I was born on Monday while my father was playing golf. He was always proud to tell him that. My father was a salesman. My mother was a domestic economic expert and a secret industrialist. I can still see two of them dancing to Que Sera Sera across the tarpaulin floor of our recently built suburban house. They go through the moon landing, Camelot, free love, breaking the genetic code. From my point of view on the stairs between the balustrades, I saw the coup in the gender gap and the "hug and influence" of the Cultural Revolution.

"What do you want to be when Patricia grows up?" The question was $ 64,000 in my childhood. I always wanted to respond to "How should I know, hell, I'm six years old," but I caught myself and smiled at how little girls were expected to do. I remember admiring this strange concept of being "what" I want to be. How was that possible? I could not control what I ate, wore, or even when I went to sleep. I and my mother were in constant conflict on bulging sleeves, floral overalls, leather patent shoes. How can I dictate my future?

I realized now that asking this question in the late 1960s put me at the forefront of social change. In 1968, there were 28.7 million women in the labor force, most of whom were trustees, beggars and printing. Most of the workers were clerics, female conscripts, domestic workers and cooks. But the young women entered the joint labor force in large numbers. They were getting college degrees and enrolling in graduate school the fastest pace in history and their expectations for the future are changing. Suddenly women were able to seek jobs in business and management as never before.

So, I was a little girl at a time of radical transformation that was ideally captured in a small talk about mothers having lunch at Messi or on line at the bakery. Unfortunately, my father did not treat me differently than my brothers. The owner of a small company, he did not see the sex lines. The women ran his office and my mother ran his books. I remember him telling me over and over again that there was nothing I could not do, if I decided. His other famous speech was "Finding a Slot in Life". This was important to him. You may not always get what you want --- and you may not always want to get what you get --- but my parents felt it was important that you share your claim in the world and stick to it.

My Irish grandmother repeated this idea of   self-determination, which I remember sitting on the beach of the Warren Hotel in Spring Lake, New Jersey, with High Ball declaring that this was the greatest country in the world. He had no knowledge or care that the drinks that are brought by the hotel staff actually cost my parents money. For his part, my father confirmed this American idea as the land of abundance and never told the "pop" that the drinks were not free.

My mother was a housewife. All the mothers of my friends were housewives. They were wonderful women, but I could not imagine making a home and taking on children like us. So I dreamed of being a diamond trader like my father's friend Reed Haberman or selling head pork like Neil Drage who owned the largest red and red truck I've ever seen - full of a giant pig's head drawn on one side.

I got a moment of "I want to be a hostess" that my American grandmother made me promise not to express again. "Tell me you want to be a pilot!" She said with her eyes wide open and her hands pressing hard on my shoulder. Prospects to become a business tycoon, an international spy, and even an astronaut. There was no reason at all for not being able to go anywhere the girl had gone before.

Then there was the year I wanted to be a nun. Outside the vows of poverty, dress, veils and dress - I felt that I could do it. The idea of   sitting around elegant wooden tables and Entenmann's Coffee Cake was very appealing. The nuns at my school painted a peaceful and promising portrait of mankind. It was quite different from the angry playground at St. Paul's. Margaret's School where you routinely disavowed the unwillingness of Bay City Rollers. "I told you she was obsessed," said Dianne Cavanagh, wearing the folds of her narrow school leaning on her knees. I did not have any time for a foreign band in funny pants and knee socks. I had to know what I wanted to be.

The cognitive and intellectual development was developed during the rainy summer afternoon during the Candyland ™ and Kerplunk ™ marathon sessions, sitting in Indian style on the floor of the garage. As I was riding my banana seat bike up and down Sandra Lane, a quiet street, surrounded by a few New York suburbs, I found myself at a socio-political crossroads in America. I was "band moud" and soda-free. I was five easy pieces, 60 minutes, Fleetwood Mac and Aretha Franklin. I was intentional and challenging, unlike me and not in line with everything, was a child in my custody.

I was not aware of what was happening in the world at that time, but I knew there was a terrible war. I remember my grandmother's neighbor in Long Island and the ill-fated morning when three men with the flag rolled up their front steps. Their eldest son had just left for Vietnam. His name was John. The fire was small arms. He was 20 years old, and I could still see his picture on the living-room wall to the left of China's closet. I never saw this house the same way again. Years later, I'm still thinking of John and I have overlooked the hedge. What did he want to be, when he grew up?

The truth is that life takes us on its way. Robert Burns famously wrote on the mouse:

The best plans were developed from mice and men
I go a lot deviant,
Leaving only sorrow and pain,
For the promised joy!
I'm still Mubarak, compared to me!
The present holds only.

The poem is a famous apology to the mouse that the writer loves while plowing a field. Burns believes in the end that the mouse has an easier life. He lives at the present time, while humans are a continuum connected to all things past. We are derived from our collective consciousness, intentional or unintended. The mouse did not have to suffer during the days before the Pocket PC and smartphone. Did not wrestle with shoulder pads and disco. He was obsessed with the Cold War, Johnstown, Charles Manson, and Sam's son. In the midst of turmoil and chaos in the field, the mouse never asked what he wanted.

I am now sounding like my six year old self asking my grandmother what he was like before cars. When you arrived in New York from Ireland, you did not check Car Fax to get the best deal on Tesla or wait for Uber's freshly traveled trip to the Boarding House. She was trying to sneak smoothly into the inner life of Green Horn. She was grateful for her lack of notice and satisfaction at their lack of distinction. At the age of 19, I was still making a decision to specialize in my college, while working in a ship across the Atlantic - in the hope that the world would be brighter on the other side.

When I look at the human presence through her eyes and the pure weight of those transformative choices that are often when our appearance on the wall, she realizes that they are the most important things. My grandmother, my mother, my aunt and all the women in my younger life did not have the luxury of endless choices and neutral gender aspirations. They were the occasional humanitarian and feminist activists who believed "whatever they are, they will be", systematically removing conventions, restrictions, restrictions, and heavy chaos in the past. From feminine charm to girl tattooing with tattoos ... these were the days of our lives. We've come a long way, have not we?