Learner Dad: I’d take pigs’ knees if it meant I could keep up with my kids on a walk

There was a time when we would have talked about music or Manchester United. Yesterday, we talked about our knees

Picture; iStock 

Here’s my advice to anyone thinking of having kids. Make sure your knees are up to it. Not just now, but for at least the next 15 years.

I was 45 when our eldest child came along, which is old, but not that old these days. Those early parenting days involved a lot of kneeling down, to change nappies on the floor, to clear up some vomit, or just to kneel there and have a 10-minute nap because no one is looking. My knees were just about up to it then, although I can remember the sharp shock of pain I’d get in the right one if I stayed at ground level for too long.

Those days are gone. I spend very little time on my knees now, unless I’m praying for one of the kids to start learning how to drive. (A friend rang recently to say his son passed the driving test, and it had given him half his life back, now that he doesn’t have to bring him everywhere.)

Ten years later, I need my knees for something else - jumping off fairly low heights so I can keep up with my kids when we go for a stroll on the beach.

I met a guy I knew in school yesterday. We're both the same age, and his kids are slightly older. There was a time when we would have talked about music or drink or Manchester United, but we talked instead about our knees. Like me, he's at the point where a jump he would have done with his eyes closed 20 years ago is now turned into a question – am I too old for this?

It’s funny how it creeps up on you. I was never that good at jumping from a height - I score low on anything that involves physical courage. 

But I can still remember jumping off rocks and out of trees without worrying that I’d end up writhing on the ground in agony. 

There’s something very satisfying about a jump. I can see it in my own kids. There’s a walk we do now that involves a bit of scrambling over rocks, with a few jumps to get back down onto the sand. Our two don’t just drop down when they’re doing it – they leap up first to get some extra air time. They have the knees to pull it off. My son seeks out the higher jumps so he can terrify his mother and make me feel my age. He’s doing jumps at the age of seven that I might have shirked when I was 12.

And there’s the problem. I love going walking with my kids, particularly this time of the year when too much time indoors can make us allergic to each other. I hope we’ll continue to walk together until they hit 14 and decide that they’d rather watch the news than be caught hanging out with their dad.

But kids don’t do nice flat walks in the country unless you force them and don’t mind an hour listening to the word ‘boring’ on a loop. It’s a broader problem that kids don’t like wide-open spaces and glorious views. (I didn’t take in a view until I was in my 20s.)

Kids are only interested in what’s straight in front of them, particularly if it’s a rock or hill they can use as a launchpad to show off their young pair of knees. So I need to keep an eye on my knees and make sure they’ll stay jump-worthy for the next five or six years.

I just googled ‘look after your knees in old age’ and the internet reckons I need to do a bit of yoga and eat more nuts. I’ll do this because I don’t want to feel helpless but, let’s face it, my knees are never going to be what they used to be. Unless the geniuses who transplanted a pig’s heart into a human being decide to help us all get a new set of knees. Seriously, I’d take pigs’ knees if it meant I could keep up with my kids.