THE CLASS A WILLING STUDENT DOESN'T LIKE TO SIT THROUGH

My dad’s dad lived with us. So, I knew quite a lot about him. But, I hadn’t met my grandfather’s dad. As a son, I was close to my dad. Then, I became a dad… My son is a young man now…

Why I am saying all this is, because, one thing has remained constant through five generations: when young, each one of us had our own set of issues to deal with. Education and the financial condition progressively kept improving… each generation tried to give a better life for the next… “My son should not go through the problems I had to go through,” yes, this has been the silent aspiration of each generation…

But, through all this, one more thing has remained constant: each generation’s restless urge to ‘lecture’ the next one! If my dad wanted to lecture me, “Look son, when I was small, our condition was like this and like that”, I want to lecture my son the same way, “Look son, when I was small, our condition was like this and like that.” Only, each generation’s ‘like this and like that’ has been different… Every generation got… gets… and will get… a strange high by lecturing the next generation on ‘Like this and Like that’!

The interesting feature about this free class is this: the next generation doesn’t like to be in this class… My dad did not like my grandpa’s lectures… I did not like my dad’s… and, today, my son tells me on my face: “Enough’ dad”!

“Just because I am a willing student,” yesterday my friend Dr. Deepak told me about how he tries to end his own dad’s lectures, “you do not have to take a class for me.”

We both laughed like two little kids… rather, like two spoiled brats!

There wasn’t electricity and a toilet in our house when I was a little boy. No proper clothes to wear and we walked miles barefoot… If I take a class on this to my son, today, do you think, he will sit through?

Did I sit through my dad’s lecture when I was my son’s age?

We all lived in different times, with different set of problems and concerns to deal with. We forget, that times have changed and, with that, we parents, too… and, our lectures, too, should. I agree with my friend, Dr. Deepak, that, as young sons and daughters, we all have been willing students. But, then, it did not, does not and will not mean, that, as parents, we should make our sons and daughters sit through our class…

It’s time we became willing parents!

GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic.: Rahmi Sondhi