Dialogue: The nightmares of parents with kids overseas

By CHRISTINE RANKIN

I am sure there must be a large number of parents suffering the same dilemmas I battle with.

We have three very loved children living in London - my son, his wife and my stepdaughter. The world feels like a dangerous place since September 11.

I have worked hard at being a balanced parent: letting them go when they were ready, not interfering, not putting pressures on them for things that I may want them to do rather than what they want.

I have always listened, given my opinion and shut up when they have chosen to do the opposite. I have felt real pride that I have been able to achieve this.

At the moment, though, I am really struggling with this. I love those kids. I want them to come home and so does the rest of the family.

I am struggling with the "this is your decision" statement I want to make to them, but really don't want to do it.

Lying awake in the middle of the night, worrying about biological warfare, the horror of smallpox, I want them home before it's too late.

With the morning light I ask myself what right I have to push them to take this action and ruin the lifestyle and the opportunities that will probably not happen for them again.

They could come home and be unemployed, certainly earning far less than they earn in London, and remain safe.

Then, of course, there is the fact that in all their worldly and vast experience they tell us that we are in fact out of touch - country bumpkins, too influenced by watching CNN and the BBC, too sheltered living at the bottom of the world, behind and unsophisticated.

The temptation is to withdraw into our little cocoon in the South Pacific, that place the Taleban ambassador had never heard of when asked if we could expect retribution for supporting the American war effort.

I could hear these same sentiments among the dissenters in the Alliance Party. This is not our war. This is not the right way for New Zealand to be involved in international affairs.

We don't realise what a huge impact our isolation has on our attitudes, although no more, perhaps, than the impact America has on the world through the eyes of ordinary Americans.

Throughout most of its history America has wanted to be isolationist, self-contained and uninvolved, and every time the turn of world events has dragged it into reality.

My children tell me that people in London and other parts of Europe have been living with terrorism forever. They are not even slightly concerned. Just relax, we will be home on the first plane after any real hint of trouble.

When is that? I silently ask myself. Is it when the first smallpox pustule appears, or is it when there are no more flights because the borders have closed?

But our view from here is so jaundiced. It's so easy to let emotion dominate, especially when it starts to affect you as directly as your children.

We are part of a world, ever more so lately, and we cannot be involved when it suits us.

I think those children want to be there. They want to be where the decisive events of their age are taking place. They want meaning and to experience reality. That's what being young is all about.

Traditionally our children have gone on their OE, often for long periods, in every far-flung place on the planet.

They have taken risks, but they have been calculated: how much of the real world do I want to experience - Earls Court or Mogadishu?

What is it that happens to us as we return, build families, careers and mortgages? Suddenly we want to view the world from the back stalls.

I understand what they are feeling and why they are doing what they are doing. I can understand the emotional drivers of some Alliance members who don't want New Zealand involved. But looked at dispassionately, their position is flaky in the extreme.

However, I have slipped in (innocently, of course) to their Christmas package a copy of the NZ Summer Holiday magazine, as the Northern Hemisphere winter sets in, along with the usual Crunchies, Moro Bars and pineapple lumps, and a copy of a very informative article about smallpox.

I am sure that this is not interfering and it allows me to relax - just a little.