Preparing For Adult Life

Of all my birthdays as a child I can only remember one very vividly. It is remembered only because of the speech my mother delivered and the immediate effects of it.

She cornered me in my bedroom, took both my hands into hers and said:

My son, you are my firstborn child. Today you are ten years old and that is the half of twenty. To prepare you for your approaching adult life, you will from now on gradually share more and more of the responsibilities in this household…

The exact meaning of her words only struck me the next day when my father explained the workings of the lawnmower to me and how to clean it after use. From that day it became my duty. I had to buy the petrol and oil for it from my allowance, get a cash slip for it and claim the money back. It was paid back promptly upon producing the cash slip but when I got my allowance the first thing I did was to see to the lawn mower.

This was a duty that I retained for the next fifty one years until my father sold the house after he had the accident early last year. The lawnmowers came and went through the years but the ritual remained the same. Every month I bought the petrol and the oil and every month I received my money promptly upon producing the cash slip; no matter how trivial the amount.

As I got older I was entrusted with more duties but none as important as mowing the lawn. My late brother was detailed to wash the car when he turned 10 two years later. Another job he kept until his death in 2000, when my baby sister’s newly married husband made the job his own without asking or being asked to do it.

And for some strange reason the two of us became exceptional good friends since. All initiated by a speech on my 10th birthday when my sister was three days short of a year.

And now when I look back over the last sixty two years – well, that part since I can remember – I’m led to believe that it was the most important birthday in my life.