I generally blame parenthood but maybe it is more about getting older because some of our childless friends say they are missing it too. It is more than the elaborate dinner parties, and god knows it is so much more than the enormous, loud, smokey parties because they were getting exhausting even in my twenties.. it is the spontaneous socialising that I really miss. The ‘let’s open another bottle of wine and you can just stay the night’ type of socialising.
Not so much the drop-in as the hang-out. Drop-ins are casual and impulsive social affairs but the hang-out is time without restrictions. How often does that happen with small children around? Not a lot, and tonight when we actually were doing some hanging out I realised again how much I miss it. I hope that comes back somehow as our children get older.
Oh lor. I miss this so much. My kid is 2 so I just have fingers crossed for it coming back one day.
God yes.
My kid is still so young that the reason is pretty obvious. He’s four months old and he needs cuddles in the night…
But there’s other things. Like people moving further apart from each other, pet owners who also need to get home, people getting too posh for public transport, people who haven’t slept in a single bed or on a couch for years and aren’t about to start now.
It sounds like my in-laws did a fair bit of this when their children were teenagers, but the trouble is that it was compulsory alcohol. No one stays the night unless the law requires them to.
At least in my (earlier) twenties I missed out on holidays with friends, hoping getting into that staves the lack of good parties off.
We have found that it can be done, but can’t really be spontaneous. If you plan for (childless) friends to stay and don’t mind being tired the next day it is do-able. Of course one of you has to take on the putting of excited children to bed which can harsh your mellow and lead to pointed glares at partners studiously ignoring you. So hanging out without the spontaneity.
I’m glad it’s not only me who feels this way. Sometimes I wish I lived in a commune where friends could drop around any time. Then again, I value my space, too.
We have a group of friends with children roughly the same age and find that we do early dinner together and then hang out pretty regularly. It is a total sanity saver. As long as you are OK with the kids trashing the house which is the price of sitting outside round the fire. If a kid needs to home early, because it’s easy walking distance, usually one parent doesn’t mind having an early night too. Also helps that these occasions are frequent enough that you’re not going to mind being cut short sometimes. In summer it morphs into a Friday night barbeque in the park with a much wider attendance.
Our little estate – with lots of lefty/greeny/feminist type families – who all live in a variation of the same house – in a streetscape made for walking illustrates how easily things can be better for families in this respect. Pity that rising real estate prices will change everything.
We try to maintain the hanging out as much as possible, although it has all the restrictions you mention. I figure if we stay in the habit, as the restrictions get older and more independent, old school hanging out will resume naturally. Of course, I doubt it will look exactly the same, but it’s the company and the rambling conversation that matters, not the props.
My parents maintained a fair bit of hanging out – we were often required to crash at other people’s houses because another bottle had been opened, another game of Trivial Pursuit begun or similar.
In summer we have a lot of “happy hours” on Fridays, with the kids running wild in the cul-de-sac as another bottle of wine gets open.
But for hanging out, I’ve found that camping or holidaying together are really the best. The accommodation can be crappy, but never the food!
Yeah, I miss silly stuff, like going round to people’s houses to watch tv, or that sense that if you found yourself at a loose end on a Friday or Saturday (or Thursday or Wednesday) night, there were a handful of places to go where people you knew would be. I miss getting ready for a night out for ours and having so much fun you don’t actually end up going anywhere, or putting the right music on and someone dropping round and suddenly it’s a party.
I know there is a different kind of family style hanging out, and it’s fun and stuff – I love camping and sleepovers with fish and chips and champagne as much as the next mum. But I get really tired now in company. I guess partly because back in the day I knew I’d be going home to my own space, whereas now, I go home to a Crowded House (and not the type with Finn brothers). I miss spontaneity, and silliness, and lack of responsibility.