My grandfather was due to visit, and my son was excited. And who could blame him? He loves his great-grandfather, whom he calls GG. 

Every day, my wife and I couldn’t resist reminding our son that he didn’t have long to wait until GG arrived, that he’d be able to tell him all about school, show him his new things, force him to play Mario Kart on the Nintendo Switch and maybe stick some Mario stickers in his new sticker book. 

The big day arrived. GG knocked on the door. We invited him in, but he barely passed the threshold before our son screamed past us and started talking at a million miles per hour, asking GG to do eighteen different things at once. 

We interjected: ‘Let GG get in the house first.’ 

But he couldn’t contain his excitement. We found ourselves constantly telling him to calm down. 

He was downcast. It didn’t spoil the occasion, but it easily could have done.  

Later, my wife and I realised that our son’s sky-high excitement was on us because we were both guilty of shovelling as much coal into the Hype Train furnace as we could.  

We meant well, but we had unintentionally become co-conspirators in hyping him up, and he wasn’t able to handle the excitement levels. The pressure built until it exploded. 

It’s great to get excited and look forward to things, but this experience reminded me of my and my wife’s responsibility to manage our children’s excitement levels in a healthy way. 

Incidentally, GG and my son did play Mario Kart, and GG placed second in one of the races. For a man approaching his mid-eighties, I thought that rather impressive!