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WHEN YOU’RE OUT there in the big bad world, it’s very easy to romanticise the cosy home life you once had.
It was a place where dinners were always cooked, bed sheets were always clean, and the only responsibility you had was to keep your own room tidy (though you tried to shake this one off whenever you could).
Going back home to your parents as an adult is always an interesting experience – it’s like time has stopped, while you have moved on.
Here are seven things that are almost guaranteed to happen every time you make the trip back to Ballyhaunis or Termenfeckin or wherever it is you call home.
Train rage.
You have your ticket. You have booked a seat. Yet you still join the waiting hordes that run pell-mell at the 6.45 Westport train as if your life depends on it. Woe betide the person who sits in your pre-booked window seat. They’ll be standing until Claremorris, but do you care? NO!
Maybe they made a comment about your new, “interesting” hair cut, maybe they maybe they insist on changing the channel during the ad breaks. It doesn’t matter really. A door is getting slammed, for old times’ sake.
There’s always so much of it, yet so little of it ever means anything to you.
“Sandra from down the road’s son Brendan did excellent in his Leeeeaving and wants to be an accountant. Imagine! And do you know who died…”
WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE.
You eat well.
Employing the logic that what you cook for yourself isn’t nearly as tasty as the food your parents make, you go for second and third helpings of everything. More gravy, please.
Take care would your parents actually put some recent pictures of you up in the house. Everywhere you go, you see your frizzy-haired, chubby-cheeked, buck-toothed childish visage peering down at you. Shudder.
Sunday 22 December, 2024
Sunday 22 December, 2024
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7 things that happen when you go 'back home' for the weekend
WHEN YOU’RE OUT there in the big bad world, it’s very easy to romanticise the cosy home life you once had.
It was a place where dinners were always cooked, bed sheets were always clean, and the only responsibility you had was to keep your own room tidy (though you tried to shake this one off whenever you could).
Going back home to your parents as an adult is always an interesting experience – it’s like time has stopped, while you have moved on.
Here are seven things that are almost guaranteed to happen every time you make the trip back to Ballyhaunis or Termenfeckin or wherever it is you call home.
Train rage.
You have your ticket. You have booked a seat. Yet you still join the waiting hordes that run pell-mell at the 6.45 Westport train as if your life depends on it. Woe betide the person who sits in your pre-booked window seat. They’ll be standing until Claremorris, but do you care? NO!
Awkward small talk with former acquaintances.
Your parents’ friends, former teachers, that girl you were really good friends with in Transition Year but then just stopped talking to.
“So you’re living in…Dublin now, is it?” “Oh yeah yeaaah, it’s great.” “Up there in the big smoke, jays it’s gas sure.” “…It is.”
You have a blazing row with at least one member of your family.
Maybe they made a comment about your new, “interesting” hair cut, maybe they maybe they insist on changing the channel during the ad breaks. It doesn’t matter really. A door is getting slammed, for old times’ sake.
You get all the local goss from your ma.
There’s always so much of it, yet so little of it ever means anything to you.
“Sandra from down the road’s son Brendan did excellent in his Leeeeaving and wants to be an accountant. Imagine! And do you know who died…”
WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE.
You eat well.
Employing the logic that what you cook for yourself isn’t nearly as tasty as the food your parents make, you go for second and third helpings of everything. More gravy, please.
You’re reminded of your childhood at every turn.
Take care would your parents actually put some recent pictures of you up in the house. Everywhere you go, you see your frizzy-haired, chubby-cheeked, buck-toothed childish visage peering down at you. Shudder.
You feel happy.
At the end of the day though, you’re grateful to be home. They may be a shower of dozy eejits, but they’re your shower of dozy eejits.
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