Henry asked me yesterday what my favourite thing about lockdown was. Easy, I said, spending more time with you guys. Under no other circumstances would the five of us have got to spend such a long, undiluted period of time together. And we probably won’t again.
But that wasn’t good enough, he wanted to know precisely which moment of lockdown was my favourite. And he wasn’t going to be fobbed off with talk of discovering new walks, learning chess or not having to go anywhere near London.
It was then that I realised there is not one single day that stands out in my memory, as nothing has happened of any note. We haven’t been for fun days out. We haven’t visited friends or had people over. We haven’t, until recently, even been out in the car.
So I asked him the same question, and he was very quick to answer: it was last week when he got to play with his friends. Typical that this was the day Andy and I were at a funeral.
And then he said his favourite overall thing about the lockdown was that his best friend Leighton had jokingly announced earlier in the year that he was going to give up school for Lent. Henry took such sheer delight in the thought that Leighton’s wish had not only come true but for EVEN LONGER than Lent! Oh how he laughed. I could only imagine Leighton’s mother sobbing quietly into her 5pm gin.
But after the kids were in bed I started thinking seriously about my favourite bit of lockdown. And I honestly think it’s right now.
It could be because we’re being teased with the idea that the rules will be eased soon.
It could be because we’ve gradually all got so used to it and to each other that all our expectations are a bit lower. We’re not stressing about achieving anything bigger than not falling out.
It could be because it was my birthday on Sunday and I was spoiled in such wonderful lockdown style by my crew and am still in a good mood from that: two consecutive meals prepared by someone else, two very enthusiastic personal gift unwrappers at my disposal, and a whole hour spent alone in the garden with the Sunday papers. All of which was followed up by one of those painfully rare things - a sunny bank holiday Monday.
In truth - and regular readers will all laugh at me for saying this - I will really miss bits of this when it’s over. I won’t miss the home-schooling and the endless catering, nor will I miss trying to juggle work and kids, or trying to explain to a sad bedtime Henry why we can’t just play all day, much as we’d like to.
But I will miss just having them around so much. Answering a thousand questions a day from Henry. Listening to Bella very, very slowly get to the end of a very long-winded and slightly confused story that, by the conclusion, makes almost no sense. Watching Xander’s face light up when he sees the other two - so much so that when they were playing together yesterday and he bumped his head he crawled to Henry for comfort.
Without lockdown they wouldn’t have had any of this special time to bond. The big two wouldn’t have devised their own secret ways to make him laugh. Henry wouldn’t have worked out - and taught us - that a certain pitch and insistence of squeak at meal times means Xander wants us to pass him his water (true story). And Bella wouldn’t have had cause to build her upper body strength by picking Xander up at any given opportunity to lug him from A to B just for the hell of it.
I’m not saying it is now - or ever has been - easy, nor that I’ve had a moment of enlightenment in which I realise this lifestyle is the way forward. But, as is inevitable, now we are starting to think about a time when things might go back to normal - school, clubs, groups, parties - I know I’ll really miss it just being us five without commitments and engagements and rushing around.
But then if we’ve learned one thing in lockdown it’s that it most definitely is possible to have too much of a good thing.
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