RECENTLY, as I've been chipping away at the proverbial coalface (hear me chip!), my more resourceful son has been busy tackling his work/life balance. You may think that's a rather fancy way to describe the preparation of his revision schedule, but with so few days of actual school left before he takes his exams, most of his time is now his own to squander or exploit as he sees fit.
Above his desk, three pages of A3 scheme, in fluorescent colours, his exam dates and what subjects he will study each day and for how long before he lets himself out to kick a ball or commiserate with soulmates undergoing the same purgatorial ordeal
.
He seems well aware that on his time-management skills now may depend the whole arc of his future, dictating his work/ life balance for evermore; whether, indeed, his grades are so disastrous that he will be condemned to an existence of menial drudgery, or so spectacular that he can expect to retire by the time he's 30.
Or perhaps it's the prospect of dropping his most hated subjects that is spurring him on. He has already ditched physics, content to re-enact the Big Bang and the inverse square law at rugby each week. Chemistry has also been given the heave-ho, though it would be naïve of me to presume he has forsworn forever the products of distillation and crystallisation.
In just a few weeks, biology will follow the other sciences out the window, however eager he may be to conduct his own extramural field studies. And abandoning geography will in no way constrain international travel plans that threaten to ground his parents for years.
When it comes to maths I have drawn the line. No son of mine will go into the world without an intimate understanding of compound interest. And, of course, as long as he lives he'll never really be able to give up on tests – 'calculator allowed' or otherwise.
But who would have him wise before he is old? I still have an idyllic vision of a younger me laid out in the woods behind my school, blinded by a blazing sunny afternoon, among the remnants of my exercise books, which we'd torn to shreds in some crazed bacchanal after taking the last O-level of the year.
Long may he look forward to such immortal moments of ephemeral bliss. And if, in nervous weeks to come, the burden of responsibility should ever become too much for him, he would do well to remember that his dad is also waiting with bated breath to discover whether he himself has matriculated – in parenthood.
• Chris Dry is Scotland on Sunday's systems and production editor
The full article contains 456 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
