By 4 I was very fixed on the idea of being a teacher.
My dad made me sit through every single news report of bad working conditions, low salaries and unemployment of teachers during the 70s. He was fond of “those that can do, those that can’t teach”. I think he was desperate to channel the results of a single IQ test in the direction that would ensure me an independent and financially comfortable life. So all sciences it was. Future engineer, computer programmer (he had me typing code by the early 80s into a computer that used a tape recorder as a hard disk, or soft disk, can’t remember which), scientist, doctor, dentist … but not vet !
I’m a teacher. Via a non-conventional route, in an area that is not really considered a proper part of the profession. Nothing makes me feel like teaching does. Not from when I put chalk to board to teach my class (my younger siblings, there against their will) for the very first time. I bloody loved it. These days I don’t have to threaten my students with older sister style retribution to show up to class 😁
My sister is actually a scientist, very high level one. I think he saw that amazing Big Career potential, just in the wrong daughter.
At the end of his own career dad was teaching the thing he loved most in the world. Showing that also those who can do, teach. By all accounts he loved it and was so good at it he won awards. Maybe the rogue apple wasn’t trying to fall as far from the tree as he thought it was. I wish he could have seen me teach. I know he would have breathed a sigh of relief. Because what he wanted was his daughters to reach all of their potential, not limited by their sex. And if he’d seen me in action he would have seen that in my own way, that’s what I do. Even if it doesn’t involve thwarting any professional gender stereotypes.