Nobody is a self-made man

No self is ever made by the self alone. The upstartish claim — I am a self-made man — stinks of ingratitude.

What about your father and your mother? They brought you into this world, they ensured you woollens when you didn’t know what woollens were.

What about your mother? She fed you when you didn’t know what food was.

Again, what about your father? He got you toys so that you didn’t assume that the world was an exercise in banality and had no room for colour.

What about your nurse? She bathed you when you didn’t know what dirt was. She kept you clean on an hourly basis so that you learnt how important it was to remain clean in a world, which was filthy in a million ways, and gave scant attention to fighting that miasmic heap.

She clothed you regularly when you didn’t know what clothes were and you didn’t know they were a must, for often in life we are forced to hide what the world doesn’t approve of and also hide our feelings.

What about your teachers? They begin with the alphabet A and use up decades of their lives to ensure that life, which is a thorny moor tract and not a walk through a bed of tulips, is not allowed to fell your desires before you reach Z.

Again, what about your teachers explaining the difference between colours when you didn’t know how crucial it was not to have a coloured view of life?

What about your teachers telling you about the weather?

They saw that you learnt that the bright sun could turn cruel — drought; the pleasant breeze could turn fatal — storm and the nourishing rain could turn satanic — deluge.

What about the porter, who carries your suitcase to your first train to the world beyond your world? They call it market. And cunning is its heartbeat.

Therefore, the claim that one is a self-made man is wrong and indeed smacks of ingratitude.