Friday 28 June 2013

The innocence of the infantine years

On my trip to Bali in March earlier this year, I was mobbed by local artisans trying to sell their wares in the Kintamani region overlooking the active volcano of Mount Batur and the beautiful serene lake partially blanketed by fog sweeping the area in cold temperatures. I was devouring the nature - silent, balmy, unflappable, aquamarine and kaleidoscopic when someone suddenly tugged at my dress and I gave in to the enamored web of the landscape surrounding me and turned around. The tiny fingers of the small hand laced with my dress, a pair of dove eyes and others flagging her entreating my attention - euphoric as I was with the nature and turned on more so to see the gleeful timid faces of nature's bounty - children of varying ages.  
 
 
Holding the little one on my lap and surrounded by the rest - Kintamani, Bali, Indonesia March 2013


















The mother of the little angel, who happyily strode into my arms was nearby, along with her elder sister - seen at the backdrop of the image and all of us were captured in this frame for life. The little one was the toggle of her mom winning the hearts over of the tourists so that she could have her bread and butter in oodles by selling her stuff. In Balinese, which I did not follow but could make out with the help of our driver, the mother admonished the elder one for her wretched ways in marketing herself and the transactions that followed. Poor crummy girl, hardly six or seven years old, showed up a doughty attitude and with dogged alacrity pushed hard on the tourists nearby.  
 
In our times, at the age of six or seven, we had been coy lambs backed by ancestral and circumstantial opulence, our dopiness would not have rung a bell of a parent's pet child. Today's generation, a smarter lot than we were, soaks up the parental gestures and that's one big fib than all others - parents' fiery denial that they have a favourite child.   
 
"Happy is the son whose faith in his mother remains unchallenged" - Louisa May Alcott.
 
However, does a father or mother take pains in fraternising with their other kids, if they have reproduced more than one, or simply get by their cherished one who grows into an over-indulgent, foolhardy and prized person later on in life. The other children (or child) left behind clamor for assiduity. The barefaced truth under veil although is enjoyed by relatives, family friends and acquaintances. No one dare proclaim this for fear of kindling bitter enmity with the family.
 
If the oldest child is a son, favouritism is quite natural in most socities bound by old inheritance laws and the social taboo holding onto the son(s) taking care of parents in their ripe age. The youngest child of a family can be a pet, the tootsie and sugar candy protected by parents usually bushing up their acts of trouble making and tantrums thrown to have their own ways. In another case a child becomes a pet of the family on grounds of sully experiences faced by the parents with their siblings as kids. Talented, intelligent, clubby and expressive kid, again, is the most favoured in the family circles. Yet another example of favouritism points to biological versus the adopted kid. An ailing child often grabs attention of parents by virtue of necessity. This is misleading to the other kvetching child who ploys better lapping up parents' soft spots. 
 
Whatever the case may be every child is different and parents' varying degrees of attention is sure to backfire. Lugubriosity, low morale, ambiguity, paranoia and number of phobias grow latent in the heart of the neglected one to which parents turn a blind eye. Researches have pointed out that the less favoured one cultivates few friends, is cold and solitary, and pops up attention-seeking demeanor.
 
Growing up has enormous effects on the less favoured one, often sardonic and cynical about family life and relationships. Hapless are those who try to establish new relationships with the grown up less favoured one as they cannot dig in times burned up.
 
I absorb some well crafted views of experts running confidence building workshops for children. Emphasising on spending quality and equal time with all children in the family, and depending on the child's nature try pulling the twitchy one to kite-flying with a friend instead of enjoying a cinema and push the bookish one to visit a museum instead of enrolling him/her into dancing or roller-skating classes.

American science writer Jeffrey Kluger published a book about siblings that claimed parental favouritism is hardwired in the human psyche. In The Sibling Effect: What the Bonds Among Brothers and Sisters Reveal About Us, he wrote: ‘It is my belief that 95% of the parents in the world have a favourite child, and the other five% are lying.'

Putting the spotlight on each child's positives helps the buds to blossom into self-reliant, selfless, self-sufficient, dynamic and vivacious sweet smelling flowers. There is no other way for parents but to be complaisant and tactful.