I have literally grown up watching this series. My first tryst with The Wonder Years was incidentally when I was about 12, at that time we used to rely on one sole channel for all English series, viz; Star TV. 4 PM every Tuesday was my date with the cute Kevin Arnold. I used to think, although we are in different continents altogether how well I can relate to his character (I am a girl). There are so many instances where I have seen myself in Kevin.
I still remember this one episode (partly because I watched it’s re-run on Zee Café) where Karen, Kevin’s elder sister is about to leave home to go off to college. It is Karen’s 16th birthday and she is going away to college that year. Her father is a possessive dad and is against her going away. She is just days away from going to college and her family wants to spend sometime with her on her birthday. Although Karen and her father are not talking to each other anymore, yet her father arranges for her birthday party and her mother bakes her cake. It is close to midnight and Karen’s family gathers, lights go off and candles are lit on her cake. Kevin and elder brother Wayne present their gifts, her mother is coaxing Karen to cut the cake, her friends have arrived is honking as signal for her to come out of home. The quiet father who refuses to let her little girl go away offer her a birthday gift. It is his old jacket that he used to wear for good luck. This jacket was a sign of approval for her going away.
Kevin who is about 12 years old narrates the entire sequence to us. He tells us about the turmoil their parents are going through, since their first born is about to leave home forever. That night when Karen left with her friends to celebrate her birthday, her father kept looking out of the window, anxious to know if his little girl is doing okay. That night her father kept the porch light on, so that when his daughter returns, she does not stumble upon anything.
It’s been eight years since I have been away from home. I was Karen when I left home; I never spoke to dad much. But after all these years everything he had done makes sense and I think to myself, maybe my dad still keeps a light on for me. Buried in layers of years and distance maybe I am still his little princess.
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