Creative Writing: Children - Essay Example

19 October Assignment Rationale: "Children do not constitute anyone's property: they are neither the property of their parents nor even ofsociety. They belong only to their own future freedom."  -- Mikhail Bakunin (Little Bits of History) One fine morning when the world wakes up to the beaming rays of the sun, everything is caught in reverse; parents keep sleeping in their beds, with children wide awake, up and about, a great start to the day to begin making merry. If children ruled the world and shouldered the responsibilities of their parents, things would be a lot different than what they are now, primarily because of the reason that children tend not to over think the decisions that they make and thus learn in the process; they have no qualms about meeting and interacting with different kinds of people unlike adults; moreover, they get along just fine with absolutely everyone. If children took control of how the world runs, it would make the world a much better place morally and ethically for the sole reason that children do not frown down upon society or have an egoistic frame of mind that bars them from being equal and justifiable towards other people. It would be wonderful to have the roles reversed for some time in order to understand the difference that constitutes the lives of children as well as adults and how carefree people are when they are younger; it is true that adults have a bigger responsibility of taking care of other people dependent on them with respect to finances and social support. However, children take care of their family members and friends too, with a simple mantra of being happy and keeping others happy; thus, if they ruled the world, the aspects of greed and negative emotions like jealousy would not fathom the minds of people because the only purpose in life would be to be happy and ensure the happiness and welfare of those around us in society. Children tend to help people understand that the point of life is not to run ahead of others in the game; it is essentially to be happy and not lose one’s friends and family. Children teach people that fighting with others is absolutely unnecessary and that the world can be a much happier place without people getting on each other’s backs because the point is to do whatever one likes without harming someone else, and thus in this manner, every individual can easily find his or her own source of happiness – even if it may be just looking at a rainbow or playing in nature’s lap. Young Terry walks out of his home on a fine Tuesday morning in his shorts and dinosaur t-shirt, with a small bag in his hand that contains a juicy red apple and a small notebook. He walks down the lane, and his friend Lisa joins him as they walk together towards their school; they walk in and sit at the teacher’s desk because they are there to impart education of course while Mrs. Hannigan sits at the tiny desk and chair, waiting to hear what the children have to say. Terry asks the class to write down what they love the most, and Lisa hands out sheets of paper to everyone. A look of confusion crosses Mrs. Hannigan’s face as the rest of the children begin to scribble and doodle on their papers in a matter of a few seconds. It takes them no time to think at all while the ‘teacher’ is struggling to write down the one thing that she loves the most. In another half hour, the other children manage to draw rainbows, dogs, cats, their parents and siblings, as well as write about their friends, food items and their grandparents, whereas Mrs. Hannigan’s paper is still blank. Terry walks up to her and asks her gently, “Mrs. Hannigan, don’t you love anything at all?” to which she replies, “I do Terry, there are a number of things, I don’t know how to prioritize them! I love my friends, my fiancee, my dog, my parents and even good literature!” she exclaims as Terry draws a small heart on the piece of paper in front of him and asks, “What does this remind you of, Mrs Hannigan?” “Off the top of my head, the first time I met my fiancee a year ago,” says Mrs Hannigan. “Then your life with him is what you love the most! It’s as easy as that, Mrs Hannigan, and if that makes you happy, that’s all you should be doing.” Terry says with a smile as Mrs. Hannigan looks completely taken aback, and a realization hits her; she wonders what she has been doing all this while and why she has spent a considerable amount of time fighting with him instead of accomplishing the things they want together. Terry goes back home in the afternoon and makes a sandwich for his parents for lunch, he lets them switch on the television and watch whatever they like and tells them that he would never impose any restrictions on them. “When you ask me not to do something dad, I want to do it even more!” he says with a snigger. He takes his father out to the park in the evening and spends the day playing catch with him; they come back tired and hungry and on Terry’s instructions eat only ice cream for dinner and that too, out of the jar! As they sit in front of the TV-set in the evening, the family discuss their plans with each other while Terry lays down a rule stating that no one is to plan to the extent when plans get in their way. He asks his father, “Why is it that sometimes we plan to play in the park and go to the zoo but you get so busy with other ‘more important plans’ that we forget to do all of that!” His parents realize that with so much prior planning with regard to work in their lives, they have been losing the time that they could have been sharing with each other, and with Terry as the head or the authority of the household, things were so much simpler. His parents had to go to work, but not at the expense of their family time. Lisa in the neighbouring home told her mother that she wanted to be like her when she grew up. “I want to marry someone who is as handsome as daddy, and I want to be at home with everyone and spend all the time with the family around me; this way I will never get bored, and I will always have someone to have fun with!” Her logic was quite simple; people can go to work only if it made them happy; if they were caught in menial jobs that would make their lives difficult to live, there was no point in living at all. “Why cry in the first place in order to smile when you can keep smiling all the time and be positive!” she told her father who seemed a little grumpy after a hard day’s work. Lisa said she wanted to take over the rules of the house and ensure that everyone could do whatever they liked as long as they remained happy; this way people would automatically learn from their mistakes without being told not to make any at all and would thus have the freedom and leverage to decide for themselves as well as be happier in general. Sunset began to dawn, and the children tucked in in their beds with their parents in their homes while listening to music and reading books. They decided that things would be much better and that the world would be a much better place if every child managed to make his or her parents and family members happy this way; if they set some rules during the course of the day and taught their parents and teachers about life rather than the other way around. That night, everyone slept peacefully and contented with their lives. Works Cited "Little Bits of History." Child Labor Laws. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Oct. 2012. . Read More