Anytime Child of the Future
I was borne premature, they say it was the chicken.
I spent the first 3 months in isolation, but I thought I heard crying all around.
There was lots of whirring noises and little red lights around me.
I went home for a while but no-one could sleep so I went from Mum to Dad to Grandma to Grandad.
Where's my room?
When I was nearly one, I went to Kindy
I had to go everyday because no-one else could look after me. They all 'had to work'.
They say I was a pioneer because it was one of the first Overnight Kindy's.
I used to go home at weekends sometimes but Mum & Dad fought so they took me back to Kindy mostly.
What is family?
Weekend Kindy was fun, there was lots of kids there, but we have to learn to share.
I get tired of all the crying and noise, there's nowhere to be quiet or just to be alone for a while.
What is Home?
When I was 5, I went to Big School.
It was right next to Weekend Kindy which was right next to Overnight Kindy ,which was now called Anytime Kindy.
Anytime Kindy is near to the Baby Hospital.
Sometimes I sleep at Big School, sometimes at my Nanas.
Mummy & Daddy still have to work
What is Anytime School?
When I was 10, Mother and Father used to come and visit me at Anytime School, mostly it was on weekends.
They never knew what to say to me and after a while they left and I felt alone again.
Did I do something wrong?
But my friends were always there at Anytime School too. Sometimes their Mothers and Fathers came to see them too. They were glad when they left too.
Where's Nana and Papa gone? Mother says they've crossed over
Why have they crossed me off?
When I was 13, Mother came to see me on Visiting Weekend at Anytime School.
She said it was getting harder to see me because of school visiting rules and she had to work.
But Mother didn't come with Father, she came with another man who said I was his father now.
What's a step-dad?
When I was 14, my Father came to see me on Visiting Weekend.
He said he couldn't see me before because he had fought with Mother about who should be able to come on Visiting Weekend.
I asked him if he was my stepfather now He said no, he was my real father.
Then he showed me another woman and said she was now my Mother.
Then they left because they had to work.
I had homework to do all weekend so I was kinda glad.
I used to like to play football but Anytime School stopped all that when they had to pay a lot of money to a boy's Mother and Father because he got sunburn. Why? He got better.
I miss my football!
We seem to get a lot more homework these days. Why? It's not fair!
When I was 15, my Biological Father came to see me on Annual Visiting Weekend.
He slapped me on the back and told me that I was a good kid and at least I wasn't a shopping mall kid, hanging out and buying stuff?
What's a shopping mall?
What's hanging out?
Why do people have to buy stuff?
Then he told me he had to go away to work in another country. I have to work he said.
He said he would always be my Dad, but now I was a man I would be alright on my own in the real world. Anytime School had taught me all about the real world right?
What's the Real World?
When I was 16, my Biological Mother came to see me at Anytime Graduation.
She said she was proud of me but I was only glad my friends were proud of me.
She came with Step Dad who slapped me on the back and told me I was a man now and he betted I was looking forward to getting into the Real World hey?
Mother explained that since Real Dad had had to work in another country, no-one had enough money to pay for Anytime School anymore and so in a week I would be leaving to enter The Real World.
At 16 and one week, Mother and Step-Dad came to take me to The Real World.
I was petrified, terrified, cried a lot, shouted, screamed and got violent.
All my friends were leaving too and they were doing the same screaming and crying – even the 'real men'.
Then the Anytime Doctor came and gave us a bigger injection of our usual weekly injection. He said it was good for us, because it kept us calm.
When we left, we didn't have far to go.
We went in a bus, all us Anytime Kids, with Fathers and Mothers in their cars.
I thought they were following us but the Doctor said it was too stressful for the parents so they were going home. Where's home?
We left Anytime School and went onto the road. It was so scary and so many strange people, all hurrying and scowling.
We went past the Anytime School grounds, past Anytime Kindy, past the Anytime Hospital, past the Anytime Gym, the Anytime Coffee Club and the Anytime Anywhere Workhouse where Mother said she met Father once and had a date. What's a Date?
Then the bus turned into a driveway and I immediately relaxed.
The Anytime Doktor explained that this was the Anytime Real World Housing Estate. Here we would be looked after by the Anytime Company.
He explained that Anytime Company was looked after by the Government Housing Department (what's Government) and that Anytime Company would look after us.
I felt calm then, very calm because I realized I had nothing to fear
(That injection stings a bit more than usual, I wonder why?)
You see, The Real World is run by the Anytime Company. I would be housed by the Anytime Housing Company, go to Work at the Anytime Anywhere Workhouse. Keep fit at the Anytime Gym, meet more friends at the Anytime Coffee Club and then if I wanted to have kids, they could look after them at the Anytime Hospital and the Anytime School, from birth if I wanted it.
And of course I would want it that way wouldn't I? What did I have to worry about? Now all my questions were answered, at least the ones I really wanted answered.
The Anytime Company would look after me all my life.
They were my family, the one I'd always known.
It was home, hospital, kindy, school, friends and later, work, play, love and life.
Even my kids would have nothing to worry about, would they?
I tell my story to other Anytime Kids in the last year of Anytime Kindy. It's my job now and we have to work, don't we?
Mostly I have to repeat all this several times to the Anytime Kindy Kids before they understand.
The Doktor tells me the injections will help them and he's working with other Doktors at the Anytime Drug Clinic (attached to the Anytime Hospital) to develop a pill to be taken just once a month. Then the daily injections can stop, which would help the kids, right?
Sometimes I think about what the Anytime Kids have to worry about these days, it was so much harder for me, not knowing that Anytime would take care of the Real World for me, the weirdness of Mother and Father.
Sometimes I wonder about how hard a life Outsiders have, not being looked after by The Anytime Company. It must be hard having mothers and fathers, step fathers and stepmothers, step sisters and brothers, told who your friends should be, having to buy stuff by hanging out at those strange shopping malls (still haven't figured out what the point of all that is), having to find a house, find a job, find a partner (how do you do that without gene matching checks).
I've given up asking the Doktor about Outsiders. He just says I worry too much and it's time for my daily injection, it'll make me feel calm again.
"Anytime Will Take Care of Everything", so the slogan goes and so it is.
Written by MightyMike
Monday 7th November 2005 10am