Two years ago I started writing this weekly column as a celebration of the state of childhood with all its beauty, intrigue, and startling odours. I promised myself I’d stop before my kids were old enough to be embarrassed by it. And so now – as the world’s parents say a billion times a day at the swings in the park – I think it’s a good time to stop and let someone else have a turn. Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t know why my wife and I have been so lucky. I have no clue how many cosmic accidents were required to gift us three happy kids – what infinite twists of DNA, what incalculable adaptive extensions of that long chain of life with its origin in the dust of comets’ tails. Read the rest of this entry »

This week our 6-year-old withdrew to his inner sanctum with a black chunky marker pen, declaring that no one was to disturb him as he would be working on a Very Important Project. Read the rest of this entry »

Childhood doesn’t end, it just has loose ends. At a formative moment in the soundtrack to my own youth, Betty Boo was “Doing The Do” – and since no news has reached me to the effect that the Do is now done, I’m haunted by the suspicion that Betty is still out there somewhere in her silver PVC bodysuit, doing it. I worry that it must be exhausting for her. Read the rest of this entry »

Seven years ago, when my wife was pregnant with our first child, I went shopping for a baby cot in Paris. In the humblest shop I could find, the cheapest cot on display was beyond our means and so the salesman – a gaunt young student with world-weary eyes and a five-day beard – took me out to the stockroom and indicated a lesser model. “You can take this one for cash if you like. We cannot sell it in the shop.” It seemed fine, so I asked him what was wrong with it. He shrugged. “This cot,” he said, “is made from the natural wood of good French trees that has not been treated with chemicals. It is the type of cot that Napoleon used. Also Molière and Sartre. We cannot sell it with the new European laws because it is not completely fireproof.” He shrugged again, despairingly. “But what is your baby going to do, huh? Smoke in bed?” Read the rest of this entry »

This week, having fessed up to further burdening an already crowded planet, we have been re-engineering our three children to render them less environmentally destructive than two standard-issue human infants. Read the rest of this entry »

My parents’ generation brought forth two kids per family, thus ensuring the survival of the species as it thrilled to a bri-nylon world of G&T, waterskiing, and promiscuous love. Then the Seventies ended, and with them any possible rationale for perpetuating humanity. Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ll be in London on 4th Feb you are warmly invited to attend a public forum at the (very beautiful) Southwark Cathedral, 7pm-8.30pm, on the theme of refugee and asylum-seeker detention in the UK. [Click here to see event flyer]. On the panel will be me, Jonathan Cox (Director of Citizens for Sanctuary), the Revd Canon Ruth Worsley, and Tom Greig, Deputy Director of the London area for the UK Border Agency. Read the rest of this entry »

I enjoyed doing this podcast with the good people at Shift Run Stop. They are the sort of folk one might follow on Twitter and never regret it.

Our 6-year-old just codified our household’s mealtime lore and pinned it to our message board, in scenes reminiscent of Luther nailing his Theses to the church door. See below for photo and transcript. Read the rest of this entry »