Minding my kids in a playground recently, I was struck by how dependent the concept of "civilised society" is on an arrangement whereby most of us, at some point, learn to behave like grown-ups, writes Frank McNally.
I say "like grown-ups", because many of us are only faking it. We never feel fully grown up, but we have a good idea of what's expected and can do a convincing impression when required. Finding ourselves at a really bad opera, for example, we might want to throw things at the singers or just lie down, beating our fists on the floor and screaming: "I want to go home!" We don't do this, however, because it is not acceptable adult behaviour, except in countries where they really care about opera.
Being an adult involves a thousand small hypocrisies: smiling when you're not happy, being nice to people you hate, etc. Politeness to strangers is compulsory, as is giving them the benefit of the doubt when they appear rude. Your only weapon then is the dirty look, which the target may not even notice.
The ability to queue in organised fashion is vital to the system, as is the ability to ignore the idiot who's standing beside you in the queue, rather than behind, because he seems to think this will speed things up. In barbers' shops or doctors' clinics, it may be a non-linear queue. And not only do you have to keep track of your place, but it's fashionable, when your turn comes, to feign slight uncertainty - something you do in the confidence that no other grown-up will take advantage.
Such dissembling comes naturally by a certain age. We don't even notice ourselves doing it. The system has evolved over millennia to minimise human conflict. Wars have probably been avoided because of the universal code that tells us to avoid eye contact in a lift.
But the average three-year-old knows none of this. The average three-year-old is a savage to whom the concept of civilised society is as abstract as the reason why adults eat ice-cream after dinner, not before. His favourite verbs are "want" and "go", and the only adverb he knows is "now!" Conflict avoidance is alien to his whole way of life. As for eye contact, the freedom to stare at strangers behind him on a bus or plane is enshrined in Article One of the Toddler's Convention on Human Rights.
The parallel universes adults and children inhabit collide in the public playground. Here, the thin veneer of civilisation is peeled back and exposed for the fraud it is. While the grown-ups smile politely and exchange pleasantries, the kids and their private thoughts run amok. Darwin's are the only laws in operation. The babble of children's laughter and the sound of parents saying "Whee!" as infants make the thrilling two-foot drop down the baby slide cannot hide the tensions along the multiple interfaces.
Swings are the worst flashpoints. Playgrounds must be the last places in the Western world where market forces do not apply. Consequently there are never enough swings. It is at the playground swing section that many children first encounter queueing: an edgy experience for everyone. There are no guidelines for how long a swing may be decently occupied. So you can only hope the incumbent's minder will notice your impatient look, eventually. The incumbent certainly won't.
When the seat is vacated, there is always the risk that some unsupervised urchin will emerge from nowhere to claim succession. But assuming you do secure the swing before the park closes, no sooner has your child been installed than another queue forms. After barely a minute, you feel under pressure to vacate, because the veneer of civilisation runs deeper in you than in anyone else here, apparently.
See-saws are another problem. My advice to future mothers is to have children in multiples of two. Otherwise your offspring will be forced to form temporary alliances on the see-saw, and such arrangements can be very unhappy. The weight, attention span, and aggression levels of see-saw partners are rarely matched. And as a parent, you sometimes learn this the hard way.
You'll be trying to read the newspaper when, suddenly, you realise that some 80-pound Billy Bunter has left your 40-pound waif suspended in mid-air. Or worse, Billy - bored with sitting on the ground - has just dismounted and abandoned his opposite number to gravity.
Small children have no concept of private property either. Or rather, they understand their own property rights very well: it's the idea of other people owning things that they don't quite grasp. Thus it's always a mistake to bring toys to the playground - or even a football which, sooner or later, some feral three-year-old will just take.
On these occasions, you and your partly civilised five-year-old son will be at the mercy of the other kid's parent as to when the ball is returned. If the person is considerate, he or she will take it off the infant immediately, even at the cost of a tantrum. But it'll be just your luck to get the sort of enlightened parent who negotiates everything.
Worse still, such people may misinterpret your patient smile as suggesting that you find their toddler even 10 per cent as charming as they do while he drools all over the ball. Meanwhile your own child, who had no interest in the damn ball until this little brat took it, is now intensely interested in its return. Moreover he cannot understand why violence is not an option, even though there are two of us and only one of the brat.
Sometimes there is a playground bully: an older boy who insists on demonstrating that he can do everything better than your child, or keeps beating him to the swing. You feel a strong urge to step on the bully's foot, accidentally. Then the veneer of civilisation reminds you that, after all, he is only six. But you don't feel particularly proud of your self-restraint. Because the realisation has just dawned that, despite having reached the age of 43, you're still only pretending to be grown up.