Julie Myerson reflects on why parents continue to cocoon teenage children when they're old enough to take responsibility for themselves.
It's fashionable to suggest that 'the family' as we know it is in jeopardy, a fragile, crumbling thing. But I'd actually argue the exact opposite. I'd say we harbour a more romantic and idealised reverence for that storybook unit - father, mother, kids, cat, dog - than ever before.
Never has the raising of babies been undertaken with so much deliberation - we read the birth encyclopaedias, select equipment, endlessly debate diet and education. Parenthood is a serious business, one you throw your heart and soul into. And then you wake up, 20 odd years down the line, to find yourself tired, middle-aged and sharing your home with a brood of large, beautiful, robust and dedicatedly self-absorbed 'toddlers'. My heart goes out to the mum in Episode 1. She doesn't want to be 40. And her 19-year-old daughter is out partying all the time. And yes, teenage girls tend to blossom sexually and hurl themselves into the world, just as their mothers are becoming aware of their waning ovaries. But this isn't about that. Forty is no longer the grey-hair-and-cardigan era it once was. And I don't honestly believe that most mothers of teenage girls want to compete. On the contrary, we are rooting for our lovely girls - excited and moved to see them out there in the world.
But what we can't stomach, what makes middle age begin to feel tragic, is the lack of pleasure our semi-adult offspring seem to take in what we call family life. The suppers, the birthdays, the daily warmth, love and goodwill - it's what we spent all those years creating, what makes the harder stuff worthwhile. And it kills us when they refuse to join in.
However, we have no one to blame but ourselves. So highly do we rate and romanticise family, that we infantilise our young adults, cocooning them at home for as long as possible. Granting them so many of the advantages of adulthood, while demanding so very little in return, we delude ourselves that we can teach them the harsh lessons of life simply by explaining, caring, loving them enough. We kid ourselves that if we clean up after them, put nutritious food on the table, they'll somehow learn to take responsibility for themselves.
What fools we are.
At one point in episode 1, weary dad walks through the house, pausing at each door as if in a hotel, struggling to reach a consensus about what his clientele are prepared to eat. One will eat rice, but not pasta. Another doesn't want rice. Another isn't fussed as long as it's quick. Except it mustn't have jam in it. Or pineapples. Dad plods on into the kitchen where he grinds to a confused halt. I laughed, but I also saw myself in him. I'm not saying I often manage to practice what I preach, but the preacher in me was yelling: for heaven's sake stop dropping worms in those great big birds' beaks and boot them out of the nest!
Julie Myerson was writing about series one, episode one of The Family.
