Julie Jay: I’m in the garda station and there's no need to panic

Ted starts to scream ‘Help! Help!’ which is up there with ’hijack’ as something you definitely do not want to hear while travelling on an airplane.

Picture: iStock 

Now the clocks have gone back,it feels even more unnatural getting up with Ted in the morning.

Ted and I generally operate in our own time zone, but this week we had to make a rough estimate of the hour as we were flying on a plane.

Ted taps me on the leg when we are in the departures queue at Kerry Airport waiting to board. ‘Ducky,’ he enquires, and immediately my heart sinks. As I remove a forgotten banana from my pocket at security, I fear the worst: Ducky has been left at home or (perish the thought!) mislaid somewhere along the way.

We retrace our steps and find Ducky lying facedown in a puddle outside the airport. We are thrilled, but the image of Ducky - weather-beaten, sodden and forgotten - is like something out of a Siegfried Sassoon poem. There is no time to ruminate on the futility of war, however, because Ted and I have a plane to catch. And planes wait for no man (unless you are flying from the truly wonderful Kerry Airport, where the planes most certainly do wait for you if you smile nicely and explain you’ve been hunting for a missing duck).

On the plane, Ted is enthralled by the take-off and watching the wings move up, up, towards the moon. When we can remove our seatbelts, Ted is elated, but trouble comes when, five minutes later, we have to put our belts on again because we are flying to Dublin, not Dubai, and getting ready to land.

Ted is not having it. He mounts his objection by standing on his seat, putting down his table rest, standing on said table rest and attempting to hop the seat in front of us like a 30-something-year-old woman leaping over a barricade at the front of a Harry Styles concert. The flight attendant comes down as I am prising Ted from the leatherette.  

"He’ll have to sit, I’m afraid," he says in a perfectly polite but firm voice.  

As I attempt to get Ted into a seated position, he screams, "Help! Help!" which is up there with ’hijack’ as something you definitely do not want to hear while travelling on an airplane.

Eventually, I get Ted belted, and we arrive exhausted into Dublin airport and cruise seamlessly through customs.

Darling Husband has been delayed slightly, so I tell him we’ll wait at car park A, and after what feels like forever, eventually, I spot the Nissan Passat. I wave madly, and Ted and I break into a run not seen at an airport since that scene in Home Alone. Devastatingly, DH whizzes by, and when I take out my phone, I realise, to my horror, it's dead. 

Spotting the Garda station at Terminal 1, I walk in and ask if I can ring my husband, and when the garda hands me the phone, I start to sweat, wondering if I know his number by heart.

I try to explain what's happening but DH has gone from zero to a hundred.

After a couple of false starts, I get there, and DH answers in a blind panic: "Hello. Who is this?" (I knew we shouldn’t have watched The Watcher before bed last night).

"Hi Fred, it’s me," I say, conscious that our conversation has to be somewhat performative, as there is an audience here.

"Who is this," DH asks, sounding befuddled. 

"It’s Julie." I pause. "Your wife? I’m in the garda station..." I try to explain what's happening but DH has gone from zero to a hundred.

‘What? I know I’m late but there’s no need to ring the guards on me." 

Judging by the panic in his voice, it sounds like he is picturing himself locked up with all the other dads running behind schedule.

"Fred, Fred," I interject.

‘I haven’t broken any laws," he shouts, and he is a slurry truck exploding. 

Suddenly I am aware that we are chatting on an official line, and anything he says can and will be used as evidence in court. What if he actually has done something illegal? I am panicking and need to wrap this up as soon as possible.

"No, of course, you haven’t broken any laws," I say in the same unconvincing way you might tell a friend you love their new fringe. 

The garda looks up from his paperwork at this part - I'm sure I see his ears prick - but I plough on. "Where are you? I’ll come and meet you now."

"I promise I’m parked. I’m not driving," DH blunders on, and I end the call before he incriminates himself further.

We find DH at the set-down area, and I breathe a heavy sigh of relief as I belt Ted into his seat. I flop into the passenger seat and realise I'm sitting on something very, very wet. I reach down and pull out the forgotten banana, a sight so woeful I feel an Adele song coming on.

"My banana," I cry out. But DH immediately comes to my rescue. 

"Don’t worry, I’ve got one right here," he says as he conjures a banana out of nowhere.

"I stopped in Abbeyfeale for petrol and forgot to pay for it at the checkout," DH discloses mournfully.

"No wonder the cops had you sweating," I say, and DH nods, because we have both watched Banged Up Abroad enough times to know you don’t mess with airport police. 

We drive away from Terminal 1 like Bonnie and Clyde, Lyric FM blares and as it turns out my banana is perfectly ripe. Sometimes good things really do happen to bad people.