“Hey, everybody! Look at the Canadian!”

One of the things I like about the United Kingdom is that their pub culture is much more inclusive, especially for people with kids. The pubs on the island where my wife grew up, for example, allow children until 8:00 PM. As a result, we spent a few lazy afternoons during our vacation hanging out at the pub with our baby.

Meanwhile, one of the things we discovered about our baby during the trip is that she’s more likely to take a pacifier when she’s upset if she sees us do it, too. As a result, I spent a good amount of my time at the pub making faces at my daughter with a pacifier in my mouth.

“Hey, everybody!” my father-in-law Bob threatened to shout. “Look at the Canadian!”

And nobody would have minded if he had, because it’s also perfectly fine in English pubs to strike up a conversation with the people around you. Who knows who I would have gotten to know better if he’d chosen to call me out? I might even have learned a thing or two about parenting from a friendly older couple at the next table. I’m not saying I wish I’d been more of a spectacle than I already was, but it wouldn’t have been the end of the world if I had.

What my father-in-law didn’t get to see was me running a giggling baby back home in a stroller a few minutes later, going to town on a pacifier and dancing around to “You Can Call Me Al.” The only people who got to witness that, thankfully, were the dozens and dozens of gawking strangers I happened to pass on the way home.

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