And the truth is, I've known the day would soon come.
But still, there is nothing that can quite prepare you for it..
We were sitting, pic-nicing with some of our best and oldest friends l and in Lincoln's Inn Field in the Centre of London when we found out.
The sun was shining, the beer was cold, the French bread and cheese were delicious.
All was right with the world.
We were free of the responsibilities of parenthood, with a whole weekend of pure enjoyment ahead of us.
We felt almost young again.
Just like the good old days.
And that's when it happened.
One of our friends, turned to his wife and said:
" Have you told them yet?"
I took another swig of beer and waited, expectantly.
" Told them what?" she asked.
'You know," he said, " about the...." and he folded his arms together and rocked them from side to side as though he was holding a baby.
" Oh that," said his wife .
And so she told us that one of our university friends ( not quite friend enough to be part of our " meeting up once a year for the weekend," gang ) has just become a grandad.
For a moment none of us said anything.
And for a split second the sun seemed to lose its heat.
Because there's something about the words " grandma,' and " grandad," that make you feel, not so much old, as passé.
Suddenly we are not just the last generation, but the generation before that.
And the problem is that, even though we are, most of us, parents of teenagers, inside we are still teenagers ourselves.
We haven't actually started doing all those things we meant to do, like changing the world and following our dreams and living the life we meant to live when the stressful part was over..
That was meant to happen tomorrow, when we had time.
And all of a sudden, we could be grandparents and there might not be enough time for us to actually be the difference we want to see in the world.
Because nobody listens to the generation before the last. .
" Well," said one of our friend's philosophically breaking the silence, " if it was going to be anyone,he's the best person to be a grandad. He's been 50 since he was born."
We all laughed and went back to drinking and eating and lazing in the sun.
And we had the best weekend, as we always do, with friends whose company is familiar and easy and a constant pleasure.
We stood on the silver, Millennium Bridge watching Tower Bridge going up and down.
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| First time Ive ever seen Tower Bridge up! |
We went to the gift shop in the Tate Modern so that we could pretend we were cultured and drank cocktails in the afternoon so that we could pretend we were decadent while Arsenal won the cup.
We ate delicious Malaysian food in bustling Soho and wandered back drunkenly to our Lincoln's Inn apartment through the bright lights of a warm London night.
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| Bright light wanderings |
And as we drank milkshakes in artist-filled, Brick Lane Market on Sunday morning we clung onto the dream that we were still young and trendy, or at least only just middle-aged and almost cool.
The sun didn't stop shining and we didn't stop laughing and we wished we didn't have to go home.
Weekends away with friends are like islands of pleasure in an ocean of exhausting weeks.
But somewhere deep inside, I felt the flutterings of disquiet.
If one our friends has already become a grandad, perhaps we are running out of time.
Or perhaps it is just that we need to make more time to do the things we always meant to do.
Perhaps tomorrow has come and we should be spending more afternoons drinking cocktails and more weekends with friends and more hours dreaming of better things.
And that way, when we do become grandparents ( and I can't help hoping that it will be a little while yet! ) at least we will be ready to enter the generation before the last without regrets.
Which is why I have made my big decision ( only big to me ) to leave my job and begin to live my dream.
So here's to life and love and friendship and days of garden-shed dreaming.
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