"When I was your age..."
WHEN I WAS YOUR AGE
by Michael Frayn
When I was your age, child –
When I was eight,
When I was ten,
When I was two
(How old are you?)
When I was your age, child,
My father would have gone quite wild
Had I behaved the way you
Do.
What, food uneaten on my plate
When I was eight?
What, room in such a filthy state
When I was ten?
What, late
For school when I was two?
My father would have shouted, “When
I was your age, child, my father would have raved
Had I behaved
The way you
Do".
When I was
Your age, child, I did not drive us
All perpetually mad
By bashing
Up my little brother and reducing him to tears.
There was a war on in those years!
There were no brothers to be had!
Even sisters were on ration!
My goodness, we were pleased
To get anything to tease!
We were glad
Of aunts and dogs,
Of chickens, grandmothers, and frogs;
Of creatures finned and creatures hooved,
And second cousins twice removed!
When I was your
Age, child, I was more
Considerate of others
(Particularly of fathers and of mothers).
I did not sprawl
Reading the Dandy
Or the Beano
When aunts and uncles came to call.
Indeed no.
I grandly
Entertained them all
With “Please” and “Thank you”, “May I…?”,
“Thank you”, “Sorry”, “Please”,
And other remarks like these.
And if a chance came in the conversation
I would gracefully recite a line
Which everyone recognised as a quotation
From one of the higher multiplication
Tables, like "Seven sevens are forty-nine".
When I was your age, child, I
Should never have dreamed
Of sitting idly
Watching television half the night
It would have seemed
Demented:
Television not then having been
Invented.
When I
Was your age, child, I did not lie
About
The house all day.
(I did not lie about anything at all - no liar I!)
I got out!
I ran away!
To sea!
(Though naturally I was back, with hair brushed
and hands washed, in time for tea.)
Oh yes, goodness me,
I had worked already down a diamond mine,
And fought in several minor wars,
And hunted boars,
In the lonelier
Parts of Patagonia
(Though I admit that possibly by then
I was getting on for ten.)
In the goldfields of Australia
I learned the bitterness of failure;
Experience in the temples of Siam
Made me the wise and punctual man that I am;
But the lesson that I value most
I learned upon the Coromandel Coast-
Never, come what may, to boast.
When
I was your age, child, and the older generation
Offered now and then
A kindly explanation
Of what the world was like in their young day
I did not yawn in that rude way.
Why, goodness me,
There being no television to see
(As I have, I think, already said)
We were most grateful
For any entertainment we could get instead
However tedious or hateful.
So grow up, child! And be
Your age! (What is your age, then?
Eight? Or nine? Or two? Or ten?)
Remember, as you look at me-
When I was your age I was forty-three.
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