DEFINING CHILDHOOD - MY MOTHER'S IDEA OF WHAT GROWING UP SHOULD BE

Some mothers hang a growth chart so that their child is able to see how tall he
or she has become. For some reason, my mother never paid much attention to
how many inches we had grown. Her focus was instead on a set of increasing
liberties and the responsibilities associated with them. She had developed
an unwritten schedule of how old a child must be in order to be given each new
liberty, and her schedule was applied consistently for all of us. For example,
when I turned five I could leave the yard and play on the sidewalk in front of the

house. When I turned six I was allowed to go to the corner store. Turning
seven meant being able to go with friends to the park on the next street over.
Later I would "graduate" to being allowed to go downtown with friends, go
on the long walk to the ice skating rink, and then take the bus to the next city
over.

It wasn't just increasing freedom with regard to how far I could go, though. My
mother applied the same kind of schedule to things like when I could wear
nylons (11 for just Sundays and special occasions, 12 for whenever I chose),
when I could wear lipstick (13 and it had to be pale pink), and when I could wear
whatever make-up I wanted (14 as long as it wasn't "caked on"). There
was also a schedule for being with boys. For ages 12 through 15 she saw
it as acceptable and normal for me to associate with boys in mixed-gendered
groups and to go to dances with the boy up the street with transportation
provided by a parent. As I got past the junior-high years and into tenth
grade (the year I turned 16) real dating began. My mother encouraged us
all to get our licenses as soon as we could (16), so it worked out that the
junior-high years were preparation for the high-school years. The high-school
years were when the schedule of growing up was phased out.

It used to seem to me that my age determined my mother's choice to give
me some liberty. Now I realize that since she was the one to invent the
schedule she wasn't at the mercy of it. She was, in fact, the one to define
what was appropriate for what age and, more importantly, how fast I would
be allowed to grow up. She had no intention or wish to keep me from
growing up. Instead, she kept me from growing up too fast. She used to
say it gave a child something to look forward to. My mother's management
of the growing-up process wasn't just something she saw as part of

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