by Charlotte Phillips (Mon Aug 17, 2009)
When my first baby was
born, my horizons shrank so much that if Chicken Licken had told me the sky was
falling, I'd have thanked him for the tip and raised the pram hood to keep
off the bits. The price for having children seemed to be exile from the world
of fully paid up adults. And while many words, ‘sex' and ‘sleep' among
them, took on ironic new meanings, none had a crueller ring than
‘holiday.'
As we poured
our offspring and half the house contents into the mobile suitcase
formerly known as the car and drove for five hours to a damp cottage for the
sheer pleasure of diligently recreating the stresses and strains of normal
life, but with smaller beds, a non-functioning TV and no sharp knives (I'd
originally assumed the latter was inefficiency, but have now realised it was a
subtle police initiative to avoid amateur re-enactments of 'The Shining')
holidays at their best were a gruesome parody of what they used to be in
faraway pre-child life.
And at their worst? Like
being trapped in a tiny space, covered in vomit and hit repeatedly with soft
toys while an inner voice repeated constantly, 'Death will be better.' Oh,
sorry - no, that was actually the holiday.
There was a solution,
though. Tantalisingly hard to arrange but, I was assured by everyone,
completely worthwhile: to leave the children behind and go without them.
At a time of year when
holidays are all that anyone still gainfully employed can talk about and no
family is portrayed without a backdrop of blue skies, golden sand and rows and
rows of unfeasibly large, white teeth set in unnatural, 'aren't we having fun'
grins, urging parents to get away on their own may seem not just an
abdication of responsibility, but positively perverse. But it's definitely
worth serious consideration. Of the parents I spoke to, (to a man and woman
strong contenders for devotion to duty awards), all saw a break without the
children as providing a timely reminder of just why they got it together in the
first place - something that can so
easily get forgotten in the daily grind of family life.
That's assuming, of
course, that you can bear the planning. While making the decision to go away is
easy, childcare is anything but, requiring an almost superhuman attention to
detail and back-up arrangements that aren't so much a 'Plan B' as a brisk romp
all the way through the alphabet and back again. One couple I know recently
jetted off for a week in Barbados. Fine, except given that it took them three
months to plan, required them to enlist the help of a dozen friends and
relations, using persuasive techniques more usually associated with timeshare
salespeople, they spent the first six days recovering from the stress.
Oh, and did I mention
the spiral-bound notebook they filled with notes to ensure everybody knew the
children's routines? Everything, from food preferences to bed time rituals was
there. Eamonn Andrews couldn't have done it better.
And if you do end up
having to take a child with you, make sure it's a quick-thinking one. One
friend who reluctantly took her 13-year-old son on his first ‘adult' holiday,
sailing in the Mediterranean, owes her life to him after he plucked her out of
the water when, off her trolley on duty-free plonk, she misjudged the distance
between the dinghy and her boat. Now, she won't leave home without him.
And however well
holidays are planned, there can be unexpected consequences. We spent our fourth
wedding anniversary in an hotel in, of all places, Tunbridge Wells, leaving our
two-year old daughter with my sister. 40 weeks later, almost to the day, I
gave birth to our second child. We almost named him after it, but 'What do you
mean, the bloody condom's burst?' just wouldn't fit on the birth certificate.
This year, we're
planning something a little more exciting than the Pantiles - a long weekend in
Paris. My goals are shopping, sleeping and eating. Doesn't sound that exciting?
Believe me, from a child-free perspective, they are the acme of
desirability. I just can't wait.
