Learner Dad: I might open up my own Boring Dad YouTube channel

"I get why parents are attached to their family cars - some of the happiest times I’ve had as a parent were when I was told to take a small child for a spin to help her go to sleep"

Picture: iStock 

I’m not as sentimental as I thought I was.

The sale on our old house finally went through this week. The whole process nearly went on longer than The Godfather.   I still call it ‘home’ in a slip-of-the-tongue way, but it hasn’t felt like that for a while. It’s funny when you strip all your stuff (and particularly your kids’ stuff) out of a house, it looks like a shell, waiting for another family to give it life. Or at least it did to me.

My wife is made of more sentimental stuff. In theory, I get where she’s coming from – this was our place, as a couple, since 2007 . It saw more than one crazy party before the kids came along and turned us into adults. Eventually, six of us lived there - two parents, two kids and two cats.

And now it belongs to someone else. My wife said it felt funny- weird that someone else was living in our house. I felt nothing. I didn’t say this to my wife in case she started worrying that I might be a psychopath.

My only emotion is relief that we got the money through for the old house and now I can start looking at cars. We have an old car that owes us nothing, and it’s time to move on. I’ll probably miss it more than I do the old house. (Again, I won’t mention this to my wife, it could all be used as evidence at a later date.) But a family car can feel like part of the family.

I remember someone telling me once that she worked in the repossessions department of a bank, where they took back cars from people who weren’t making their payments. She said that more than one guy broke down crying, telling her he was heartbroken because he and the family had so many good times in that car. I told her she was heartless. She said they used to give them their bus fare home if they needed it.

Anyway, I get why parents are attached to their family cars. Particularly dads. Some of the happiest times I’ve had as a parent were when I was told to take a small child for a spin to help her go to sleep. Driving along with nothing else to do is like some kind of holiday when you have small kids. We have also had a great time while the kids are awake, driving down to Gougane Barra, counting sheep and singing songs.

I reckon we’re much happier in the car than in the house. There’s much less aggro and the kids are tied in, so there is only so much bothering they can do.

I’ll wave a sad goodbye to our old car once we find a replacement. I’ve been spending a lot of time watching YouTube videos to find that replacement. From what I can see, the kind of people who get a job reviewing cars on YouTube videos tend to be overgrown boy and girl racers who resent having to drive a car that doesn’t draw attention to itself at the traffic lights. It feels like they’re mocking me for not driving my family around in a miniature rocket. I think I might open up my own Boring Dad YouTube channel, where I test-drive dull cars that can carry kids, bikes and a dog.

But for now, I’m going to enjoy the last few weeks of driving in our old banger. (It’s not actually a banger, in case you’re thinking of buying it.) A nd of course, lik e everything else at the moment, I’ll feel guilty for enjoying time with my family. To borrow my mother’s phrase, isn’t it well for me, moaning about how long it takes for a house sale to close while people are being blasted out of their homes in  Ukraine. And the only use for many family cars is as a means of escape over the border.

So if we do get out for a family spin over the weekend, I’ll cherish it more than ever.