In which Mrs Young reveals some very bad news that turns out to be very good
In the newspaper business there’s a name for a story that makes your jaw hit the floor and your eyes pop out of your skull: ‘a marmalade dropper’. For instance, the disclosure that HM Revenue and Customs had misplaced the personal records of 25 million people was ‘a marmalade dropper’, as was the revelation that Lembit Opik was going out with one of the Cheeky Girls. However, I have always thought of this as a figure of speech rather than a literal description of the effect a particular piece of news produces. Until now, that is.
‘Darling,’ said my wife as I sat at the breakfast table munching a piece of toast. ‘There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.’ ‘Oh yes?’ ‘Do you promise you won’t be cross?’ ‘You haven’t been fined for not paying the Congestion Charge again?’ ‘No, no, it’s nothing like that.’ ‘What then?’ ‘I’m pregnant.’ Splat.
‘What?!? You’re kidding. How did that happen? I mean, I know how it happened, but ... oh Jesus.’ To put this in perspective, we already have three children, all born since 2003. Indeed, the latest arrived six months ago. Add another to that list and we’ll have four under five. I used to joke that Caroline and I had gone from being Dinkies (Double Income No Kids) to Sitcoms (Single Income Two Kids Overextended Mortgage) in the space of 19 months, but that now seems like a model of financial prudence compared to the leap from two kids to four in less than a year. Where on earth are we going to put them?
When I calmed down, I began to realise that there might be some benefits to becoming Acton’s answer to the Waltons. For one thing, I needn’t worry any more about how I’m going to afford to educate my offspring. Sending four children to fee-paying schools is clearly out of the question so they’ll just have to go to the local comp. Then there’s the money I’ll save by not going on exotic foreign holidays every summer. From now on, it’s two weeks in Bognor in a camper van for the Youngs.
Come to think of it, having another child may be the perfect solution to my chronic status anxiety. When I only had three children, the possibility of earning enough money to keep up with my more successful married friends was just about imaginable. For instance, I could fantasise about being given an astrology column on the Daily Mail. Now, even that amazing stroke of good fortune wouldn’t be enough to make a dent in my weekly outgoings. Short of winning the Lottery, there is no change in my circum
es that would make it possible for me to n a member of the middle classes. On ontrary, I can now resign myself to the inevitable drift downwards, eventually taking my place among the lumpen proletariat.
Given how many children I will soon have, there may be an argument for stopping work altogether and living on benefits. It could be a good career move. In a recent piece in the Guardian on the future of the novel, the author Giles Foden wrote that ‘the most interesting material tends to come from the cultural periphery’ and cited Zadie Smith’s White Teeth as an example. ‘What is needed now,’ he concluded, ‘is a novelist from the underclass.’ Maybe I could be that man. I might even apply to appear on the Conservative party’s approved list of parliamentary candidates. In my previous incarnation as an educated, white, middle-class male I wouldn’t have had a hope, but as an unemployed father-of-four I may be in with a chance.
The ridiculous thing about this sudden reversal of fortune is that it runs so counter to the popular view of men with large families. The reaction of my friends on learning that my wife is pregnant again has been to congratulate me on the absurd grounds that a fourth child is a highly desirable ‘status symbol’. They point out that only the very rich can afford to have so many children, so my Oxford contemporaries will assume I’m doing incredibly well. Unfortunately, the illusion will be shattered when my children stop them in the street and relieve them of their wallets at knifepoint.
At least in Acton my progeny will receive a crash-course in such life skills. Thank God I’ve left the leafy suburban arcadia of Shepherd’s Bush behind.
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