Before kids: Weekends were a source of respite, recovery, nourishment and play.
They might have started with a couple of cheeky drinks after work, home for a take away and a quality bottle of wine or beers. Maybe a little marital / commonlaw horseplay and then a lazy lie in on Saturday morning. A few chores and maybe even one load of washing then food shopping and a coffee with a friend. Saturday night might feature a meal at some friends, a trip to the pub or, for the more daring to a club or band.
Sunday morning would be long, lazy, maybe a roll-together, some reading of newspapers, a long bath and a cooked breakfast which you got to finish yourself. A walk in the woods, Sunday lunch at a local pub with friends or the colour supplement and maybe an afternoon film at the cinema. A long, uninterrupted phone conversation with your mum or close friend, some rubbish telly, a good book and then bed…
After kids:
Friday night is exactly the same as any other night of the week: manhandling children into pyjamas, wiping the contents of their tea off the floor, hasty bedtime (not letting them know for a minute that it’s Friday night and there’s no school tomorrow) so you can get to that discounted bottle of wine you bought in Tescos – 3 for 2 – which turns out not to be that nice at all and you now own 3 bottles of the stuff. Fall asleep in front of a movie it turns out you are now too old, tired and picky to get through without continuous moaning and nit picking.
Saturday morning starts at 5am because no one told the kids they didn’t have to get up before sunrise. Lie on sofa pretending to be asleep while they re-enact the Battle of Le Somme with Power Rangers and find an accordian to serenade you with. Unfortunately you do have a hangover even though you only had a glass and a half of atrocious wine. Roll together doesn’t work as kids keep coming upstairs to find out if you’re OK and to bring you some ‘breakfast’ in bed (crushed biscuits mashed with banana).
Saturday spent trying to food shop with two (or more) small wild animals, resisting the magnet-like forces of the local toyshop, putting as many loads of washing on as you can feasibly dry in a day then racing to the children’s party you forgot to eldest/ youngest / that-one-in-the-middle was invited to, quick stop via toyshop for present (at which point resistance to buying a new toy meets toughest test yet). Drag tired children home full of Sunny Delight or generic equivalent, wash and to bed. Either sit and lament lack of life or scrape together money for a babysitter and stare exhaustedly into a beer in a pub it seems is full of 20-somethings in cobweb tights and music that seems just a little too loud…?
Sunday: repeat as Saturday.
no mention here of your adoring friends who adorn you with food and love and the visit to the Golden Lion on a Friday night which spills over to saturday morning…..