note from a small island

a family holiday i don't need a holiday to recover from

Photo by Ryan Spencer on Unsplash

I’m on the tiny Greek island of Hydra with my sons. The weather is bright and mild, breezy — not hot — which suits me fine because I love running and swimming, even when the water is bracing (I like jumping in, shrieking and gasping for breath).

There are no cars on this jewel-box labyrinth of an island, no chains, no street performers or sweet vendors, only craggy-faced waiters and sweet-natured donkeys for hire. It’s low season so the tourists are scattered, relaxed, and remarkably well-dressed. There’s a table at every taverna, the beaches are empty, the cats are flirtatious and keening for scraps. For the first two nights of the trip, in Athens, my sons tried to murder each other but since arriving on the island at our Lilliputian two-and-a-half room cottage they’ve given up the grudge match in favour of making jugs of fresh lemonade from the tree on the terrace, playing basket ball and taking turns on the iPad, cuddled up in a hammock.

I went for a long run along the coastal path today in the spitting rain and as I rounded a bend and looked out at the undulating skin of the Aegean it occurred to me, this is the first ‘family holiday’ (with a family of my own) that I can remember during which I don’t feel the need for a holiday to recover from the holiday I’m on.

Holidays are a kind of religion in Britain; the middle classes live for them. It’s a combination of the lack of sun, status anxiety, cheap flights and easy access to Europe, the most beautiful and culturally diverse continent on the planet. But holidays can also be stressful, stupidly extortionate and depending on the company, a special kind of hell. The expectations for enjoyment are vertiginously high. The pressure for everything to be heavenly all the time often leads to disappointment and squabbling. Add tiny children to the mix and well, why not just burn money, get drunk and cry in your own back yard?