A salient aspect of being the youngest in a family is that, no matter how old and responsible you become, you will always be regarded as the baby. Sometimes your individual free will is lost in this infantilisation: your decisions chalked up to the impetuosity of youth.
In my family, I doubt this will change. For example, every year I try to go vegan, and eventually fail. The first time this happened, roughly 15 years ago, my mother hailed it as a fad. “No, these are my genuine values,” I said, citing climate change with a dollop of anticapitalism. “I’m old enough to have my beliefs. I’m in year 11 now.”
Over time, the evidence I submitted for having my own mind evolved (“I’m a graduate now”; “I have a proper job”). Yet even if my life credentials were to reach impossible heights (“I’m the leader of the Labour party”; “I have single-handedly solved global poverty”), I’m sure my endeavours would still be met with a dismissive: “Pffft, sure. Shall I make you an omelette?”
Having heard this for so long, I think I somehow believed it. They say you become more conservative as you age – not just politically but in the way you live your life. But I am one of the others: I grow more rebellious. More ideals, more conviction, less fear of speaking up and a growing peace with being an irritant. I will bring my own bamboo cutlery to the party. And I won’t apologise.
People mock the youthful stereotype of the rebel without a cause, but frankly, I’m on their side. Causes can be gained, but the spirit? That’s something else.
Still, I’ve yet to convince my mother. “We’ll see how much you love rebelliousness when you’re a parent,” she says. “Anyway, eat up. I’ve made you an omelette.”
