The longest hour of my life

"Excuse me," a boy around five with brown mousy hair stood in front of me, his blue eyes swimming. Cook must have made spaghetti bolognaise for lunch, because he had the tell-tale greasy red marks around his mouth. "Can I please use the toilet?"

"Of course you can," and I couldn't help smiling to myself. "Don't forget to wash your face – your lunch is all over it." The boy touched his face, grinned, and went on his way.

I'm not sure why, but the children are meant to ask permission before they leave the playground and walk the few steps to the toilets. I guess it is so we have an idea of where they all are — though that is impossible. I've surmised that our main purpose is to make sure mayhem doesn't  break out on the playground.

I volunteer as a lunch time supervisor at my children's primary school and am on a rota with a couple other keen mums. That means I walk around the playground for an hour – sometimes in freezing weather — once every three weeks or so. Don't get me wrong. I don't do this because I'm altruistic and have a need to fulfil a public duty. No, my reasons are completely selfish — I'm nosey and want to know what goes on at school and mainly that my children are fine.

This came about because last year I saw on the notice board that the school were "desperate for lunchtime help". At first they put me with the Juniors, and I was completely out of my depth (I have little girls, who apparently play differently than older boys). The pre-teen boys kept wrestling and play kicking each other. I freaked out, trying to get them to stop, and another mum on duty, an experienced one with boys, reassured me that was how they "play". Luckily from then on the office put me on the Infants playground.

"Wuke-y called me a mor-non," a waif of a boy with a razor hair cut and the remnants of a crispy cold under his nose stood at my feet. He had a slight accent, probably Polish. I had no idea what he was trying to tell me and knelt down and asked him to repeat himself.

"Wuke-y called me a mor-non,"

"You mean Lukey?" I didn't recognise the boy, he must be one of the ones in reception that just started staying full days. I wanted to tell him that I get called a moron all the time and he shouldn't let it bother him, but his pride was clearly wounded.

"Let's go find him," and we went in search of "Wuke-y". We found him playing alone in the dirt by the bushes. I knelt down at eye level and asked both boys if they were all in the same class. Yes. Are you friends. Yes. Good, it's nice to have friends at school isn't it? Then you have someone to play with. They were young enough to shake their heads and not give me dirty looks.

As soon as they were on their way, I saw my daughter, Alexandra, in tears being escorted toward me, a boy and girl on either side. Her escorts were wearing class council badges. It turned out she had ran full speed into Poppy, her current best friend. They both had red marks on their cheeks. I quickly sussed they would probably be OK.

"I think you'll live," I told them both. The class council groupees looked gutted. I think they wanted to go to the office. I'm not sure what the attraction is, but every child wants to bring another wounded one to the office.

I glanced down at my watch. 12.20. Really? Forty more minutes of counselling lunch duty to go?

This is going to be the longest hour of my life.

Photo credit: jantik