I was the youngest child and got a lot more freedom than my brother and sister. I used to wander, doing my own thing under the radar, but I didn't get in bad, bad trouble.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
My childhood was bittersweet in many ways. We moved around a lot. By the time I was 10, I had travelled thousands of miles, often on my own. My parents were like my friends, so it felt like I didn't really have parents at all. But in a crazy way that was very liberating. It forced me to be independent, maybe a leader, and certainly a survivor.
It was a great childhood. We weren't especially wealthy or anything, but I felt I had a kind of safety and freedom.
My parents were intelligent and encouraging, but at the same time, they were displeased at me becoming a wandering troubadour and wire walker.
When I was four, my mother insisted I get out of the car and find my own way home. Although I got lost, I did find my way home. It taught me the value of independence at an early age.
My parents had us very young. We lived in a modest house. We built forts, we hiked, we went camping and they wanted us to be independent. It's how children grew up in the 1940s and 50s: outside all the time, playing in the dirt, riding your bike around.
My childhood, I wouldn't say it was bad. It helped me grow up. I stayed out of trouble. My parents taught me what's wrong and right, and knowing that I had a little brother following me, I had to make sure I was doing the right thing so he knows what's right, too. I was in the house nine days out of 10. There wasn't nothing good outside for me.
My parents were concerned that I would not get good schooling, so they put me up in my uncle's house in Dharwad, and I spent about six years there. So at a very young age, I was away from my parents. I developed an amount of independence and learned to stand on my own feet.
I was quietly rebellious. My parents thought I was very good but secretly I did things like saying I was staying in one place and going somewhere else instead. My older sister was openly rebellious and would tell my parents where to go, but I never did that.
I went through a period of great rebellion within my family, when I was about 9 or 10. I was mad, I had no focus, had no real interest in anything, and so I started to do things that were just rebellious and stupid.
I always managed to get in trouble, like every kid. But I had to learn a lot of hard lessons on my own, without parents who would nurture me and guard me through that part of life, at a very young age.