Lovely Ambitions!

Ask any child in the preschool age what he or she wants to become when grown up, and the usual answer is to be like one of the parents. The parent is the child’s ideal. It is a magical world for the child to be like one’s parent. But then, during school age the ambitions change, sometimes twice a day.

As doctors, to get the child’s confidence and cooperation for the examination, we often engage the child in such talks, and before the child knows it the quick examination is done and we can then get on with further management of the child’s illness.

On the other hand, these questions can be quite a needle prick for the parents, because once the child is relaxed, heaven only knows what he or she will blurt out. So you are never quite sure which way the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”,  will lead.

Recently a family brought along their three year old daughter
for consultation. The girl was well behaved and pleasant in demeanor. She was accompanied by her father’s parents and her own. The child’s parents were a couple just getting settled in life. The mother works as an officer with a governmental agency, and the father is a software engineer with a private company. The little girl was wearing spectacles and that added a charm to her face. She was quite expressive and was given to talking rather easily, unlike most boys at that age.

Something interesting happens when a child is impressed with what her parents do in their work life. Wanting to become like one of her parents, the child’s face lights up and she starts talking excitedly about it all, forgetting that she is just a three year old, not yet grown up. Time gets mixed up in their heads, for at once these children start living in the future as well as in the present, and hence their answers to that question are as if the child is actually living the life of her parents now without having grown up. It is one of the most interesting phenomena to be a witness to such a conversation.

As a part of routine conversation, the girl was asked what she wanted to become when she grew up.  This girl lighted up; she said that like her dad she wanted to go to office, work all day on the computer’s key board doing “tuk, tuk, tuk”, and then come home in the evening and kiss her mother.

At this point there was a palpable embarrassment in the consulting room; both the parents were finding it difficult to hide their blush and the grandparents just smiled.

We can be sure that no matter what this child grows up to be, she will certainly be a loving person. We need more families like this one. Let such lovely ambitions flower in all homes, is all that can be wished.