Making Choices.

Being the youngest in the family does have it's drawbacks. I can hardly remember my early childhood. My first memories are of age four or five. I can't remember anything about those first few years. I know of people , who remember their kindergarten teacher. As for me , all I remember is a room full of crying children , including me. But the reason I was crying was because the teacher was crushing me to her ample bosom,cooing ,"Don't cry baby."

I was always protected . My mother, father and sister always kept me away from any situation, good or bad. I just , sort of floated along with them , doing the things they did or doing the things they expected me to do. It was not bad, really. But in the bargain , I just never grew out of my cocoon. Well ,you could say , I was molly coddled , but in a nice way.

Only when my sister was married and gone did I get to experience life , in reality. I started making choices ,something I had never done before. One of the first ones was giving up fish. I had never liked eating fish but would continue to do so merely because my mother commented, " Who's heard of a Bengali not eating fish?" Making choices is an important part of growing up. I insisted on having omelette's instead of boiled eggs and surprisingly my mother gave in. I am not sure what it was, but maybe because I was the only one around she didn't think I was the younger one any more.

It took me a long time to open my wings and fly steadily. I bumped a number of times but got back on track and continued . I think my parents were shocked too. I was a very average student in school, but by the time I was in college, I was doing very well. I had realised my potential and made the most of it. I continued to make choices and face the consequences that resulted from them. This taught me to make good choices.

As the years have gone by, I realise I have been living life on my terms . I am now a mother and constantly try to not molly coddle her. I need my child to be sharp and a go-getter of her dreams. Though I am going to make sure I can influence her dreams. At least until she dreams the right dreams.