Mr. Jam gets locked out
MORE and more adults are choosing not to have children. This will "reshape human society," according to social demographers in the UK. I guess they mean "reshape" as in "wipe out."
But before that happens, something scarier will happen. There will be a pandemic of meltdowns.
You see, having totally helpless dependents (children, grandparents, pets and some husbands) causes an adult's capacity to tolerate problems to expand until it is roughly the size of Australia or Donald Trump's ego, whichever is larger.
Here's proof. A childless, only-child, unmarried friend of mine received the wrong lunch order. Apoplectic with fury, he was unable to work for the rest of the day (and possibly the rest of his life).
The same afternoon, the father-of-three next to him was informed by telephone that one child had smashed the TV and another had poured Ribena into the Blu-Ray disk player. This news had no affect on him.
Parents become immune to disaster. Children alternate between ruining our lives and giving them meaning, and sometimes do both simultaneously.
The other night, I kissed my two most helpless dependents (granny and my youngest child) goodnight and took another one (the dog) out for a walk.
I returned to find that they had gone to sleep after accidentally locking the door that connects the living room to the bedrooms, the toilets, the shower, and so on.
My wife, a teacher, was working late. When she got home, she saw why I was worried. Granny and our youngest child are world-class sleepers: I'm talking Olympic gold level. The child can sleep 16 hours straight and Granny 20. Both remain comatose through alarms, thunderstorms, earthquakes and teenage parties.
Bereft of beds, toilets and showers, we spent hours trying to break in.
We tried every key in the house, and then hairpins, screwdrivers, pliers, wrenches and our teeth.
We tried kicking the door down like in cop shows.
We threw our bodies at the door like in Hollywood movies.
We used a battering ram like in Viking cartoons.
Nothing worked.
We spent the night on the sofa in our working clothes dreaming of toilets.
At dawn we awoke to the ghastly prospect of going to work in our dishevelled, cross-kneed, unwashed state.
Then my wife had an idea. Educators have a secret weapon called the Teacher Voice. It's not exactly a shout, nor a shriek, but a sort of controlled, powerful missile of low-frequency sound. Could it penetrate several layers of doors, the roar of air-conditioners and the cocoon of Olympic-level sleep? I was skeptical.
She took a deep breath and yelled out the child's name in Teacher Voice.
In return, silence.
She did it a second time.
Pause. Then…was that a slight sound we heard?
She did it a third time.
Pause.
Click.
The door opened and the cute face of a sleepy child looked out. The previous night's trials were immediately forgotten.
Tonight, one of the kids will probably microwave my phone.
Tomorrow the dog will eat my wallet.
The next day Granny will burn the house down.
Am I bothered? No, it's all part of the rich tapestry of events, which make up that joyful thing called family life.
I can survive anything. Even getting the wrong lunch order. I am invincible. I am unruffleable. I am a parent.
To know more about how to survive family crisis, visit our columnist at http://mrjam.typepad.com.
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