What’s a moment when you realized you were officially an adult?

‘You are not a LKG student,’ I heard this rebuke long after I was adult. The process of adulthood is long as it is linked to wisdom and maturity. By that yardstick I still doubt whether I am an adult.

Yet a certain amount of maturity comes with age when our guardians feel that the fledgling is ready for the flight to the sky. A pigeon laid eggs in a pot filled with soil, which was meant for a plant, in my balcony. I allowed the pigeon to hatch her eggs. When the chicks grew up to be fledglings, they took several sorties within my balcony to be ready for the flight. They flew away from my balcony eventually.

I went through the process of becoming adult under the watchful eyes of my parents. I had my studies away from my home and hence I had to make bus journey to reach the hostel. But those were within a short distance from my home and quite often my parents had someone to give me company. Even for going to cinemas, I could convince my parents to let me go, when I had an elderly uncle or brother to be with me.

I am not sure of a decisive moment when I embarked on adulthood. But when I had to go to Kolkata after I had admission into an engineering college there, I got the real taste of adulthood. This time I was going alone with anxiety and hope about the days ahead. I was set free, but I realised that from then on I would have to fend for myself.