<p>“To dispense with ceremony is the most delicate mode of conferring a compliment,” these immortal words by Edward Bulwer-Lytton somehow struck an ever so discordant note with me when I was young. I recall the first time I was called an “aunty”. If indeed, by calling me so, the child was “conferring a compliment’’, I was not in the least amused and would have been happier being called “akka’’!</p>.<p>You see, back then, I am afraid I was still very much a college freshman, and decked, rather informally in my bermudas, and tee, and poring through a comic book, out in the garden. This cute, three-year-old was playing with his ball and innocently asked me, “Aunty, can you please pass my ball?” I glowered at him, then told him sternly, how I was not an aunty. The bewildered child looked at me, mouth agape!</p>.<p>That was the death knell in the coffin of my youth. From then on, I seemed to be haunted by the very spectre of ‘auntyhood’, what with each and every child I saw referring to me innocently as aunty. Oh! How it smote my delicate, and oh–so-quite vain heart!</p>.<p>With the passage of time, I progressed from being a freshman to being a graduate. I moved on to my first job in a school nearby.</p>.<p>Here, too, I found, quickly, all my students quite happily bandying about this word, while addressing me in my off-duty times as “aunty”. Initially, I have to admit, I used to literally duck when I saw any of my students outside school since I dreaded that aunty word like the very plague. But, there was no way around it. Let us just admit it, auntyhood had caught up with me, and there was no pretending to be younger than my years!</p>.<p>Still, it irked me, and, when possible, I defended my non-aunty status protesting vehemently, like others of my legion, ’’Aunty mat kahon na (don’t call me aunty!)’’. That was then. Since then, I have watched children around me blossom like little flowers, joining college and their workplaces, and felt a quiet contentment in being addressed as aunty, even considering it to be a happening status!</p>.<p>Since that first encounter with aunty hood, I have accepted, initially, with exasperation, then, resignation, and, finally, with a quiet pride the epithet my dear children have bestowed upon me. Finally, I may well conclude my discourse on auntyhood, saying, “Live life and forget your age,” aka auntyhood (with apologies to Norman Vincent Peale)!</p>
<p>“To dispense with ceremony is the most delicate mode of conferring a compliment,” these immortal words by Edward Bulwer-Lytton somehow struck an ever so discordant note with me when I was young. I recall the first time I was called an “aunty”. If indeed, by calling me so, the child was “conferring a compliment’’, I was not in the least amused and would have been happier being called “akka’’!</p>.<p>You see, back then, I am afraid I was still very much a college freshman, and decked, rather informally in my bermudas, and tee, and poring through a comic book, out in the garden. This cute, three-year-old was playing with his ball and innocently asked me, “Aunty, can you please pass my ball?” I glowered at him, then told him sternly, how I was not an aunty. The bewildered child looked at me, mouth agape!</p>.<p>That was the death knell in the coffin of my youth. From then on, I seemed to be haunted by the very spectre of ‘auntyhood’, what with each and every child I saw referring to me innocently as aunty. Oh! How it smote my delicate, and oh–so-quite vain heart!</p>.<p>With the passage of time, I progressed from being a freshman to being a graduate. I moved on to my first job in a school nearby.</p>.<p>Here, too, I found, quickly, all my students quite happily bandying about this word, while addressing me in my off-duty times as “aunty”. Initially, I have to admit, I used to literally duck when I saw any of my students outside school since I dreaded that aunty word like the very plague. But, there was no way around it. Let us just admit it, auntyhood had caught up with me, and there was no pretending to be younger than my years!</p>.<p>Still, it irked me, and, when possible, I defended my non-aunty status protesting vehemently, like others of my legion, ’’Aunty mat kahon na (don’t call me aunty!)’’. That was then. Since then, I have watched children around me blossom like little flowers, joining college and their workplaces, and felt a quiet contentment in being addressed as aunty, even considering it to be a happening status!</p>.<p>Since that first encounter with aunty hood, I have accepted, initially, with exasperation, then, resignation, and, finally, with a quiet pride the epithet my dear children have bestowed upon me. Finally, I may well conclude my discourse on auntyhood, saying, “Live life and forget your age,” aka auntyhood (with apologies to Norman Vincent Peale)!</p>