IT MAY not be a battle in the trenches, but it is a war zone.
The perils are dotted throughout the sub-strata, there are no-go places, plastic pointy things, noise and general chaos as the yells and the woops fill the room.
There are people going down for the count, only to rise again as if from the dead and re-enter the fray.
The ground is littered with their arsenal of plastic toys and would-be weapons.
The soldiers don’t even have time to go to the toilet. They go where they stand, they eat like they may never eat again. They throw caution to the wind, every day.
And at the going down of the sun, peace reigns, only to break out again as the day breaks.
This is the world of the modern parent.
Most recently, it is my daughter’s world, a mother who has withdrawn somewhat in order to protect the baby she is about to give birth to, leaving her husband to enter the fray.
He dodges those toy hazards, scattered haphazardly about the floor, like tiny mines about to explode. The children dance around them.
Earlier, he was talking, building blocks, colouring, telling jokes and telling them what to do. And now, he sits almost comatose staring the thousand-yard stare of the traumatised soldier recently released from the trenches.
Living in a world of three and two year-olds is a perilous location.
I remember craving bed time (for the little troupers) and sometimes lying, cajoling and begging to get them there. If I told them it was 7pm lights out at 6pm, would they know the difference? Of course, the subterfuge always came back when they got up an hour earlier the next day.
There was one holiday (I told my husband that life was one long holiday) where I took the four children, aged under five, camping by myself. My husband took us there, then tootled off.
I told him I didn’t need a car when everything was walking distance and I had a double stroller.
Stupid idea. He came back one week earlier than planned to pick us up, his return being the first time I had spoken to an adult in a week.
Instead, I had visited the park, the beach and done every activity within walking distance before 8am.
Same battle, different field.
