Let’s do this together

In the car on the way to visit the oldies at the weekend, I explained the rules of engagement to The Dark Lord.

“Granny and Grandpa haven’t seen you for a while,” I nagged. “So don’t go skulking off and leave me to do all the talking. They want to hear about what their granddaughter is doing, not tales of my boring middle-aged life. Especially since the most exciting thing to have happened to me this year so far is a double dental-hygienist appointment.”

“But I never know what to talk about,” she said sulkily, turning the music up to ‘blare’ again on the car stereo. Luckily I have a sneaky volume control on the steering wheel, so I turned it back down to ‘can hear myself think’.

“You can tell them how you’re getting on at your new school,” I suggested. “And you’ve got your guitar, so you can play a few tunes. And try to smile – whenever you’re forced to spend time with adults, you wear a pained, bored expression.”

“I just never know what to say and I don’t understand all the stories,” she muttered.

“Well, ask questions then, and don’t get your phone out – you know how that annoys grandparents. Surely you can manage half an hour without fiddling with it?”

Then I told her how I used to get sent to stay with my grandparents on the east coast of Ireland for the whole of the school summer holidays.

“I think a small part of me died of boredom,” I told her. “Put it this way, the day a whale shark washed up on the shore was the highlight of the interminable six weeks.

“On the plus side, I did commit to memory the entire coastal region’s tidal timetable.”

“Sounds fascinating,” she said, but her brain had already switched off.

It’s not just with grandparents – all adult conversation is the most tedious thing for self-centred teenagers whose idea of peak entertainment is watching YouTube videos of juvenile frat boys skateboarding into brick walls.

Half an hour into our visit to see the oldies, The Dark Lord sneaked off to the loo.

After a long enough time, I went and rapped on the toilet door. “Can you put the phone away and come back, please.”

There was silence, then a splash, then a worried-sounding: “Oh crap.”

Her phone’s not worked the same since.

Email me at siobhan.mcnally@mirror.co.uk or write to Community Corner, PO Box 791, Winchester SO23 3RP.

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