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Lorraine
EricaOver the Christmas period I had a bizarre conversation with my parents where I learned that my first Christmas was spent in a pub. I was sleeping upstairs in my carry-cot to be precise rather than in the smoke-filled bar (so that’s alright then?!)
The Anchor - where I spent my first (and second) Christmas
No, it’s not as bad as it sounds – my parents aren’t trailer-trash who’d dump their baby anywhere at the first sniff of booze. It was 1960s England and my dad worked at a pub part time. He had two jobs, not to keep us in a luxurious lifestyle, but simply to make ends meet. These were the pre-computer-generation days when your average man didn’t earn a lot. At the time his wages from British Gas didn’t cover the mortgage, bills and modest living expenses. Anyway, as a result of working in the pub the landlord and customers were my dad’s good friends so that’s where my family spent Christmas night. Having a new baby didn’t deter my parents and I was taken along.
My second Christmas was apparently also spent in the same pub. Once again I was left upstairs in my carry-cot to sleep, but by this time I was mobile and I was later discovered wandering around by a lady coming upstairs to use the toilet. That’s how I ended up behind the bar playing with mixer bottles and collecting glasses – hmmm, suitable pastime for an 18 month old?
I listened incredulously to this story as my parents retold it. It sounds implausible – a baby left alone upstairs in a noisy pub while her parents partied downstairs?! Where was the baby monitor? Where was the pack ‘n’ play? Where was the stair gate? But they were relaxed, they were having fun and despite the minimal risks – sure I could have fallen down the stairs – having a baby didn’t fetter them.
This story came up after we had been discussing whether we could go to stay at my parents’ house since my 23 month old would have no proper bed to sleep in. Would he settle in a borrowed travel cot I worried? Shortly before realizing that I needed to take a chill-pill and stop worrying so much. The fact is things were so much more relaxed (ahem) 40 years ago. No one was worried about safety equipment; we didn’t have car seats, cribs and high chairs that had to comply with safety standards (and parents didn’t have to keep abreast of the recalls for those that didn’t). Parents didn’t spend evenings listening to the sound of their babies breathing on a baby monitor. Moms weren’t bombarded with commercials suggesting that if we don’t continually walk around our house coating every surface with a fine spray of Lysol the entire family will be struck down with the dreaded lurgy.
It may not have been such a ‘safe’ environment, but it was a relatively stress-free one and in my mind that makes it a healthier one.
Filed under: Parenting Tagged: | anxiety, Baby, Christmas, Family, Motherhood, Parenting, Postpartum, pub
I remember my cousin spending one Christmas sleeping in a drawer. I can’t think of a mother now that would try and pull that one off. I think our parents may have had the better ideas though – on reflection now they seemed much less stressed about such things than we do.
SO true!! I clearly rememer riding “the hump”- and fighting over it- in my parents blue caprice classic. That would be the spot in the front middle that didn’t have a seat belt… or wasn’t even considered a seat! It was the arm rests.
My parents (responsible folk, elementary school teachers actually) used to leave me and me three siblings in the car on rainy afternoons while they popped into the pub for a drink. We’d get a bottle of club orange and some crisps and were told not to touch the handbrake!
My brother used to ride in the trunk of our estate car.
Good times!
LOL! We used to be stationed on the pub doorstep with bottles of Coke (with the paper straw that went soggy after 2 slurps) and a packet of crisps. But we were talking to a friend recently who was remembering sitting with his sister in the car outside the pub with his coke and crisps as fun times. He claims kids today are spoiled and wouldn’t see this as at all entertaining.
I think sometimes it’s easy to over-romanticise the past. In some ways, I’m sure they were less stressed, in other ways not so much.