I was a Baby Against the Bomb

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/jun/21/i-was-a-baby-against-the-bomb

Version 0 of 1.

My son has just come in from the garden, where he has been battling imaginary dinosaurs with a stick. Seconds later comes the shout: "Mummy, I'm hungry." I am busy vacuuming. He is sitting next to his dad, who, as far as I can tell, is reading something on his phone. It's fine, I tell myself, he is only three and he's asking you because you're nearer the kitchen. He is not making some kind of statement about gender roles. I fetch him a banana. I pick up the vacuum cleaner. Not for the first time, I wonder if my mum would have done the same thing.

When I was born, my mother's family and friends gave her a quilt made of patchwork squares they had all designed and sewn themselves. There were delicate patterns featuring ducklings and petals, and then, in the corner, one bright white square with rough stitching that reads: Babies Against the Bomb. My first political statement, courtesy of Mum's friend Jean, draped across me at birth. After I outgrew it, the blanket was stored in a drawer until I retrieved it near the end of my pregnancy and laid it next to all the things we'd bought in preparation for our son. I think that was the moment I first realised how different my baby's childhood was going to be from my own.

No one has quite the same childhood as their parents, of course, but in my case there was one significant difference. My younger brothers and I were Thatcher's children. Our parents – both teachers – were veteran campaigners.

Growing up, politics was the wallpaper of our lives, sometimes literally. There were CND postcards stuck to the fridge and newsletters from the local Women's Aid in the downstairs loo. Barbie was banned in our house, and so were Dole bananas. As a baby, I attended pro-choice marches. My dad stayed at home with me on the day of the Southall riots, when the teacher Blair Peach was killed, but my mum was there, at the front, as the Special Patrol Group rode in.

Our family photo albums reveal a series of "alternative" days out. I remember the holiday in Wales, where a goat got in the back of the car with me. My mother now tells me this was when we went to the Women's Aid holiday house, as volunteers, with families from the refuge home. There is a photo of my brothers and me on a picnic rug in the sun, a particularly sweet picture that was proudly displayed in my grandparents' house for years. I later learned that Mum had taken us out that day to a spot near the local army base. She knew there had been a break-in the night before and wanted to see the damage, so she carted her three kids down on the pretext of a picnic. There are only a few grainy photos from Greenham Common, but we were there. My brother threw his Gremlin over the fence and howled until a friendly soldier chucked it back.

I remember childhood as being quite cold. In retrospect, perhaps this is due to all the hanging about in fields in mocked-up nuclear bunkers, or spending Saturdays in town, not shopping, but handing out leaflets about the housing association. If I could get away with it, I'd always choose to stay in the car with a good book. Mum started working full time for a women's refuge and we would often go there in the school holidays, watching Neighbours with the residents. Sometimes, they would babysit for us. Our favourite was Marilyn, who used to tell us that men were all worms, before chasing my brothers round the house. "You little worms!" she would shout, and they would shriek with glee.

All this seemed normal to us. It was just the stuff that went on in the background, stuff we were mostly indifferent to, as we were more preoccupied with Robin of Sherwood or ThunderCats. We knew other children who lived in communes or were only allowed to wear handmade clothes, so by comparison I thought we were pretty average. We resisted when it came to the things that really mattered. There were howls of protest when my dad bought me a chemistry set for Christmas, while my brother got a crystal-growing kit. I was dispatched to fancy dress parties as a pirate ("anything but a princess!") and had a near identical haircut to my brothers for years, until they got crew cuts, but somewhere along the way I acquired a silky white dress, my "bridesmaid" dress, and a strong yearning for a pair of blue ballet shoes (never got them).

When I was 11, my parents separated and my mother's new partner – a woman – moved in. I suspect it was a combination of my age and these new living arrangements that prompted my rebellion. I grew my hair long. I started shaving my legs in secret. I bought makeup and hair dye and Wonderbras. All ordinary things for teenage, or even tweenage, girls – but not in our house.

I didn't stop calling myself a feminist, but I wasn't in any rush to announce that I was one, either. My teens co-incided with ladettes and girl power. I did actually burn my bra, in the back garden, but only because my friend Marysia and I were bored, and my house was closer than hers. My clothes got smaller and more see-through, but my parents said nothing, beyond the occasional, very gentle, suggestion that perhaps I ought to think about putting on a few more layers when I went out.

A decade or so later, I announced I was getting married. "We always rather hoped you'd end up with a nice young woman," my mum's partner joked – but as with all the best jokes, there was an element of truth in it. My life at 30 was decidedly conventional. I wrote for women's magazines. I not only shaved my legs, but got into waxing, too (the horror!).

I was marrying a lovely, kindhearted man, from a very different background. He did his best to fit in, but somehow he was always a visibly different presence in my mum's house, a bloke in a house where men weren't the enemy, but were noticeably absent. He was a bit like a visiting dignitary from a foreign country. We didn't have a big white wedding – it was more of a knees-up in a field – but I wore a white dress and my dad walked me up the makeshift aisle. He gave a speech, too. The next day, my mum gave me a beautiful letter, that was the text of the speech she would have given …

But none of these things seem to matter much, until I discover that I'm pregnant, and that we're having a boy.

My first thought is, thank God. I didn't want to have to deal with the pink princess rubbish that all my friends with daughters were dealing with. But then, as I realised how many people were also thrilled that I was having a boy – a little too thrilled, in some cases – I began to feel the first twinges of indignation. I'd grown up in a world where girls were just as prized as boys (more so, my brothers might say). What kind of message was my son going to get about men and women, if people were congratulating him on his gender before he was even born?

What kind of role models are we, as parents? I've kept my own surname but I'm not named on our mortgage. I stayed at home with him until he was one, and now I work part-time while Daddy earns the "real" money. I only passed my driving test in March and the first time I took my son out he screamed "Daddy drive, not Mummy" for the entire journey.

Perhaps these are just little things, but when I look back at my childhood, I suspect it was really those little things that taught us the valuable lessons about how to live. The Saturday marches and the ban-the-bomb banners were just colourful stories. Our parents never asked us to make the same choices as them, but they showed us in a million tiny ways the significance of the small things. After I grew my hair, I have a memory of my dad plaiting it with expert precision, and finding a ribbon to go in it.

So, for now, these are the steps I am taking. I climb trees with my son in the park at every opportunity. He prefers wrestling with my husband, but I try having sword fights as often as possible. I have salvaged a doll's house from a skip, which he loves. I tell him it's fine for boys to cry. These days at my mother's house, the CND postcards have largely been replaced by photos of grandchildren and, thanks to my niece, my mother plays a lot of games involving princesses. But I hope that when he's a little bit older, my son will open up the photo albums and ask us about what he finds there.