We’re just back from a family holiday to Japan and after two decades, I’ve developed clear ideas about who does what on these trips. Historically, my husband has been responsible for energetic fun, ensuring we get everywhere too early, asking strangers questions the rest of us are too shy to ask, and keeping hold of all passports. My responsibilities are minutely researched accommodation and food choices, worrying about somehow causing offence, and taking my spouse for an early-morning coffee so our sons can sleep past 6am. They, at least in their teenage years, were mostly focused on staying in bed for as long as possible, crushing our excesses of enthusiasm and finding wifi. That only made the moments when they joined in with energetic fun, enjoyed the obscure bakery I marched them to or conceded that it had been a decent holiday all the sweeter.
But the greatest certainty over the past 20 years was that we were the grownups: in charge, making decisions, handling logistical snafus and emotional upheavals. When one of the kids got upset about the treatment of a street dog or had a hangry meltdown, when they lost their chargers or favourite Pokémon cards, we had the answers.
