No Consequences

I was visiting my niece (yet another one) in college - about 4 or 5 weeks into her first semester. She had traded in a very close knit, highly supervised environment for life on a college campus in the United States.

"So how's it going ?" I asked her - "Good, I am starting to make friends, figure things out.. some classes are easy, others not so much... but you know what is weird.... you have all this freedom... there are rules, but there are no consequences for breaking them.. of all the changes, that is the one I've been most surprised by".

"No consequences ?" the logic student inside me bristled. "You mean there are no immediate, direct, visible consequences ?" She gave me the look that the very young and intelligent reserve for crazy people to whom they are being polite only cos the crazy person is picking up the dinner check and says "Yeah no consequences".

The logic student noticed that she hadn't acknowledged her point - "Let me tell you my dear, there are consequences - they are just waiting for the right moment to catch up with you!" What do you mean ? she says.

"I too was young and skinny and beautiful like you" said the maiden aunt, "and I was certain that nothing could take it away from me. I loved batawadas - oh never mind, you don't know what a batatawada is - I loved batatawadas the way you love ice-cream. Oh come to think of it - I loved ice cream as well and french fries and anything that had potatoes in it and was deep fried. And I was young and skinny and beautiful.. and I could eat as much of these things as I wanted to, and I did. To the point that I could make a meal out of batatawadas.... You ask me dear, why I have to shop at the plus size store ? Its cos the damn batatawadas and poor food and poor lifestyle choices finally caught up with me!!"

By now the young woman was starting to think that the aunt might be going crazy - was this free dinner worth listening to her rant about batawadas ? Then she got it - this was the consequence of accepting a free dinner, even if it was your favorite restaurant, you had to sit and listen to the aunt - cos she was paying for the dinner, and she was going to drive you back to the dorm. If she was extra polite, the aunt's generosity might stretch to ordering an entree that they could takeout for tomorrow night. A good consequence.

"Interesting" she said, "but you must have continued your poor food choices - this could not be the consequence of a batatawada you ate 30 years ago" "Well, if we had enough time, I could probably show you the connection - but let me help you with one that is a little easier to follow. 20 years ago, I decided I did not want children. That career and financial stability were more important. There were no consequences back then - or if there were I did not notice. But here we are 20 years later. And I cannot undo that action from 20 years ago. Thank God my brother and his wife followed a different path. Whom would I be visiting today if they too had decided they did not want to have children ?"