The Holiday – Part 8

Are we nearly there?…when are we going to get there Mum?…How much longer?…Are we there yet Mum?…

I remember a time when I thought this was the child/parent equivalent of water torture –

The endless repetition of how long now, accompanied by pitiful snivelling I’m bored…this is bo00-oo-rring…

By the nipping, pushing, pulling and general torment of a sibling. Jamie hit me…Ana made a face at me…he’s looking at me now…she’s looking at me now…

Followed by noxious odours and sudden wind-tunnel window-openings. Jamie’s farted… Ana smells…

I developed immunity sometime between Evan and Jamie. All it takes is the occasional screaming injunction will you two be quiet! I am warning you! And the ability to simply retreat into a virtual reality where noisy obnoxious bored children do not exist…

Meg of course – newly returned to the family fold after a 2 year absence – has the tolerance threshold of a demented Victorian nanny. Each are we there yet is an ever-increasing and deliberate insult to her powers of subjugation. As she increases the decibel level of her attempts at sedition-suppression they discover the unfathomed joys of big sister baiting.

In the end I scream at her. You are worse than them! For gods sake! What bloody age are you?

She then goes into a major huff with me. I knew I shouldn’t have come on this holiday!

And for the first time since joining the M74 at Abington I catch a glimpse of Ana and Jamie, in my rear-view mirror, smiling at one another…

The Holiday – Part 4

In the event I was brought forcibly to a halt, about 100yds after the summit, by a couple of sheep – whose insouciance I could do nothing but envy.

Jamie and Ana – whose attention had previously been entirely taken by the apparent disappearance of Papa and his car – switched their attention to the sheep. Sheep!

Whilst the kids compared notes about the merits of their respective sheep (for they had decided ownership of said sheep within seconds) your sheep is scabbier than mine…your sheep has funny eyes…yeuch! your sheep has poo on its bum…(you get the drift) – Megan and I debated who a) was going to brave the sheep and b) the possibility that Papa and Mamie had dropped off the last corner and into the valley below.

It occurred to us both that if option b) was reality (and if there were such a thing as the next world) then Papa and Mamie were no doubt watching us, cursing me roundly and worrying about the fickleness of their grandchildren…

We hadn’t resolved the issue of who was going to look down the hill when Papa and Mamie rounded the summit…Jamie casually greeting their appearance with hope they don’t scare my sheep.

Perhaps there is a salutary lesson here for any parent/significant adult-other?

You are only ever as important as the next road-hogging sheep.