To Everyone Who Is Around Kids

Hellooooo, people.

We all have heard that parents get to know when their child is in love or more specifically, mothers get to know their daughter is in love and fathers their son. But, if that’s true, then how do they not know when child is suffering? Oh yeah, hold on. They just don’t come forward with that revelation. They've to immediately stop a teenager for committing the sin of being in love but stopping the suffering isn't urgent so they let it be.

PS: I ain't writing the terms like "Indian middle class parents" or "Asian families" or "Brown people" and so on. You'd know which specific category of people I'm talking about by just the terms "few" and "some".

Some –or say most of the– parents have their way of saying sorry in the phrases like, “I made your favorite dish”, “Come on, let’s go for a walk”, “I got you chocolates” and so on. But do we ever get to know what are they sorry for? I don’t think so. And, my guess? They themselves don’t know.

Coming to today’s topic. This write-up is for all those people who are going to deal with a child for even a few hours in their life. I ain’t saying this is only for those who wants to have children, because if you’ve decided you don’t want to become a parent, you’re going to an uncle or aunt someday. If you don’t have any siblings, you’re still gonna be an uncle or aunt of the babies of your friends. And, let’s just come to even more specific category; those who have friends who also don’t wanna be parents or even more specific, if you don’t have any friends, then, this write-up is still for you because someday, somewhere, in a party, during travelling, in a family gathering or in a crisis, you’re going to talk to children. Or atleast be around them for a considerable time.

In case, you think a few hours at any of these events can’t change a kid’s life or their point of view towards something, then it’s probably not true. You know, changing someone’s perspective towards life or a muffin for that matter, can take just a few minutes. And, sometimes you do it without even being aware of it.

so confident in writing this very paragraph, because a lot of my own perspectives have been affected by those small moments; in case you’re not someone who remembers little things, let me just remind you, the people you have around yourself aren’t exactly same as you; also remembering small details of particular moments and getting affected by certain little things are two different things

We all have had our fair share of incidents in our families, especially our parents. There are few sentences and actions which are still engraved in our minds, for good or bad. We all have had those conversations with them which either they didn’t want or we didn’t want. We all know about the situations they grew up in and the environment we have around ourselves.

In this time of being so aware of mental health and sexuality, can we just check in for a few things apart from this?

Are we becoming like our parents? Is it a good thing or bad? Do we want to change anything in the ways we’re becoming or not becoming like them? Are we even capable of change? What would we say, as a young adult, if a child who we care about a lot, tells us about they’re in love? Would we tell them teenagers’ love is rubbish and they should stop messing around and focus on their studies? Or are we going to tell them what is love, how does being treated right feel like and what is a red flag and why communication is important between any kind of relationship while they still focus on their studies?

How would we react if a child who we love, tells us their best friend identify as bisexual? Would we have the same reaction if they tell us they are pansexual? Would we know about what being a pansexual means? Would we ask them at the moment, if we don’t know? Would we care to research more if we already know?

Let me save you a google search though. Pansexuality is sexual, romantic or emotional attraction towards people of all genders, or regardless of their sex or gender identity.

Now, explanation in my words:-

For example: If you’re a straight boy and feel more attracted to girls having a particular type of feature or a set of features, then whenever you’re looking for a partner in your life, your first priority isn’t those set of features. Your first priority is that the partner you’re looking for is a girl in the first place. For a pansexual person, gender and sex are not determining factors in their romantic or sexual attraction.

Coming back to the topic, if you’re going to spend a day with, let’s say, a neighbor’s kid, because the neighbor had an emergency, then, do you or do you not think that the kid is going to learn things from you? Whether it’s the way you present them food or the way you show them how easy or difficult it is to order food instead of making it while giving them a moment to realize how their family is so much similar or different from them?

No matter, how you talk to the kid, be it in a good way or a bad way, they’re going to compare it with how their parents do it and realize one thing or two about themselves and their family. The way you two would make conversation would let you know things about each other and like it or not, you both will have impressions on each other. The kid probably would get to know you more and you would get to know them and your neighbors as well.

Everything you do makes an impression on everybody around you. Even if someone hates you, they’re still making an impression on you and you on them. To the people who are going to be with children at any point of life –includes everyone, probably– please ensure that you don’t give a kid the wrong impression of the world. They’re younger than you, knows lesser than you. If you’re going to add into their knowledge from your box of wisdom, I hope you choose the right elements to enrich their point of views.

I hope you get to see a lot of happiness around you. And I really hope so much more that, that you yourself be the reason for most of the happiness around as well as far from you, darling.

~Miss V