More thought on time

It is amazing that my children have any grasp of time at all. "We're leaving in TWO MINUTES" I say. Then I get chatting to a friend, and ten minutes later I repeat "I said we were leaving in TWO MINUTES. Come on, hurry up, get your stuff. Now. Quick. We're going to be late." Then I remember one more thing I had to tell my friend, and five minutes later I repeat "Now. We're going. Quick. I said TWO MINUTES."

Maybe my mother was the same. Maybe that's why I have a struggle with the whole concept of time. If my children ask me any of those cosmic-related questions like why we have summer and winter, my reply is "that's because the earth spins on its axis, no, hang on, wait a minute, no, it's because the earth goes round the sun, and, um, the sun is hotter on one side than the other, no no, that's not right, um, oh yes, I remember, it's because the earth is tilted and doesn't face true north, so it gets colder when it's round the back of the sun because England and America get tilted away, and yes, that's why the moon is sometimes up in the daytime too because we see it for longer when we're tilted." Poor kids. They don't have a chance.

I know 7-yo ponders these things. He once said to me "It's not fair for kids. When you're a kid, when something is boring, time seems to slow down and it lasts for ages. Then when you're having a good time, like at recess, time seems to speed up and it goes by so fast." I hated to disillusion him, but felt I had to. "You know what? When you're an adult, it's exactly the same thing. You've got more used to it, but it's the same thing." He took the news in his inimitable child stride.

Living in America makes it more complicated for them than it was for me as a child (which was already complicated enough, let me tell you). They know that when we Skype grandparents, it's our morning but their afternoon. How complicated is that? They understand very easily now, but I remember struggling to explain it before we came. Before we flew out, nearly two years ago now, we carefully explained to them that it was going to be a long and exhausting journey. Not only was it a long, long way and we'd have to be in the plane for a long, long time, but also, there was this thing called the time difference. This meant that the day would be an extra long day, because it would be like it had six extra hours in it. We'd arrive in the evening, but it would be for us as if it was the middle of the night. We'd be tired, very tired, was the message I was trying to get across. 7-yo took a different message though. He told a friend of mine "Do you know, in America it's great, because their days are six hours longer than ours."

I repeat, I would love to be inside my child's head for a day.
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