An untimely interruption

Wendy and I discovered during our year in London in 1961-62 that we woke each morning an hour or two before our children. If we wanted quality time to ourselves without interruptions or distractions, those early morning hours were our best bet, better than evenings when one or both children often had demands that kept us hopping until it was our own bed time.. This hour or two of freedom from kiddies was especially welcome at weekends when I didn't have to get up and away to start my day at the Social Medicine Research Unit.

Early on a summer Sunday morning Wendy and I were frolicking on our king-size bed, happily expressing our mutual affection. It was hot so we had discarded our bed clothes, nightgown and pyjamas. The technical name for our enjoyable activity is foreplay and it was absorbing our undivided attention. We may have been whispering or murmuring sweet nothings to each other but our bedroom was quiet until suddenly the silence was broken by the outraged loud voice of Rebecca, demanding to know, "What's Mummy doing to Daddy?"

There behind us were our two toddlers, hand in hand as they often were, gazing with wide open eyes at their embarrassed parents. Hastily we pulled a sheet over us and swept under a pillow the devices we used in those pre-Pill years to minimize the risk of further additions to our little family. Wendy donned a robe to render herself respectable and escorted our two little spoil-sports back to their own bedroom.

Years later I asked both Rebecca and David if they remembered that morning. David was too young to have started laying down memories and Rebecca was on the cusp, does have some fragmentary memories of that wonderful year, but has no recollection of that embarrassing morning, embarrassing to us anyway. Probably it's just as well that she doesn't remember it. That episode could have left scars on her psyche - or given her ideas long before she was able to put them into practice. Rebecca's question that Sunday morning doesn't qualify as a cute saying but it's one early childhood remark we never forgot.