Shepherds Bush, October 14th 2017

The father who lives upstairs and his young son stage an audio play outside my window at 7.10am each morning. The apparently simple task of getting a child to walk down six steps and move down a pavement actually involves much coaxing, pleading, bargaining, explanation, demonstration, and exasperated sighing.

The father talks in a measured cheerful way like a 1970s children presenter. The son was, until recently, a happily curious child whose every sentence would begin with ‘Why..’. This he would follow with that one word again and again until he felt he’d really scraped the life out of a topic.

His curiosity fixated briefly on anything that passed his eye-line; bike helmets, leaves, rubbish, neighbours, birthday balloons, insects, railings, the colour of his dad’s trousers. All answered in a calm tone that suggested there was a soothing order to the world. That has changed.

The son has replaced the one word with three new ones.

“It’s not fair”.

He wants to wear a badge but doesn’t have one to wear and so “It’s not faaairrrrr”, he doesn’t want to go to play school in the rain and “It’s not faiiirrr”. He wants to stay at home with his mum but isn’t allowed and “IT’S. NOT. FAIR”.

The father has entered a new world of parental pain. Meanwhile I lay praying the alarm grants me 9 more minutes before having to haul my exhausted bones into another day and think ‘He has a fair point’.