People come with different preferences for family sizes. Large, small, compact – all depends on the outcome of personal experiences. I decided to have only one child due to reasons of feeling neglected being among many.
I come from a large family of six siblings. Can’t say if it was a blessing or penalty of something I said to God before my birth. I am the second in line. My eldest sister Samira, being the first one, automatically became the apple of my parents’ eye. I was too small but I still remember I expected the world to go around me and only me. In efforts of becoming an apple too, I ended up becoming a dried fruit in my parents’ nose.
I am sure my parents did love me when I was a child but I hated the idea of interruption of this service when Samira snuggled in between. Over the time crankiness seeped into my veins and became evident characteristic of my personality.
Then my parents went overboard and had four more offspring. Four years from my arrival came Faiqa, two years after getting bored with her they were given Yumna, three years after realizing she was not even the dream child came my brother Asim, and then to the extent of my immortal disbelief, after five years Farah ping ponged in our house.
I grew up puling my own hair and others.
Living in the same house was not that difficult as it was to travel in the same car with others. Pulling one another away from favourite window side would continue as long as it took to reach the destination. And then it would resume on the way back. Nobody ever got lucky making peace with the window. The only window I remember easily available was the bedroom window which was not fun because the view was stationary.
I am not sure if I was tortured by God for being born different or by my siblings treating me as microscopic particle of dust carrying an untreatable virus. I looked at myself in mirror almost after every minute I stepped away from it. One minute was more than enough for me to think I might have grown something on my head. So I checked again. Finding nothing there made me think if there existed something on my back which gave my siblings a loop hole to ridicule me. Soon I started turning in circles in front of mirror. This is how I learned to dance free style.
After realizing that I was a pure human and not an alien, I had to gear up in battle field to protect my identity from being erased. Getting noticed by parents among the troop of monsters in different sizes was difficult. I remember clearly jumping a little higher and popping my head out and manage to stay in air a few second longer than my competitor attention seekers. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. I got stuck in the air and never landed.
When deprivation of emotional attention became eternal, I shifted my efforts towards protecting my space. Although we lived in a big house, we were still bound to share bedroom with at least one sibling. The universe hated me, so I was struck-bound with Faiqa.
Relationship between Faiqa and me was of a Red Indian and a White. I, being the Red Indian.
Faiqa was born with innate skills of torturing me just by having a round face with fringes on forehead. Her became darling to every adult especially my uncle next door was an automatic rifle aimed at me 24/7. My observation always concluded that round faces are considered angelic and naïve. Whereas long faces evil and cunning. Notice the movies where witches and demons are always projected with slender faces. I had a long oval face.
My uncle moved from our neighborhood leaving Faiqa with her full pensive attention on me. When I was eighteen, incidents of concomitant occurrences evolved. Replacement of my shampoos with tap water, disappearance of my pen caps and other items of graspable sizes, displacement of my personal belongings in my locked wardrobe, signs of claws in my drawers are just a few to mention here. I was not surprised when I found all that I lost from Sonia’s cupboard.
I had Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I followed system through proper channel and believed in morals therefore I raised my complaints to my parents considering them the highest delegation of the household government. My motions faced out straight rebuff. Allegations put on me were that I was always embroiled in a spirited donnybrook over my territory; I had conflicts of emotions; and my demonstration was enveloped with anger.
Quite contrary of my size, I often retorted with physical violence with my siblings and others due to frustration. It was later in life when I learned the power of words.
I was a cleanliness freak. I was mostly found crawling on knees with nose pasted on floor or kitchen counter sniffing for invisible stains. A mop was one thing I never lived without. I would clean vivaciously over and over again after my sisters who were the dominant elements of life cycle of callous mental persecution.
I don’t remember having Asim at home much as he spent all his life in his school engaged in extracurricular activities till night lead by pursuit of homework and bed. He often wore his night suit over his uniform at night considering that in few hours he would have to go to school any way.
Farah was mainly brought up by me until I got married. I formed my very first, my very own kingdom of power with her with the population of only one person. Because of her size and age, it was easy for me to experiment my techniques of various types on her. Although seeing her now it is hard to believe that I learned cutting hair on her while keeping her hysterically crying, walked her to school stretching her arm as long as the distance to school, experimented my clown making techniques on her, and shoved food down her throat tangled her in my arms every day.
All those people who object on my decision of keeping a compact family of three with only one child, might understand some day it is a small price to pay for perpetual peace.
Right, we need should concentrate our care by having less babies.