With summer grinding past, many parents flounder in keeping their kids' boredom at bay, writes Orna Mulcahy
DRASTIC ACTION was needed after weeks of rain and wails of "but there's nothing else to do" (except watch TV and play video games). So we've decamped to the country to give the children a break from Nickelodeon, Big Brother and X-Box. The idea is that they get out into the fresh air, climb trees and ride their bicycles through the lanes, away from the clutches of Unfabulous, Drake and Josh and Grand Theft Auto.
Day one and they're in shock, having been dragged from their suburban den and transplanted to an area of outstanding natural beauty with no broadband. Even the phone line has been cut - during a too-vigorous pruning of the wisteria - and mobile coverage is only available at the top of the nearest hill. "Stinger on staying here for two weeks," my eldest says and promptly links up the forbidden X-Box to the puny portable television that only delivers RTÉ through a snowstorm. From the bedroom above comes the little tinny noises of two Nintendo DSs being played in unison, and it is a glorious day outside.
Feeling cross and deprived, they refuse to come into the village where I'm drawn to a shop window notice for a pottery course. It's local, it's starting soon and the person running it has a reassuringly arty, foreign name. After an afternoon of indoor squabbling, I am ready to enroll the lot of them.
The trouble is that, like a lot of working parents, we're at a bit of a loss to know how to fill in time with our own children when the holidays come along. The fortnight stretches ahead, but our three are not so thrilled at the plans to picnic on the beach, or stroll around famous gardens or visit the local attraction, a model farm and maze. "Not the maze again," said the eldest, not taking his eyes from the 12-inch screen for a minute.
I'm tempted to head for the nearest internet café myself, rather than face the reality of quality time. We're too exhausted to come up with great big ideas like building a raft or a tree house, too lazy to pack some sandwiches and trek up the nearest mountain - but still, too guilty to farm them out.
Part of me wants to be able to sit down and cut out shapes and colour them in with my youngest, but another part, the stronger part, gravitates towards the newspaper and coffee. "This is so borinnnnng!" she says in revenge.
I call the pottery number but the course is full up. Naturally. Stupid to assume otherwise, what with working parents everywhere drawing up summer timetables of activities so that every day is filled.
Summer courses need to be booked early. Like in January, when other childrens' parents have read the brochures and sent off the deposits.
Otherwise, come the month of May, when you suggest to a parent that their child might like to come over to play sometime over the three-month break, you could be told: "Yes let's see now, she's just off to Irish college tomorrow for three weeks, and then she's doing a sailing course, and after that she is around for a few days before we go to Spain/Portugal/France/Italy for a month, and after that she really wants to take up Mandarin and the lady at the Spar is going to give her a fortnight's lesson, so maybe sometime after that . . ."
Say all you like that you think summer is a time for children to relax and laze around, but it doesn't cut the ice with the organised brigade. As they well know, summer is a time for children to sharpen their hockey skills, learn to cook or master the art of public speaking.
Not all camps and courses are good, though. There are art and hobby courses where you know the supervisors are bored and just trying to make a little extra money. Held in leaky halls or hired school rooms, they are generally packed and rowdy. Your child comes home with a paper plate transformed into a doll, and a squashed fairy cake, and you think that for €110 they would have been better off at home, helping granny to make buns . . . except that granny is probably off doing a course herself, or working, or on a Ryanair flight to Dubrovnik.
There are drama camps where the few really talented ones (who take classes all year round and have already been on the Gaiety stage) tend to dominate, and your child is destined to be a tree in the end-of-week play.
There are sailing courses that involve them having to put on smelly wetsuits and fall out of little boats, and be shouted at, for €150 a week. There are tennis camps so crowded that they can get lost in the scrum.
There are football courses that at least tire them out and, as they get older, there are rugby courses in Biarritz and Spanish courses in Salamanca and in boarding schools in rural France. These are costly little outings for 16 year olds who invariably need to to be given a lot of spare cash for phone credit and for pizza.
Yes, the idea that children should be doing things at all times has taken hold. It even applies when they have friends over to play.
This used to be a simple arrangement, with children hanging around the house together, or kicking a ball around outside. Now they expect to be taken somewhere with their friend - to the cinema, or to Build A Bear, or to an adventure centre or at least to McDonald's or Gourmet Burger.
Back in the cottage, on day two a miracle is under way. The youngest has turned a large cardboard box into an ice cream parlour and is open for business. Gratefully, I get down on hands and knees and order a 99.