Time flies...

So that’s son number one’s first term at school completed. First nativity play. First school Christmas dinner. First set of school shoes completely and utterly ruined (note to self, waterproofing spray is worth the extra money, Clarks shoes maybe not). It only feels like a few months ago rather than over 5 years, that I was overdue and awaiting arrival of son number one, let alone number two. I hear myself saying it more and more these days, (I must be getting old) where does the time go?

The weeks don’t seem to be as long as they were years ago. I remember as a child the time between Bonfire Night and Christmas seemed to last forever. So desperate were we to get to the festive period. Now Christmas and Bonfire Night all seem to be a part of the same festive blur. In fact, add Halloween to that too.

Could it be that time is actually speeding up? Is there some great conspiracy out there that is magically changing all of our clocks and making each minute actually last half the time? If that is the case, why do the days when the kids are at there most annoying seem to drag? But no matter how much hard work the kids are being, and how often I have a bad afternoon, it doesn’t seem to change the fact that the weeks and months pass by quicker than I’d care to mention.

It’s ironic that some days we wish the time away (I can’t wait for them to get to bed so I can have some me time), and others we wish time would stand still (one day they’ll grow up and I’ll be surplus to requirements).

The man has a theory. The older you get the faster time goes because each unit of time becomes a smaller percentage of the time you’ve been alive. So a 4 year old feels like a year lasts forever because it’s a quarter of their life, but to a 34 year old it feels like no time at all because it’s only a 34^th of your life. Move over Stephen Hawking. It’s a pretty good theory, and I wonder how accurate it is.

I like to think of my Facebook picture as “recent”, but in reality it is nearly a year old. I need to change it for a slightly more haggard version before I get done for false advertising. Why does it feel like that picture was taken only a few weeks ago, but at the same time, when I think of how much I have done this year I realise it feels like a different person and a different life altogether?

Time supposedly flies when you’re having fun. So does that mean that our kids (who think ten minutes is a very long time) are bored out of their skulls and us grown ups are having a whale of a time? Seems a little unfair given the amount of energy we put into giving our kids a good time (usually at a cost of fun for ourselves).

There is actually scientific evidence to back up the theory that time flies when you’re having fun. The University of St Thomas, Minnesota, for instance, conducted an experiment where they asked people to comment on their enjoyment of a task set, secretly switching a stopwatch during the task to make one group think that the task lasted 5 minutes, and the other 20. The group who believed the task lasted only 5 minutes, reported greater enjoyment than those who thought it had lasted 20. I would love to know what the actual task was, and who the people were who took part. Different people would report more enjoyment in different tasks. If you set a watching TOWIE task to me and the man, I would report a dramatic quickening of time, but the man would probably report a drastic slowing down of time and increase in general malaise.

There have been many scientific experiments about our perception of time and they all conclude that yes, time does indeed fly when you’re having fun.

So maybe the cure for time going so fast is to have a boring, unpleasant life. I think I’d rather have a speedy happy one, rather than miserably dragging it out just for the sake of it.

I’m quite happy that time flies. Apart from the odd less than positive comment from the man (“we’ll be old and dead soon” – what a cheery thought), as long as time is flying I’m having a great time. I must be. Science says so, and you can’t argue with science right?

Whose Christmas is this anyway?

Like many people around the world this weekend we ventured into our loft (and hopefully unlike many people around the world also discovered a leaking roof, ah what a great time of year), to recover several boxes of sparkly stuff and adorn our house.

I keep hearing people say that Christmas is for kids. But I love Christmas. And kids get play time, toys, millions of dedicated TV programming time, an almost guaranteed birthday cake and party every year (to which all the guests bring presents) and someone else to cook, clean and earn money for them. Let’s face it, they get it pretty cushy. Grown ups get the crappy end of all of that. Frankly, as adults, we deserve Christmas. So if one more person says to me “Christmas is for kids” I might be inclined to whip them with a clipboard holding my “Reclaim Christmas for All” petition.

So anyway, we got our decorations down from the loft. Our Christmas decorations are pretty much limited to tree (and it’s adornments), one set of Santa lights for the playroom and a tiny glitter Christmas tree I got from the pound shop a few years ago in an effort to spread the Christmas joy to my kitchen, which now sits at a bit of a wonky angle. I do love it when people go absolutely mad with their decorations. We often drive around just to look at folks outdoor displays. I would love to have a house like that but I can’t help but imagine the work (not to mention cash) that goes into creating these masterpieces, so may I take this opportunity to thank those who put in so much effort for the rest of us to enjoy.

When son number one was 2, we didn’t have a tree. Not in a sad way, it was just that we lived in a flat with only one living area and we knew a two year old couldn’t be trusted with one. So I made a tree using sugar paper cut outs of handprints, it still got ripped up but at least I didn’t have to keep redecorating it.

Now we have a house and a sitting room. Note I call it a sitting room, not lounge and not front room, because this is a grown ups room, where no toys are allowed and children only under supervision or permission from adults. We also have another two year old, but we have a nice room in which to keep a tree away from his inquisitive little fingers.

Well that was the plan anyway. We hadn’t even got all of the boxes down from the loft before we had a broken bauble being trodden into the carpet, all the boxes and bags ripped open and tinsel and pinecones spread all around the house. Kids just don’t get the organisation that goes into unpacking and packing up Christmas decorations, least of all a two year old who just sees baubles as sparkly bouncy balls (takes a good few broken ones before they realise that they don’t bounce) and pine cones as a potential food source.

So I was already feeling the pressure and didn’t even attempt to do my usual nice organised tree decorating, with my Now That’s What I Call Christmas CD playing in the background, a cup of tea and a mince pie. I gave the decorating over to son number one (supervised by the man) while I took other son up to bed and away from the chaos.

I came down to find the tree, usually tastefully decorated with just the right mix of traditional and contemporary pieces, positively groaning under the weight of our entire Christmas decoration collection. The man had apparently tried to explain that we don’t usually use ALL the decorations, just some of them, but son number one, in his enthusiasm, could not be restrained.

We also let son number one have an old broken fibre optic tree in his bedroom to decorate and another tiny fibre optic advent tree, which plays very irritating Christmas music, the epitome of tackiness but there is no accounting for taste and he loves it. So the few decorations that had escaped being put on our main tree have ended up on those. And he does love to take all the decorations off and redecorate it, so proud is he of his very own Christmas tree.

OK, maybe my enthusiasm for Christmas decorations is waning some what, and doesn’t have the same vigour as that of a child. But that doesn’t mean it’s not for grown ups. I work hard for my Christmas damn it and I am determined to enjoy the Christmas spirit if it kills me. Maybe we have a few broken baubles and our tree chocolates won’t last the week, but I’m not doing all this work just for the kids. With all the Christmas shopping, cooking, planning and let’s face it, stress, us grown ups need some Christmas joy just to get through it.