Let’s Get Packing!

Every generation is the product of the generation that raises it, but more importantly it is a product of it’s time. When you are a child you are raised in a way that reflects both and if you have a family of your own you repeat the pattern but not the final design. There will be things about your upbringing you enjoyed and want to replicate and there will be things you will never do again once you leave your childhood home. These things differ both in the elements concerned and the reasons behind them. Some people will have had very unhappy times in their family lives and want to do their best to leave everything behind them. Others will have enjoyed certain aspects but will not be able to repeat them due to lack of money, lack of time or a changed society.

Looking at the way I was raised and my own approach to parenthood I think the main difference is that the children are completely central to every decision we make, even now that they are adults. When we had family holidays with our own children, for example, we made sure that everything was set up so they could have the best possible time. The Pontins holidays we had were not ones we got a lot out of in terms of activities but the children loved them, which was the main point of going, so we went back three times because it was cheap and it was the best holiday we could afford for them. When we had a little more money we went to Amsterdam and Mallorca and both times their needs were central to our decision.

The few family holidays we had when I was growing up were entirely focused on what my parents wanted and I was expected to accept that. I did because I didn’t expect anything else from the holiday and I don’t suppose many families of my generation were any different. My memories are not of halcyon days of family togetherness! I remember getting badly burnt on a beach in Malta because my sun worshipping Dad gave me sun tan oil to try to get me brown instead of the ‘pasty’ complexion I had. He would get absolutely dark brown by the end of a two week holiday whereas I went from white to painful red and back to white again. I remember being told off for talking too much to the woman sitting next to me on a coach excursion when we were in Scotland and being made to apologise for being a nuisance. To be honest I can’t remember many good experiences because I never suited the role of mini adult. I think my early experiences gave me a dislike of holidays that took a long time to shift and even now I feel like I would rather stay at home instead of go away. I need to be pressed into holidays although generally I enjoy them once I’m there. The cost of the holiday means that I put huge pressure on myself to make it as good as possible for everyone else and I will happily not do what I want to do if it makes everyone else happy. Even now that’s the case. I do enjoy parts of the holidays once I am there but I don’t really relax in the way other people do. Part of that is my nature but a lot of it is the early experiences of family holidays as an additional complication.