Highly symbolic childhood experiences

When I learned to walk, my parents decided to put up a barrier at the foot of the stairs so I wouldn't go up them and fall down. I found this hideous. To be fair, they were probably pretty wise in doing this, since before I was 10 I had fallen down the stairs 2 or 3 times (without breaking anything or sustaining brain damage.. or at least that's what they tell me).
The first day, I glared at the barrier whenever I saw it.
The second day, I went up to it and gazed up the stairs longingly.
The third day, I tore it down in a rage and triumphantly ascended the stairs, shouting "up! Up! UP!" at the top of my lungs.

When I learned to walk, my parents too put a barrier, specifically a gate, in front of the stairs. It was an especially dangerous stairway, as the steps had no back, so I was liable to simply fall through them. But, being a crafty little bastard, I soon figured out how to unlatch this horrific impedance. So they started tightening it with a wrench so that I wouldn't be able to undo it, and they put the wrench on top of the TV, where I couldn't reach it.

So one day, while my mother was reading the newspaper in the living room, I went sneakily about in front of her while she pretended not to notice me. I made a sort of stairway out of the drawers of the dresser the TV stood on, climbed up, and snatched the wrench. I went running over to the gate, and looked at the wrench. I didn't really know what to do with it, so I simply waved it at the gate like a magic wand, and was mysteriously able to unlatch it and ascend with glee. My mother ran over to the stairs and asked,

"Where are you going?"

To which I responded,

"To London, to visit the Queen!"