall as I grumble about the price of toffees and how much better everything was in my day. Without wanting to wish my life away, I'm looking forward to it already. But right now, I'll let them sleep and pay later, it's worth it for the silence.
