Writing for life

Published in the WOW! supplement of the Evening Echo 07/11/2007

Children and parents view birthday parties very differently. The twins had been looking forward to their birthday for weeks. We, on the other hand, while not exactly dreading it, had been viewing its approach with something akin to mild apprehension.

From a parent’s perspective a children’s birthday party, while admittedly great fun, heralds a disproportionate amount of hard work. If parenthood was a business you’d take one look at the potential return on your investment and scrap the project before it even got started. But it’s not, and so we go through the rigmarole year in, year out.

First there’s the preparation: the invitations, the shopping, finger food, cake-baking and decoration, balloons, party games and the hundred other little details that go into a successful birthday party. And that’s before a crowd of overexcited kids are dumped on the scene by parents who, in spite of the pretence, are obviously eager to palm their little cherubs off on some other poor sucker for a few hours.

We’d been so organised that morning… or at least my wife had been. I don’t really do organised – at least, not very well. Somehow, despite our best efforts the hours evaporated and it was suddenly time for guests to start arriving.

The girls had engaged in some debate earlier in the week about who they would and wouldn’t be inviting to their party. In the end, unlike last year, they decided to open it up to boys as well as girls. I was impressed with their spirit of equality and inclusiveness… then I overheard their rationale. By inviting boys as well, they surmised, they’d get their double the presents. So much for equality and inclusiveness – still, I suppose enterprise and cunning will come in handy later in life too.

Luckily nobody in West Cork arrives anywhere on time. With a heroic final push we pulled it all together and had everything ready just as the doorbell started to ring.

There were fifteen children in all – plus our three – and it was complete anarchy. Our attempts at event coordination amounted to little more than herding the mob, sheepdog-like, from activity to activity, and engaging them quickly before they could dispersed to the four corners of the house again.

We played all the old party favourites (yippee!), along with a selection of seasonally inspired Halloween activities like bobbing for apples and fishing creepy-crawly shapes out of a bowl of jelly with their teeth. Undisputed favourite, however, was the now traditional piñata.

It’s amazing how much pleasure children can derive from simple things. Hang a papier mache tube filled with sweets from the ceiling and ask them to bash it with a big stick and they’re over the moon. It’s better than any video game. It’s more interactive, and it’s real. They get to hit something as hard as they can with a real stick, and when they finally overcome their opponent, and the piñata explodes, it rains sweets. For all their complexity and innovation, you won’t find a games console on the planet that gives you sweets when you win.

Everyone had a great time, and went home tired and happy. When the girls were tucked up in bed I surveyed the aftermath and resigned myself to joining the clean-up operation. Parties may not offer a great return on investment, but they make the children happy, and at the end of the day that’s reward enough.