Much of the thought behind this column is to balance the highs and lows of parenting, celebrating its joys as much as I lament its tedium. I have mined the latter for laughs as much as any parent, but I hope I’ve put across that, for all the easy jokes about how terrible parenting can be, it’s also genuinely enjoyable, not just in some theoretical, ‘love conquers all’ kind of way, but in the real, tangible, non-sentimental sense of actual enjoyment.
Being a dad has, I hope I’ve made clear, given me more wrinkles from smiling than frowning. And, basically, I hope I’ve built up enough goodwill that I can afford to write the following: being without my children for four days last weekend was truly, truly wonderful.
Mick and Maria got married in Galway, in a beautiful ceremony attended by many of our favourite people. In January, we decided we would take this run solo and my in-laws agreed to mind the kids. We hatched alternate plans as backup.
Then our daughter’s sleep training finally took. Plans became bookings became a schedule, and we set off for four days and three nights of childlessness.
Four days is as long as we’ve ever been away from our son and a good deal longer than we’ve been apart from our daughter, so it would be customary to say we were worried about leaving them. I find that ‘worried’ is not quite the right word, but ‘ecstatic’ might get a little closer, as everyone who met us there will testify.
There’s something unspeakably gauche about being child-free at a wedding. For one thing, you find yourself mentioning it to everyone, in the manner of an elderly aunt and uncle who’ve returned from Marbella with breathless stories of tapas and Orangina.
‘We took a dip in the pool this morning,’ you’ll say to deeply unimpressed, childless friends. ‘Together!’ you’ll add, all but wiping tears from your eyes.
We drank and danced and stayed up late, collapsing into bed with the shocking, nerve-shredding pleasure of knowing we could sleep for as long as we want without child services becoming involved. We ventured into Galway city for lunch with pals, walking its pretty streets, starry-eyed, like Ariel from The Little Mermaid.
Our friends wisely kept their distance, as we clapped buskers and pointed moronically at things in shops, astounded by all the quotidian joys of our newfound independence. Delighted not to be carrying either small people, a buggy, or the 12kg ballast of baby accessories which has accompanied us outdoors for the past five years, we held hands like young lovers and generally made tits of ourselves.
We returned, refreshed and ebullient, to find our kids had hardly noticed we’d gone. Perhaps we chafed at this, I can’t recall. I think I was too busy smiling.
Did Ye Hear Mammy Died? by Séamas O’Reilly is out now (Little, Brown, £16.99). Buy a copy from guardianbookshop at £14.78
Follow Séamas on Twitter @shockproofbeats
