Why I’m nobody’s aunty

It’s official. I’m accelerating towards my big 40 with astonishing speed and there is no pressing the brake. With only a little over a year to go, I’m already dreading the big ‘celebration’, as though it is something to celebrate when the opposite is true. What happened to those quiet days of ignoring your milestone birthdays, except for maybe cutting a cake with your loved ones? Now, there is the pressure to make a big show out of it by inviting all your family and friends (and the friends of your family and the family of your friends) and partying as though there is no tomorrow. Cakes today are so intricate they look like they belong in the Louvre. Cocktails are so fancy, you’re afraid to actually drink them. People are so loud you feel like you need to insure your ear drums. 

Why is it that we are never happy with our age? When we are young we can’t wait to grow older and when we’re older, we can’t help but wish we were younger. One of the things about growing old is that you never feel your age. If you were to ask me how old I feel I am, I would say 25. That’s why the first time you hear yourself being called ‘aunty’ by your nephews, nieces or your friends’ children, it comes like a bolt out of the blue. You look around wondering who they are referring to before you realise it is you. Overnight, you have gone from a ‘chechi’ or an elder sister to an ‘aunty’—that bane of every woman’s aspirations for youth.

That’s why I can totally empathise with the Indian-origin health care assistant in the UK, Ilda Esteves, who filed a lawsuit against a nurse colleague for calling her ‘aunty’ despite her repeatedly telling him not to, thereby “causing injury to her feelings”. She won the lawsuit and the man had to pay her Rs1.8 lakh in damages. A small step for Ilda, a giant leap for women everywhere who want to believe they are still young when they are not. We might not drink from the elixir of youth any more, but we don’t want you to drive home the point by turning us into an ‘aunty’ before we are ready for it.

At the same time, it is a little daunting to think you could be sued for calling someone ‘aunty’. That’s because the term is not exactly derogatory. It cannot be abandoned altogether for it has its uses, especially in India. In the west, of course, there is a one-size-fits-all solution by calling everyone by their name. Here, however, there is a crucial difference: respect for your elders might as well be an unwritten Constitutional principle. You can and must call some people aunties and uncles; but deciding who to call that requires immense reserves of wisdom, and the absolutely indispensable skill of judging a person’s age.

If someone asks you how old you think they are, you naturally de-age them by a minimum of 10 years. But when it comes to deciding what to call them, the scene becomes like a Van Gogh painting: for the life of you, you can’t figure it out. Things are further complicated in this age of botox and laser treatments, when no one really looks their age. In this scenario, you are bound to make the mistake of calling someone half your age ‘aunty’ and someone twice your age by their name. The distinction is extremely important because it is the difference between respect, friendship, camaraderie or insult. Of course, calling someone an ‘aunty’ lets you evade the problem of actually remembering their name, which is sometimes an issue for people like me with faulty face recognition software.  

So, you can see what a minefield this is. In case someone I know is reading this, please don’t call me or make your children call me an aunty. Please call me by my name for as long as my dermal fillers last.