Growing up with a massive age gap between my older sister/cousins and I meant that I was exposed to a lot of things that other kids my age were not used to.  While other kids would watch cartoons on Nickelodeon, I was watching Claire Danes and Jared Leto hook up on My So-Called Life.  My 6-year old self would scream along to the angsty tunes of Alanis Morissette and No Doubt, while my peers were listening to… I don’t even know what they were listening to.

“It’s my life, don’t you forget!”, I would yell at the top of my lungs, not really knowing why or what Gwen Stefani was singing about.  I vaguely remember screaming that to my parents when they tried to ground me.  A 6-year old pointing an accusatory finger at her parents who stared back in utter disbelief?  Not exactly model child behaviour.

I clearly recall my mother being slightly upset that I was mindlessly singing along to all these songs… and it wasn’t just music, I was not spared from “corruption” in the visual department either.  There was many a time where I would stumble into school, bleary-eyed, because I had stayed up late to watch Ally McBeal the previous night.  I would excitedly tell my poor unsuspecting schoolmates about the latest sexploits on the show, wondering why others weren’t watching the same shows as I was.

This trend followed me to high school, where my friends would be swapping their Linkin Park CD’s, as I offered to lend my limited edition The Clash: London Calling CD set to an uninterested audience.

Don’t get me wrong, I still listened to music and watched shows that were generationally appropriate—I was just fortunate enough to have older relations who broadened my spectrum of interest… and I will be forever grateful to them for that:)

Do you have anything to be eternally grateful to your older siblings/relatives for?