The difference between imagination and real life

Growing up birthdays were never a particularly big deal in the Kean household, it’s just how it was. Anniversaries of pretty much any kind tended to be discrete affairs. A card, a couple of small presents and that was typically it. There would be a small birthday party as I was growing up, but I think my parents discretely stopped kids birthday parties altogether as early as was reasonable. Certainly before I hit my teens the idea of a birthday party after that was just never put out there, it’s just how it was.

I remember a birthday party at my uncles for Granddads 65th, but even that was sold as a retirement party rather than a birthday celebration.

The biggest get together and celebrations were always about family. The biggie was always Christmas, we’d all gather at Granddads, eat our fill, drink, open presents, make pass-the-parcel into a full-contact sport and give up watching the Bond film because there was too much going on.

Other big get togethers were New Year and every summer there would be a Sunday or two where we’d all get together, barbeque, mum and at least one of her sisters would get falling over drunk and dad would have to help her into the back of the car.

As I think about these times the one constant in them is that I picture my parents being about the same age I am now, in their 40’s. Dad was in his early 30’s when he became a father, older than many in his generation and almost 10 years older them mum when I was born.

A friend of mine thinks my father was rather dashing as a younger man, broad shouldered, fit and dark haired. She also said he sounds “like Sean Connery, only sexier”; his Scottish accent has been tempered by living south of the border for the last 50 years.

There were a few years when I was first living in the US where I could not afford to travel back to London and see my parents as often as I’d have liked. While I’d talk to them a couple of times a week on the phone, it was always startling to see them suddenly age a year or 18 months when they would come to meet me at Heathrow.

Dad’s hair would be a little thinner with more grey. Mum would be slightly shorter than I remember, less stable on her feet and get tired a little sooner. Why it was always a surprise I’m not sure, but it was.

As I said in my mind dad is about the same age I am now and I’d be met at Heathrow by this man who looked about 20 years older with grey hair and now a bit of a stoop. Even now I visit 3 or 4 times a year it takes me by surprise every time.

If he tried to lift me up onto his shoulders as he used to when I was 6 it would probably kill him now. Heck even at his fittest, joints would have been put out at the very least had he tried to shift today’s bulk.

It’s the same with mum, I always imagine her as she was 20 years ago. Which considering how she was last time I saw her is for the better.

Even though we are both middle aged one of the last conversations I had with mum was how I was the sensible one and gave them little worry as a teenager (I saved that for my 20’s and onwards), while Stephen was the younger one and always doing something that they were worried about (and he calmed down somewhat about the same time I started to push my personal envelope).

Part of it is that when I’d visit my parents (OK, it was Mum) treated both of us like we were still in our early teens, a little nagging about rather unimportant stuff, worried about where we were going that evening, not to go out with wet hair as we’d catch a cold and so on. I think in some respect this reverting back to type gave my brother and I permission and freedom to act the age we were being treated. Which would have been about 10 and 12.

Quite a few years ago mum gave me an album of photos of me growing up, my parents growing up, family outings, weddings and so on, with my grandparents featuring rather strongly in it. As cool as an X-box, bike or remote controlled dalek is, its’ the best present I’ve ever been given.

In this picture dad is about the same age as I am now. I’ll leave you to work out who the rather handsome young man sitting on his knee is.