WHY I LOVE SERVICE STATIONS

Jo Dunbar - 19 Feb 15

Sssh. I have a secret love affair with service stations.

Yep, you heard me…. those soulless, busy, noisy places where you can barely hear yourself think over the sound of traffic hurtling past and small children clamouring for a Happy Meal.

Before having my son, service stations were a place where I spent barely minutes: a quick dash in for the loo, to grab a coffee and possibly some sad-looking carnations if I was en route to see my folks.

They definitely weren’t a dining destination.

Dining out, to my husband and I, meant checking out the latest highly-reviewed hard-to-book restaurants. Special occasions sometimes warranted a Michelin star; generally involved cocktails, high heels and a cab home. Service stations, we would scoff, aren’t restaurants. They’re places to buy a map or refuel on caffeine.

Oh, how things have changed.

These days, with a toddler in tow, the highlight of any long journey is the hour or so we spend at a service station as we wipe, feed, change and then wrestle our son back into his car seat. In fact, since becoming parents, our service station experiences form the bulk of our eating out. During my first 15 months of parenthood, I have become quite the expert on the best service stations between my home in Newcastle and where my parents live in Worcestershire. I even have the Moto services app (yes, there’s an app). I know which ones have a Waitrose, which have an M&S Simply Food and which, bizarrely, has a baby change room that is always locked. Quiz me on A1 and M1 services and their relative merits. Go on, I dare you.

Despite their charmless appearance, service stations are a parent’s paradise. And it’s because no one cares. No one cares if my son liberally scatters his lunch on the floor. Or screams at the top of his lungs with impatience because I am just not spooning yogurt into his mouth fast enough. Or rubs cheese into his hair. Or drops his toys on the floor repeatedly. Or objects at the top of his voice while I attempt to change his nappy.

I’ve been part of the unseeing, unhearing, uncaring brigade too. Tuning out other toddlers and their tantrums, closing my ears to arguments on other tables and choosing not to hear the clenched-teeth ‘I-can’t-believe-you-didn’t-check-the-map’ conversations between other couples. At a service station normal social graces can be suspended as we focus on feeding, cleaning and leaving.

There’s always an abundance of high chairs; nappy changing facilities or a strangely-named ‘family toilet’ nearby and a microwave in easy reach. There are no apologies for the mess we inevitably leave behind despite my efforts with a packet of baby wipes. Most importantly, no one, I reckon, even notices that I am inhaling a McDonald’s meal deal at breakneck pace while my son merrily shouts ‘car’ for the 400^th time whilst dropping breadsticks all around him.

And, looking through the clusters of bored businessmen and long-distance coach drivers, zoning out the raucous racket of hungry kids and passing lorries, I spy other mums, dads and families of sticky-fingered noisy kids – delighted to be set free from their car seats for a while.

Fed and watered, with trips to the loo all done, it’s time to pack up the baby baggage, grab two takeaway coffees, and continue down the M1.

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Jo Dunbar

Jo Dunbar is a freelance writer and has worked as a journalist at various magazines and newspapers for over 10 years. No longer in London, Jo is bringing up her son William (with husband Chris) in Newcastle upon Tyne. Between soft play and sensory classes Jo can be found at her laptop or underneath a mountain of laundry.

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