The VC-G’s Forward Planning Unit

Tucked away in the European Commission is the Forward Studies Unit. It was set up by Jacques Delors in the heady days of the Single European Act when there were only twelve, yes twelve!, EU Member States. It is very much the creation of a French-mind – a calm place where grand ideas can be mused over, pondered on and ultimately presented in academic format to policy makers. It is the kind of Unit that gives fruit to one French Minister's famous remark to the Americans: “Yes, it works in practice but can it work in theory”.

I only know about it because a good French friend of mine did a six month stint in the Unit. Later I managed to direct Lisa Lyngso there when she was looking to do a traineeship in Brussels. She was, she told me, going to work on “Futurism”. “Futurism” didn’t sound exactly academic to me, more mystic Meg than high-brow intellectualism but Lisa assured me it was very much at the cutting edge of academic thinking.

Today, twelve years on, I gather it remains a lively Unit where Europe’s brightest and finest minds sit behind their desks overlooking a motorway that goes by the name of the Rue Belliard. I imagine them sitting behind their desks, feet on table, pens a'tapping, staring out of the window with glazed eyes and looking deep, deep, deep, deeeeeeeeep into the future of Europe:

“Hmmmm, I see the future and the future is …. a blue flag with inter-locking yellow swirling stars that reach out infinitely to the east …. …”

I have decided, based on last night’s experience, that the VC-G’s will benefit not from a Forward Studies Unit but a “Forward Planning Unit”. It is indeed sad that it has come to this since by instinct I am a laissez-faire kinda girl but what with four little VC-G’s in the house I have come to the conclusion that it is probably for the best. I need to plan the immediate future much better. The unit will not be at all theoretical. Rather, it will be purely practical based on strictly functional lines the ultimate aim of which is to save time and heartache so that at the end of the day G. and I can squeeze in a Saturday and Sunday morning lie-in – i.e. not being trampled on in our beds before 7 a.m.

Our Saturday morning had begun as usual – rushing out of the house, I to bring L. to ballet between ten and eleven and G. to bring J. and K. to karate lessons between ten and eleven thirty. After lunch I went with K.M. into town to do some shopping and to stock up before J.s birthday party the following day. I also bought a white rambling rose which I intended to plant in a shady corner at the back of the garden. K.M. and I had quite good fun in town but we did make sure we were back by 4.15 because G. had an appointment at the hairdressers and was going straight for a run afterwards.

The weather was warm and mild. As we walked though the door R. began bumping his way down the stairs from the telly room, J. was stuck behind his gameboy and L. was colouring in the kitchen. It all seemed very peaceful and happy. By this stage it was pushing five, heading towards late afternoon. A critical time when one has young infants because it is normally between five and six that their needs urgently need to be addressed.

What I should really have done whilst there was peace and harmony was: forward plan, seize the opportunity and:

i) tidy up the kitchen
ii) begin to get strawberries ready
iii) lay the table for supper

All three options seemed particularly uninteresting. Instead I decided to spend a small part of the week-end on something that I wanted to do. So, rather than beginning the tasks listed above I decided to plant the rose at the back of the garden.

The house seemed calm enough. Kids were all occupied and in any case it was a nice pleasant warm afternoon. So far so good. But, it was at this point that R. began to emit low level whinging noises. The kind of low buzzing noise that spells trouble. J., who had emerged from behind the gameboy wandered into the garden and began to play rough with R., who was just not in the mood. So the winging got louder.

Regardless, I still had my eyes set on the pear tree at the back of the garden and the potted rose I had just bought at bargain price on the market. I managed to involve J. in the planting, which he did quite cheerfully but R.'s bawling just wasn’t going to go away.

The whinge and whine dial was turned up a notch or two louder. I looked at the watch but it was only 5.30. I tried to jolly them along a bit further whilst trying to get some weeding done and hoping that it was a passing irritant: surely they would all cheer up soon and begin to play calmly with each other?

By 5.50, however, it was totally obvious that I had to give up. R. was standing in the middle of the garden covered in mud. J. began to complain of a really bad headache (probably because he only had two spoonfuls of rice for lunch), and L. was (literally) shouting: “I’m hungry Mummy”, “I’m hungry when is supper ready”.

R. began to cry full volume. Ahh yes, we had forgotten to give him is afternoon nap. So our fourth toddler in a trot was suffering not only from hunger but he was also, probably, tired. I decided the best option was to put them all in the bath and sort food out later. Normally a bath calms them down.

J., who was himself, a screaming toddler not so long ago, had no patience with his younger brother’s tantrum and began to shout over R.’s crying:

“Stop crying. Just stop it I have a horrible headache”.

K.M. and L. were playing at the back of the garden in a big cardboard box that they had been given by G. which involves crawling inside through a cut out hole, standing upright and toppling themselves over full force onto the ground. Such play invoves lots of screeching and whooping.

However, when L. saw me heading upstairs to bathe R. and J. she soon came running inside shouting indignantly:

“Where is supper? I want supper Mummy. I am hungry. I am hungry Mummy. Come down here. Where are you going? I am hungry”.

The “I am hungry” protest followed us up the staircase, from the kitchen and into the bathroom. Inside the bathroom the volume was amplified by the acoustics of the tiled room and water running into the bath. R. simply would not stop crying no matter how hard we tried to distract him and J. was beginning to look pale and shivery.

At this stage the cacophony was beginning to get to me as well and so I just walked out of the room to escape the chaos. K.M. decided to take action began to read Noah’s Arc to R. in a very loud shrilly voice that managed to transcend the screams and sound of water filling up the bath.

K.M.'s tactic began to work. Slowly but surely the wailing turned into sobs and the sobs into sniffles. J. looked relieved. As was I. Phew. We had a peace of sorts. The noise level dropped again to normal proportions.

When they were all out of the bath I ran downstairs to get R. his bottle. “I better find the bottle soon” I thought since the crying for “BOTTLE” was beginning to get louder and louder threatening to spill over again into a full-blow explosion. But – of course - not having tidied up I only had one clean bottle but no clean teat. In fact I couldn't find a teat anywhere let alone a dirty one. Quite frankly any one would have done at this stage – even one plucked out of the garbage. Eventually, I found a rather dodgy broken looking one which I quickly rinsed under the tap with some soap suds and ran upstairs to give it to R. One suck and the dude crashed.

Well at least that was one down. Three to go. It was later, whilst I was making a ton of sandwhiches in the kitchen that I stumbled across the idea of a forward “planning” unit.

Had I planned better I would have:

i) tidied up the kitchen when I cam back at 4.30. Result: no scrambling for teats off the dirty floor.
ii) prepared the strawberries. Result: very happy children prepared to be jollied along whilst I plant bushes.
iii) got supper ready. Result: could have given them their supper before the crying got too bad.
iv) given R. a nap in the afternoon, instead of wandering into town. Result: R. wouldn’t have winged and cried at five already and probably played happily until later. (Nor, would R. have woken us up at 6.30 on Sunday morning by bouncing on top of me saying “keekeboe” having gone to sleep at 6 in the evening).

Calm was just beginning to be restored when G. walked back through the door from his run.

“Sounds quiet upstairs. I take it everything went well then?”