In this chapter, the Little Flower narrates her life as an eight and half years old. Her elder sister Pauline had entered the Carmel and because of this, the Little Flower had fallen sick.
I don't remember falling sick but I remember entering the house of a Christian for the first time in my life. I too must have been eight years old and there was this girl, older than me, I don't know by how many years. I had a friend circle of a few girls older than me and who liked me. She too liked me and I guess I too liked her genuinely. There were no pretences at that age - I either liked or disliked a person - no in-between. So the liking was mutual and everyone called her Jassi. But now I feel that she must have been Jessy. So Jessy invited me to her home for Christmas and made sure that I visited her house. She kept telling me about it again and again.
So I took my dad's permission to visit her house on Christmas morning. I dressed up in my best attire and dad instructed me to wish her Merry Christmas as soon as I entered her home. I think I took a Christmas card as well. So I entered her house and handed over the card to her but did not wish her. I shamelessly ate all that was placed before me but till the time I left her home I did not wish her. Either I was shy or embarrassed - I just couldn't say the two words Merry Christmas. I left in a hurry as I could not handle the situation anymore. I don't remember anything after that except that she had a few brothers older than her. I think one of them was introduced to me and because of that, I was uncomfortable in their house. I just wanted to escape. I did escape but I don't know what happened after that. I fail to remember.
Thus it was the first time that I had entered a Christian house and I wasn't comfortable. I was never comfortable in the presence of Priests and Nuns also. Something in them scared me. While writing this I wonder if it was the holiness about them that scared the little devil in me. The Little Rebel that I was, I am sure now that the blessed Trinity residing in them must have recognized my unholy childhood. Thus I must have been apprehensive of my unholiness and it scared me. I was like this until the time I met Fr. Alfonso, the then-editor of the magazine THE TEENAGER TODAY for which I started writing in 1999.
I had no idea who Mother Mary was though I had heard about Jesus Christ whose birthday was celebrated on 25 December and because of that we got a holiday in school. The same goes for Good Friday because of which we got an extra holiday. But my dad bought a cake for the family on account of Christmas.
To digress from the topic, unlike the Little Flower, I was not an intelligent eight years old child. I was weak in my studies, especially in Mathematics, and how much I used to cry and get beaten by my dad while memorizing the multiplication tables. I just couldn't do it and the terror of sitting with him during his drinking sessions kicked the daylight out of me. I was petrified to death and sometimes could not control my urge to wet my pants. I got more shouting for doing that.
My dad wanted me to be a teacher and loved it when I taught my invisible students after coming back from school. I wrote down that day's lessons on the doors and window panes. I couldn't and didn't want to wipe them until he had seen them after coming back from his office.
All these happened till 1988 when we were in Bhilai and I had not entered my teenage years. Though weak in studies I was good at extracurricular activities and sports. I was over-enthusiastic about them and tried to participate in as many activities as I could free of cost. I backed out wherever the money was involved. Such was my life in the first 12 years of my existence on Earth. To top it off, I could hardly speak English. I developed this through regular reading and writing which I was picking up during the late 1980s. I had developed a liking for reading, thanks to my dad, and I still remember the name of the library from where he borrowed books for reading. Its name was APNA PUSTAKALAYA (our library).
So the Little Rebel had one of the most unholy childhood, unlike the Little Flower.
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