It had been a long drive and now we found ourselves faced with no parking space outside the flat and three flights of unforgiving, winding stairs up which to lug a plethora of boxes and black bin liners.
Some time later, as I piled the final load into the hallway, there was a shriek from the top of the stairs and I was suddenly reminded of Michael Caine’s exasperated comment in The Italian Job.
She had opened the door a bit wider than normal and the entire thing had become detached from one of its hinges.
“You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!” which, I guess is why I almost smiled as I surveyed the scene.
We needed more light to work out the extent of the problem but the pre-paid meter seemed to have a problem. Despite showing the amount that had been deposited upon the card, this was not translating into either heat or light in the flat three floors above, even though we had checked all the fuses.
Of course, at 6pm on a Saturday evening, the estate agent’s office was going straight to answer machine and, unlike my own rented accommodation, there was no emergency number for out of office hours essential repairs. Unable to secure the property, we couldn’t leave her stuff there but the thought of transporting it all back home again was not an option. There had to be a more localised solution and I certainly wasn’t prepared to leave my child until I was certain that she was safe in her new home.
The local constabulary sent us away with short shrift when we enquired by telephone if they had a recommended emergency builder for making good in such eventualities – you’d think they must have the problem often with acts of vandalism and have a list – and no local firms were picking up their internet-listed emergency numbers.
Fortunately, her father saved the day when he found a friend of a friend who didn’t live too far away. Our hero arrived fairly swiftly and reattached the door with the proviso that the agent should ensure the position of the hinges was changed so the less rotten part of the frame if the door was to be fully secure for the future. He also sorted out the electric problem.
That’s when I started looking around properly. In my own search for new accommodation, I had seen a lot of flats and none of them had been in such a state of disrepair and lack of cleanliness as this.
In a University town, there much be lots of properties like this. Aimed at students with lesser standards of expectation, I noted the rotting floor in the bathroom and the ceiling paper hanging off, the mildew on every grouted surface in the bathroom and the dripping tap under the sink. An awful lot of cleaning was going to be required to make the most of this little bedsit’s potential and make it worth the extortionate amount the two kids were paying to live here.
But I couldn’t show that I was despondent, must offer practical help and endless enthusiasm if I wanted to help my child’s first steps on the journey to adult independence.
So I fixed the smile upon my face and helped to make a list of things to which the landlord needed to attend, before dropping her off at work and starting the long drive home with the promise to return the following weekend to help with some cleaning.
Children Leaving Home. Instinctively, it’s what they have to do, being hard wired to learn to stand on their own two feet right from the moment of their birth.
And we, as parents, have to do all we can to support them… without just taking over.
It’s a fine line as we watch our fledgelings become adults.
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