I was conditioned to think of going out as morally superior to hibernating. Now I regard the decisive opt-out as a dynamic choice too
As of Wednesday this week, a quarter of all kids at state school in New York were absent, for virus or other reasons. In the UK, a week before Christmas, they wouldn’t have been at school in the first place, but across much of the US, winter break doesn’t start until Christmas Eve. Every year this seems ungenerous, but this year it’s unbearable. We struggle in on Wednesday in -3C weather, and that night I have a conniption. That’s it, we’re out. I tell my kids, we’ll stay home tomorrow; the vacation starts now.
It costs me something to say this. Through a combination of kneejerk rule-following and a desire to have the house to myself, we rarely skip school, even when people are sick (not with Covid). Until recently, we didn’t skip anything much. I’ve long subscribed to the theory that it’s better to do things than not do things. I also have to be vigilante against constant lobbying from my kids to take the line of least resistance. “No, we’re going, so stop asking me,” is a phrase played on repeat in my house with varying levels of crossness. “Giving up” is bad. Effortful endeavour is good. “You’ll enjoy it once you get there” – a line used every Thursday night by my mother when I didn’t want to go to Brownies – has surfaced three decades later to be rolled out prior to violin, taekwondo and playdates in the park. Silently, I say it to myself as I shrug on my jacket prior to dinners.
Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist
