Well, most of you have been around me enough to know me but I decided to spotlight my parents. I came from amazing ones :D. Now it’s time to get to know them a bit.

My family has a pretty interesting history.  We were born in the Caribbean and island called Dominica in the West Indies. A land where it’s normal to live to 100 (my great grandmother was one of them she lived to almost 115).

My sister and I were among the first generations in our immediate nuclear family to start our careers on the mainland, also known as the United States.

At 25, I’m starting to reflect a great deal on my life (mostly reflecting on my lack of culture of loss of culture). I decided to interview my parents — wondering how they were at my age. My mother is one of 20 siblings (yes 20 by both parents) and my dad is one of 7 or 8 (according to which grandparent you asked growing up).   I decided to interview my parents mainly because our lives are so different. By the time they were my age, they already had all 3 of us (my brother passed away). My parents are currently in their 40s (yup young) and migrated to the Virgin Islands where we lived briefly with my dad’s parents.

This was a portrait done of me for my 25th year:

Here’s the recollection from my mother:

Where did you live when you were 25? Dominica

What did you worry about the most when you were my age? How to take care of you three kids.

What did you want for your future? At that time, I was hoping for a career after you guys grew up and hoping to have a close family.

What do you love about your age now? I’m more experienced and I make better decisions/judgement.

What do you plan for your future? To be rich (she laughs). To tell the truth: I just want to be able to keep being happy and content in my life. To handle anything in my life and that’s pretty much it.

What advise do you have for me now that I’m 25? Put yourself first and whatever choices you make in life make sure it benefits you before anyone else. Whatever you choose to do think about it so that you don’t regret it in the future.

What advise did you wish that your mother had for you when you were 25? I never knew my mother then but I wish she could have told me what she did at 25 and how I could better myself for my future.

Here are my Dad’s answers:

Where did you live when you were 25?
Dominica.

What did you worry about the most when you were my age? I wasn’t worried. When I was 25, I already had you kids.

What did you want for your future? I had children, so I just wanted to have a good home and have the children grow up well. It was all about you guys. I was working to get a house, and send my children to school.

What do you love about your age now? I love the idea that at my age I can’t be easily swayed by anyone. I have my own mind and thinking and no one can fool me. Age brought reasoning. I love that. Young people these days don’t seem to have the same. Young people are easily led astray. I know good from bad easily. I can hear it, I can sense it… that’s knowledge.

What do you plan for your future? Not very positive. It’s unpredictable. All I want for it is to prepare for when God comes (my dad’s religious). Make sure my life is order. I seen too many people my age who have passed away and gone already.

What advise do you have for me now that I’m 25? For you now, I’ve spoken to you many times… you have to take your life seriously. Live and enjoy yourself but make sure what you do is something you won’t regret. You’re supposed to live without regrets but there are things that you can do that will cause you to be so. Just live it to the fullest with necessary caution. Usually people say that they don’t regret anything but according to what you did it can leave you with consequences… i. e. hurting yourself intentionally might cause you not to be as reckless anymore.

What advise did you wish that your father had for you when you were 25? Well, he wasn’t the type who would sit and talk and I wish he had. I don’t blame him for that. He just didn’t have that upbringing. I wish when I was younger that he would sit and talk about life to tell me: Look, Education first. He did his best to give me everything I wanted but I felt like I raised myself. He couldn’t go through my books to tell the difference of whether it was right or wrong. It wasn’t like when you guys were growing up and I could correct you myself. I wish that he was educated. If he were, then I may have taken a different path. However, as I get older, I realized this is the best thing about my life right now realizing that I can’t blame my parents. Whatever he did for me, that was his limit. That’s what he could have done and it’s now left to me to pass it on. He didn’t have the technology or things that I had growing up. Just like you guys have new technologies. At a certain age, you want to focus on certain things. I wish that he went to school (he couldn’t read or write). He thought he did the best for us by farming (his trade). He was happy enough to know that we were eating and could laugh and be healthy. That was his accomplishment. He didn’t abuse us, although we were scolded, he did the right thing.

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It’s interesting speaking to my parents about this now. I hope to have more interviews with them. Our family has changed so much in the past few years.

What am I worried most of at my age: Maybe failure. Not making them proud? They always seem proud of me.

For my future now: I hope to be content. I hope to acquire knowledge along the way and never regret anything. I hope that if I do decide to or get the opportunity to settle down that I can share this with children of my own.

2 thoughts on “At a quarter century, interviews with my parents

  1. anantha

    good very good excelent

  2. My Birthday Weekend! | Design Lady NYC

    […] Remember when I interviewed them in November? […]

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