Stripy shadows from the landing
When I was a kid I used to spend a long time sitting at the top of the stairs on the landing, somewhere between the world of growing up and being a grown up. Sometimes I’d take some colouring in books, or a knitting nancy, as an activity to do whilst quietly listening to my parents talk to each other, or their friends, or some random grown up like the financial adviser. Curiosity for this grown up world was rife.
Yesterday, as a grown up I was feeling curious and looked inside my daughter’s spy notebook (well, who could resist that?) She, along with her sidekick (little bro), has recently started a new hobby of ‘spying on parents’. My curiosity of her led me to discover her curiosity of me. She’s on the landing (well, metaphorically)!
The same day we also hosted a party for the her little brother. Even calling him ‘little’ brother indicates how we like them to stay younger for longer. Yet their desire is to grow up:
‘when I grow up I will be as tall as dadda’, ‘when I grow up…when I grow up’ and we in return say ‘when I was younger…’.
If only the ability to swap places, as in the Freaky Friday movie, was real! I’d be up for it.
And as I think of my children and their spying of me (I’m really quite boring, what must they think?), it reminds me to think of my own parents because I often forget that I am still a child too. However I think they are also on the landing, observing how we are parenting, listening to our conversations with our friends, trying to keep up with the current trends that were actually real first time trends back in the day, or feeling proud (I hope) of who we have become.
We recently renovated and now have stairs and a landing (see photo). I’m so happy to have a landing, it’s one of my favourite places in the house and now I know why. It seems there are lots of people on the landing. My family near and far. I built it for us.
Stripes and trees x
Stripes & Trees 