Two weeks running around Europe had not built up enough resilience for two days with two small children. I was exhausted after the first couple of hours. I don’t know how Glen’s sister, Miranda, manages to look after three children. I was impressed with her stamina and ashamed by the lack of my own. Also she walks a lot and while carrying a baby and pushing a toddler in a pram.
I just felt a bit more of my energy seep away writing that.
Because we hadn’t got our hire car, we walked everywhere with them and were restricted to keeping things local (though Miranda’s definition of local appears to be anywhere within an hour’s walk). We spent our first day with all three children as the eldest was given a day off school to spend time with us (and to partially celebrate his upcoming birthday).
It’s been almost two years since we’ve seen the kids (and the baby we’d never met before). I was curious to see how we’d fit into their lives as the middle child was barely more than a toddler when we last saw her so I was expecting her to be shy of us at first.
Not so.
As soon as the door opened, we were welcomed with screams of joy (hopefully not just because of the bag of presents that Glen had brought along). The baby was terrified of us, however, and couldn’t even look at us, let alone be held by us, without screaming and crying. Wearing sunglasses seemed to help, otherwise we tried not to look her in the eye. By the end of 48 hours we managed to get some smiles from her and what smiles they were!
Durham was hit with warm weather (mid-to-high twenties) and lots of sunshine, which was totally unexpected, even though it was midsummer. The first day we went out picking flowers and climbing trees, then had birthday cake before walking into town for lunch (very good fish and chips) and to watch a student production of a ballet version of Wizard of Oz. I’m not a big fan of ballet and even less a fan of off-key orchestras. Fortunately, each half was a short 45-minutes long and I only nodded off a couple of times.
After that we trekked to what felt like the next county to drop the eldest at Beavers for bouldering while we bought supplies at Tesco’s and lolled at a local playground where the clouds started to gather. Glen and I were wiped out from the walking, but we managed to make it back once we were all done, getting a little bit wet in the rain. We had pizzas for dinner, played with the kids some more, then went home to die from exhaustion in the evening.
The next day Glen and I walked the eldest to school, taking the middle child with us. She declared exhaustion about twenty metres down the road and would barely budge if we didn’t give her a shoulder ride. There was much grumbling and complaining and she played both of us very well, eventually getting a shoulder ride all the way home.
We hung around the house for a while as Miranda managed to fit in some gardening in between the baby waking up and crying. Around lunchtime, all of us walked into town for another serving of fish and chips before going back to the house. The walk back always felt longer than the walk there.
Back at the house I fell asleep on the couch and it was glorious. I woke to the eldest returning home from school and preparations being made for going to a “local” park where he could kick around a football.
The park had Horrible Teenagers™ in it but they kept to themselves, either hanging out on the roof of the garden shed or tormenting each other by stealing glasses, soccer balls, dignity. We kicked around the ball, got stomped on by children and generally tried to keep everyone entertained though Glen and I were very quickly flagging. Again, I don’t know how parents survive.
I lost my Favourite Uncle status with the middle child because she got told off for being a bit rough, but luckily Glen was on hand to receive the full weight of adulation thereafter. I still managed to get smiles by the end of the trip.
After a while, we were all ready to go. The two eldest kids had swimming training somewhere across town. Glen and I wussed out and returned to our hotel, went for dinner, and went back to our hotel again to watch tv.
Our final day with family arrived. We took the eldest to school again and said our goodbyes, then returned and hung out until the middle child had to go off to Forest School. More goodbyes and waving through the bus window. Glen was sad to say goodbye, especially as thoughts of when we’ll see them again creep in.
We’ll likely see them next year, but that’s another year gone where they’re another year old and becoming different people. I wonder what the eldest is going to be like as a teenager and when he’ll be too old to hang out with his uncles. I wonder whether the middle child will forget us in the intervening year and we’ll have to reacquaint ourselves with her again. And I wonder what the baby is going to be like when they’re a bit older too, whether excited to play, whether wary, whether something else entirely. I bet parents worry about this and so many other things all the time. Being a parent must be damn hard.
Travels with Dan 
What do you say, eh?