Julie Jay: My vigilant little boy could have a future as a health and safety officer

The health and safety officer came one day to deliver a scathing report on our chef’s cleaning standards, and it’s safe to say my boss didn’t take it well.

“I hope your parents are proud,” he spat at the man in a grey suit armed with a clipboard.

“Actually, they are,” the man retorted as he signed off on a ‘notice to close’ form.

Later that night, over a few shandies, the same manager continued venting about the man who had cost him weeks of pre-recession profits.

“Nobody dreams of being a health and safety officer,” he said to me, inferring that he actually felt sorry for anybody whose job consisted of checking which chopping boards went where.

I thought back to this exchange recently as my eldest has been showing increasing capacity for a health and safety role in the future, though I’m not saying he has a five-year career plan just yet.

He is on to me constantly for leaving potential hazards lying around — Sellotape dispensers, Crayola scissors, and pom poms are all produced in evidence by Ted that I am not taking my parental duties seriously enough.

“Mammy, you must clean up the floor because JJ is only a baby.” Thank God Ted reminds me of this fact on the daily before I accidentally apply for JJ’s J1 visa and ship him off to drink cans in San Diego for the summer.

Last week, I committed the cardinal sin of suggesting a run around the playground only to be met with a scowl from Ted and a finger wag.

“Mammy, the sign says no running.”

He alerted me to the visual depicting a child running with a gargantuan ‘X’ beside it. I had always presumed the symbol inferred no playing soccer, an unsurprising ban given the prominence of Gaelic football in west Kerry.

Standing corrected, my running came to an abrupt halt. I was further shamed when Ted confided in a bystander: “My mammy doesn’t know the rules,” he sighed.

This sigh misrepresented his mother to the world as some sort of serial lawbreaker who was on day release from prison rather than the reality of me being a múinteoir who always carries an emergency box of tissues in her handbag, just in case.

Before we head off on journeys in the car, Ted will always double-check his belt is in properly.

Usually, such second-guessing would have my nostrils flaring but, with Ted, it’s hard to be mad at someone who also happens to be your number one fan. Except when I am driving on the motorway and he will insist I am driving too fast at 100km.

I have few pleasures in life but one of them is candles because I am anything if not a cliché. I love to make things romantic by lighting the cinnamon-scented variety as I do the dishes.

However, my back will barely be turned before these candles are blown out because, as my four-year-old chides his resident housekeeper and reminds me: “Fire is dangerous.”

On top of this, Ted either places no faith in my ability to operate a blade or is worried I might go on some sort of rampage in town. I know this because every time I attempt to cook, I have to wrestle the knife set from his clutches and insist that adults are allowed to use the big ones.

I was met with similar alarm when I hung baubles on our Christmas tree. Ted could barely conceal his exasperation when he spotted I snuck some particularly glittery acorns around the bottom.

“Mammy, what about the baby?” he exclaimed, his open palms and outstretched arms as if to tell me this was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

His judgement was so extreme, you’d swear I had just informed him I was heading out for cocktails and he was minding the gaff for the night.

STILL, the good thing about having a resident health and safety officer is that very little gets past this guy.

Ted is essentially the eyes in the back of my matted, unbrushed head.

More than once, I have been happily going about my life oblivious to the fact that JJ is chewing a Lego head like it’s a Tic Tac. 

Worse again, he will be chewing an actual Tic Tac. But for his brother being there to call for back-up, I dread to think what could have happened.

The precautions don’t stop there. Ted is a child who flatly refuses to look at his scooter as much without wearing his helmet and will always double-check that I have his brother strapped securely in his buggy before we can go for a stroll along the marina.

Some 60% of the time, this micromanaging proves totally unnecessary — 40% of the time, I’m just grateful one of us knows what we are doing.

I have no doubt that health and safety officers still provoke palpitations in business people up and down the land, even in an era where we know chopping boards need to be rinsed on occasion.

Surely the only thing that strikes more fear into the hearts of us mere mortals than a man armed with a clipboard is a man armed with a speed camera.

Perhaps we should all take Ted’s advice and drive at 100km on motorways, just in case.