RULE 15

Look pleased to see them

Now here’s something that really gets my goat. I can’t count the number of parents I’ve seen do this. Their child comes in from school or an afternoon out, and as they walk through the door they’re greeted with, ‘Take those muddy shoes off!’ Or, ‘Homework, now! Before you do anything else’.

I have a friend who once came home from school in the middle of the day with a huge bump on her head, after a fall in the gym. This was in the days when you were allowed to go home on your own after something like that happened. Her mum was busy mopping the kitchen floor as my friend appeared in the doorway. The mum looked up with wrinkled brow and said, ‘You can’t come in. The floor’s wet’.

How are these children supposed to know their parents love them? After all, their mum and dad greet the dog, the grandparents, their children’s friends, even the postman^* more warmly than that.

The alternative practised by some parents is just to ignore the children when they come in, as if they were part of the furniture. This is just as bad, since giving them no attention at all is arguably as bad as giving them negative attention (that’s wibble-speak for shouting at them).

Everyone is generally rushed at breakfast time on school days. But it takes no time at all to be friendly, and frankly anything that makes the kids a little bit less grumpy while you’re trying to get their hair brushed or shovel some food down them has to be worthwhile, doesn’t it?

How hard can it be to give them a smile, and maybe a hug (if they haven’t reached the age where they won’t let you)? It’s only a small thing, but it makes a huge difference to your kids. They just want to know that you’re happy to see them.

And if their shoes really are filthy and you’ve just cleaned the kitchen floor (one might ask why, when the kids were about to appear in muddy shoes), you can still use humour to stop them in their tracks and then give them hugs and kisses for co-operating.