Off The Cuff: A wry look at life

Looking up to someone. A role model. All of us have admired different individuals through various phases in our lives.

As a child, perhaps your hero was a parent or an older sibling. You look at them as a grown up and wonder why they seemed larger than life way back then. Like encountering someone many moons later, someone whom you used to think was the cat's whiskers.

Dispassio-nately viewing this erstwhile paragon of virtues as an adult, you find yourself wondering whether you were perhaps mentally challenged as a child.

What could you have possibly seen here to hero-worship. That's a part of growing up. Finding out that your childhood rose-tinted lenses are poor quality glass.

But this phase in one's life is sweet as long as it lasts. I remember a four-year-old niece firmly believing that her papa was indomitable, the fairy prince who would come to the rescue of anyone in danger. During the bedtime ritual, papa would read her a story.

As he neared the climax and was about to reveal how the princess was saved from a fate worse than death, a little voice would confidently pipe up, "And papa rescued the princess".

I happened to be present at one of these bedtime rituals and was amused by the hero worship on that little face. And the look of embarrassment on my brother's face as he became aware of my presence.

Of course, I had to disagree just to see her fierce rebuttal. So I told her that her papa wasn't invincible.

And I could see her face turn mutinous as I tried my best to burst her bubble. I know that was mean of me but I couldn't resist teasing her and hearing her rush to her beloved papa's defence.
Such loyalty and faith was touching.

Many years later, when I reminded her about her firm conviction that her father was an amalgam of every childhood hero, she laughed and said, "Was I really that naive?" So she had grown up, too.

Perhaps a favourite role model for children is a favourite teacher. Have you ever tried telling your young one that no, she can't do her homework that way. That it is more sensible to do it the way you say.

Words you regret a little later as you hear the inevitable response, "But my teacher said so".

The finality of those words sounds the death knell to your perfectly good intentions to teach your child an easier way to do some schoolwork. You might have twice the teacher's qualifications and experience but you have been completely routed.

By a child's conviction that teacher knows best. You learn yet another lesson. That you cannot ever hope to win against a role model. You can see that you have upset your child by daring to imply that perhaps the teacher might not know everything.

So you try to convince the child that there's a certain method to what she sees as your madness.

But you know that you are fighting a losing battle. Discretion being the better part of valour, you decide to give up. Because you can see by that familiar set to her jaw that she has blocked you out. Put up her mental shutters.

What's next? Operation Damage Repair. You utter soothing words such as "I know your teacher's right but I was only trying to show you another way". Or "It's okay. Do it the way your teacher told you".

With your capitulation, you can see the thawing of the chilly reception to your "crazy" suggestion.

Head bending down again to labour over what you can plainly see could have been done much faster your way. But you bite your tongue. You daren't risk bursting that bubble.