The Perfect Child
As you can no doubt see for yourselves, now that I’ve come across some old photos and scanned them in, it’s difficult to improve on perfection. Me.
And indeed as I child, I was perfect in absolutely every respect. From my incredible cuteness, to my impish cheekiness, to my allowing my parents a good nights sleep all the time (which is why it’s such a surprise to see my mother looking tired in the ‘baby’ photo — maybe it was just the camera flash?) , to my always listening to my parents and doing what I was told, I was a perfect child from start to finish.
At least, that’s how I remember it. Speak to any of my relatives, and you’d probably get an entirely different story, but I reckon that’s just jealously because they weren’t perfect. Which is why it’s such a surprise to me as a parent that my kids don’t always listen to me, that they can be awkward and misbehave at times (although they are darling angels full of big ‘huggles’ too).
I simply don’t know where they get it from, as my wife assures me she used to be perfect too, and that stories of her putting lizards in her sister’s bed are, while technically accurate, a mis-representation of the true picture…
Although one of the photos is some kind of weird temporal anomaly, because so far as I can tell that’s the one photo of me in my lifetime where I actually wanted to wear a tie.
Oh, and incidentally, the right hand photo of the montage is the wrong way up. Technically it was my parents who were sitting upright and me who was clowning around (in a perfect manner, obviously). I thought I’d better mention it, because the angle I’ve got the photograph at, it looks like my mother is about to pour a cup of coffee over my head… which she obviously wouldn’t do to such a perfect child!
Shannon says:
March 25th, 2008 at 3:23 am
That’s funny, I was a very similar child, except that everywhere I walked, there sprang up rainbows and sunshine behind me and when I “cried” in my crib it sounded more like a melodious aria. My parents were so lucky.
Gill says:
March 25th, 2008 at 12:11 pm
I truly was perfect. My mother will tell you I was. All blonde curls, beautifully spoken, well mannered, generous – I shared my toys. All in all, the absolute epitome of what every parent desires……. well apart from the daffodil incident but we’ll gloss over that minor aberration.
Jack's Mam says:
March 25th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
OK- what will you pay me not to reveal the truth?! Cute,maybe- but the ‘good night’s sleep’ business is definitely stretching things just toooooo… far. You were 4 before you slept a night through! Your children are indeed angels – they must take after their mum or maybe their grandma !
JackP says:
March 25th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
@Gill
Daffodil incident??
@Everyone else:
don’t listen to “Jack’s Mam”. It’s all lies. Lies, I tell you. You do believe me don’t you?
…oh, all right then.
Gill says:
March 26th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
The Daffodil Incident
Aged 3, my parents bought a new build in Luton. Next door were a couple with a boy the same age and we became great mates. Our world revolved around the two back gardens and the driveways.
The houses were built on chalk and both sets of parents fought tooth and nail to get anything to grow in the gardens, as there was no topsoil after the builders had finished.
Ian and I were used to seeing lots of greenish things that eventually shrivelled up and snuffed it, so one day we were thundering up and down the drive on our Triang bikes when to our horror, we noticed his mother’s green things in the front garden appeared to have developed large yellow growths.
Knowing that this wasn’t right, we thoughtfully spent a good half hour removing all said growths until it was all nice and green again. Neither of us could quite understand the reaction as we got walloped from one end of the drive to the other and shut in our bedrooms for the rest of the day.
Mike says:
March 26th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
There’s one of your mum and dad here, which you may (or may not) have seen before.
You’ll need to log in – family only, I’m afraid…
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