And it was alright.
In fact it was pretty good. Really good, at points.
We’d always wanted to take the kids to festivals, to give them that kind of experience at a young age, and with everything that’s happened over the last year+ we kind of just went ‘fuck it’ back in the spring, and bought tickets and a tent. We thought End of the Road might be the best bet, but the line-up for Green Man was so good this year that we couldn’t resist.
I’m glad we didn’t. Even though I’ve always (jokingly) maintained that standing in a muddy field surrounded by Shed Seven fans on drugs sounded like hell. (It still does.) Even though I’ve never camped properly before, let alone done a camping festival. (we have done All Tomorrow’s Parties a couple of times, pre-kids, but you get a chalet, so…)
So it rained – relentlessly – on the Friday, and was horrific and muddy, and Nora had more than one awful pre-schooler tantrum (including an immense one at half past midnight at the festival toilets which culminated in her yelling at me “it’s my body! It’s my decision! Don’t touch me!” when I was trying to get her onesie off and get her to have the wee that she’d requested I take her for. Yes, there were other people present. No, no one said anything. Yes, some people looked sympathetic, albeit in that ‘stupid fucker kept a 4-year-old up after midnight’ way).
But on the other days – Thursday, Saturday, Sunday – it was generally sunny and warm, and the mud dried up quickly, and the setting was exquisitely beautiful (surrounded by verdant Welsh mountains, in a natural amphitheatre with a babbling stream and a pond and gently undulating fields for camping), and the food, though expensive, was great – Dosa Deli I love you; Goan Fish Curry I love you, Los Churros Amigos I love you – and the kids’ field was brilliant, and the line-up was fabulous, and Em saw a Caitlin Moran talk, and Nora got to watch Kiki’s Delivery Service in the cinema tent, and I even got to see (at least some of a set by) the following:
These New Puritans
Villagers
Stereolab
Sharon Van Etten
Four Tet
Eels
Sons Of Kemet
Fat White Family
TVAM
Big Thief
Stella Donnelly
Emily Magpie
Poco Drom
Aldous Harding
I also got to listen to the following artists quite clearly from the tent:
Yo La Tengo
John Talabot
Father John Misty (Em got to watch this one, with sleeping Nora in the buggy, while I took Casper back to the tent)
That’s actually not a bad return considering that we had two very small children with us.
We managed Casper’s meds. We just about managed Nora’s emotions. We saw old friends, bumped into lapsed and distant ones, and made new ones too.
We’ll do it again.
Sick Mouthy 