Your Family

Coronavirus: Please don’t make my children feel unwelcome in your shop

Lots of us have to bring them with us. And tensions are high enough already

Four of Jen Hogan’s children on a walk

Jen Hogan's face
Jen Hogan
Tue Apr 14 2020 - 06:01

I feel I should make a sign that reads “Leo says it’s grand – we’re all part of the same family unit” to wear around my neck these day as I take my little social pariahs for their restriction-permitted walk.

Side-eye, from disapproving walkers who spot my potential vectors strolling alongside me with micro-dog on her lead, is not unusual. It strikes me as incredible, however, that they fail to realise they could well be vectors too.

In fairness to my littles, who are naturally highly excitable by nature, they know the rules, having heard them repeatedly each day before we leave the house.

“What can we not do?” I remind them as we head out the door. “Run up to others,” they reply automatically and in unison.

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“And why are we not going to go into the local shop?” I continue. “Because of the coroner virus,” the youngest replies, making me beam at the cuteness of his mispronunciation.

Who’d have thought there could be anything considered cute about Covid-19.

Of course, I’m in a very fortunate position. I have teens, which means I can leave my smallies with them should I need to go to the shops. It didn’t take coronavirus to make me realise this is a huge bonus. Food shopping with children is not for the faint hearted at the best of times. Without my teens, however, I would have no choice. My husband still goes to work so I am keeping the ship afloat at home, which includes working from home myself, attempting some degree of homeschooling and getting the troops out for their daily exercise.

The lioness in me has reawoken. She springs to action anytime my Hogan cubs are threatened but I think the “fight or flight” state of mind I appear to be in constantly, these days, has contributed to her reappearance. I have an even lower tolerance level than usual for nonsense or exclusion. I feel mounting frustration on behalf of my fellow parents who are trying to juggle it all in various different personal and familial circumstances.

Making children feel unwelcome in shops when there is no other choice available to their parents, or glaring disapprovingly at families out walking who are abiding by the restrictions and the social distancing rules, all adds to the negative narrative that seems to currently surround children.

I’m also frustrated by the fact that my eldest cub who, since college has closed is now working every hour God sends in what used to be her part-time retail job, seems to be subjected to frequent outbursts from angry customers. I understand tensions are high and that people are nervous and scared, but that doesn’t make it okay to take it out on retail staff who are doing their best in very challenging times. A little kindness, or even civility, goes a long way. I feel helpless to protect her – yet another consequence of those pesky kids growing up – and it adds to my general sense of unease.

Home School Hub on RTÉ2, on the other hand, has lightened the load considerably when it comes to homeschooling pressures. It’s even given me an hour a day where there are slightly less interruptions, as I try to work, than normal. And as the days go by and the primary-schoolers become more used to the routine, I’ve even found the secret to fuelling their interest in learning. It’s all about the experiments, not the books.

And so each day they’re glued to the screen, waiting to see what the day’s experiment is. For the first few days, they were happy enough to shout their answers at the television, and see if their guesses as to what might happen would prove right. And then the enthusiasm spilled over into reality and their wanting to recreate the experiments at home.

Balancing between appreciating their eagerness and a desperation to get on with some work was hard but I knew resistance was futile. And so I donned my eager-beaver cap and filled a basin with water. The kids scattered to four corners of the house in search of items to test in the “sink or float” experiment. Fruit, pencils, toys and random objects adorned the diningroom table and awaited testing. I declared it “yard-time” ahead of the experiment, and threw the minions out to the back garden in the hope I could manage to have a sneaky cuppa.

A good 30 seconds passed before the six-year-old crept past me with micro-dog under his arm. I scarcely noticed until I heard him announce to his younger brother that he was going to see if the dog could float!

A reminder in these strange times that not all has changed, changed utterly.

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