The insanity of the school run

I’ve only been doing the school run a number of days, but it’s already become the bane of my life. I knew it was going to be bad, but I was quite unprepared for this daily ritual.

The roads around school are bumper-to-bumper busy and cars seem to get strewn in any spot large enough to accommodate a vehicle. As for the quality of some of the driving, well, let’s not even go there.

On Helen’s very first day in reception class I noticed another parent parking on a side street 10 minutes away and walking with her children to the school gate. Her kids were older than mine and so she was clearly very experienced at handling the drop offs and collections.

Less than a week after my child has started school I’ve started doing the same myself. Walking the last few minutes has turned out to be a considerably more pleasant experience; Helen and I get to have a little chat on the way to the playground, we arrive early so she gets to have a little play before going to class and I don’t get caught up in a horrendous traffic jam trying to leave afterwards.

In fairness, my opinions of school run driving were heavily biased before Helen started reception class. We live very near a school and I’ve witnessed some appalling and very dangerous driving over the years. Parking on blind bends, parking on top of speed bumps, failing to indicate, suddenly swerving across the road, hardly a day goes by when I don’t witness this at our neighbouring school.

A little while back I saw a car come to a screeching halt on a junction that had double yellow lines painted all over it. The children duly got out of the car and headed off to school. I tweeted about what I’d witnessed and a local father (a vague acquaintance) tweeted an apology thinking he may have been the culprit. It felt rather good knowing I’d made someone stop and think twice about their actions.

I’m resigned to the fact I will be doing a school run in some form for the next few years. For the sake of my health and blood pressure, however, I’m going to park round the corner and walk as often as possible. I just can’t face joining that scrum every day.

About John Adams

John Adams is a married with two young daughters. He has been a stay at home dad for almost four years. John started blogging back in 2012 after being invited to one-too-many "mother and toddler groups." This inspired him to write about the issues he faced as a stay at home dad and the gender barriers men face as parents. John continues to write about lie as a stay at home dad. He also writes about every aspect of parenting; schooling, education, pregnancy and birth, childcare and so on. Over time he has broadened the focus of his blog so he now writes about family finances, photography and occasionally covers men's style and fashion. John was originally a journalist. He concedes, however, that was a long time ago.

• Mail
|
• Web
|
• Twitter
|
• Facebook
|
• More Posts(31)