Parenting without my village taught me what I have

THROUGH some stroke of bad luck, everyone I hold dear went away at the same time. Except the three children I’m responsible for, which is where things got hairy, writes Darren Levin.

IT takes a village to raise a child, but what happens when the village goes on a five-star cruise to Vietnam and leaves you to experience single parenthood for an entire week?

The village, of course, is my parents. And like most Boomers they continue to blow my inheritance on needless holidays instead of chauffeuring around the children we made primarily to stop them from asking (in a whiny Jewish voice): “When are you going to give us more grandkids?” Well, mum and dad, we have given you more grandkids — three of them — and (also in a whiny Jewish voice) now you wanna go on cruises instead of dropping them off at school? Oi vey.

To add kosher salt to injury, my wife went to Queensland on one of those “work trips” where you go on boat rides and drink the whole time. My last remaining lifeline — my mother-in-law — was off to Canada to see family. You know things are really dire when you miss your mother-in-law. (Love you, Ros!)

Darren Levin with one of his three daughters. (Pic: supplied)

Obviously, my wife and I are pretty capable of looking after our own kids; we always remember to put a bowl of fresh water out and there’s heaps of Babybel in the fridge. But as two full-time working parents, we rely on our parents to help with school drop-offs and pick-ups, especially since their schedule still serves a 1950s-style nuclear family where mum stayed at home and dad lived in another city with his mistress.

And it turns out we’re not alone. According to a recent survey about one in four children receive some form of grandparental care. When they’re away, it costs an extra $102 a day to book them into before and after-hours care.

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So there I was faced with the reality of looking after my own children completely alone for an entire working week.

Each day starts the usual way: with Netflixand scream, which rolls into breakfast and scream.

Everything is always on a knife’s edge. If I put a sock on slightly off centre, both socks will be ripped off, the leggings will be ripped off, the T-shirt will need to be changed, and the whole process starts again. A tantrum can be sparked by the tiniest of things: a stray glance, a misplaced toy, Peter Dutton’s face on TV.

Darren Levin with his three daughters. (Pic: supplied)

Then there’s breakfast. One of the things they don’t put in the “So you were dumb enough to have kids” starter pack is a fact sheet on how each of your children will have different tastebuds (crazy, I know). It means that the first meal of the day at our house isn’t too dissimilar to hotel buffets that see short order cooks busting out customised omelets and shrivelled chipolatas thanklessly one after another.

Our eldest wants raisin toast with a dollop of jam. One of the twins likes Special K with no milk, which is basically like eating a bowl of sugary sawdust. The other will consume nothing but poached eggs cooked in a water bath at 63 degrees two minutes before we have to leave.

After 14 minutes of what can vaguely be described as teeth brushing, we are finally out the door. It’s 8.42am and there’s now a 13-minute window to drop three kids off at two schools.

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Like a fast food drive through but for children, the kiss-and-go zone, or the drop off area as it’s more commonly referred to, is one of the most unheralded innovations of the modern era. It allows busy parents to gently nudge their kids out of the car while the motor is still running and dart off into cross-town traffic.

It’s 10am when I finally sit down at my desk, but still ahead of a childless millennial colleague who texts to say they’ve “slept through their alarm”.

I have six good hours until this routine starts in reverse again.

I need my village back.

Darren Levin is a writer, editor and wannabe dad-fluencer based in Melbourne. Find him on Twitter and Instagram.