Kishore Singh: Obstinate genes

PEOPLE LIKE US

Long years ago, when I was still a student, I was taken to see a psychiatrist for reasons too complicated to go into here. Suffice it to say the only thing I remember about that meeting was being analysed as having a nature best described as "obstinate". Since this is a well-documented family trait, I could have willingly confessed to it without having to suffer the travails of a visit to a counsellor.

Obstinacy, as far as I know, is not contagious, so it's a moot point whether my wife came with the bug or picked up the virus in our family, but where pig-headedness is concerned, you won't have to look further than the two of us to find excellent specimens. It means we're never agreed on anything, and when it comes to choices for the children's education, tuition or potential careers, all hell breaks loose every time a discussion is scheduled. Still, since we have agreed to disagree on everything, at least it is not upsetting when, yet again, we fail to see eye-to-eye on anything at all.

It was hardly surprising then that while we spent the last few years fiercely arguing over our daughter's choice of subjects and prospects, she went ahead to do precisely what she wanted. But now, a handful of months before she must commit to those long-term decisions, she seems to have gone into a blue funk, irritatingly wailing all the while, "What am I going to do with my life?"

It was in the midst of one such painful lament that my son called from Pune to ask if I would advance him the following month's allowance by a few days so he could plan a holiday with his friends to Goa. Since he had wangled, one way or another, three times the sum of his negotiated remuneration for the second month on a trot, I pointed out how I had been too lenient with the cash which, as I reminded him, did not grow on trees (having always wanted to say that to someone), and that it would be best if he considered studying instead of holidaying as a short-term alternative.

Several hours later, feeling like a heel, I rang back to say that it was all right if he wanted to do Goa, and how much money did he want? "Seriously, that's cool," said my son. I insisted he tell me the sum I could transfer to his account for the holiday. "Oh that," said my son, "I called mom who's agreed to fund the trip anyway, but you might want to send me some extra cash, just in case..."

I remembered too late how a career counsellor had recommended that our son choose law instead of the various options he had been studying up till then. "He knows how to negotiate the best terms for himself," she said, astutely figuring out, I guess, the manner in which he'd managed to survive the warring factions at home.

Which is why, even as I write this, my daughter is probably filling out an aptitude test at the same counsellor's. In the previous weeks, she's obstinately rejected all the job profiles I'd managed to research for her "" hotelier ("ugh!"), designer ("chee!"), management ("that's so boring"), marketing ("mad or what?), banking, insurance "" the lot.

Just before leaving though, she called to ask what she should say when the counsellor asked her what she wanted to really do.

"Tell her the truth," I replied cussedly, pointing out that she probably knew when someone was fibbing.

"In that case," sighed my daughter, "I'll just have to tell her I want any job that doesn't require too much responsibility, or work, but makes me a lot of money."