Beatings make Little Darling

As I drove home from work today I drifted back to my childhood. It was a time when I was always right and quick to shoot down others’ opinions on things. Not much has changed since then. However, in those days there was a price to pay for being a potty mouth. That price wasn’t grounding or time out, as they do today, but rather the good old fashioned trouncing.

My mother has always been a firm believer in that portentous line from The Scripture, ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’. For those who are not au fait with the phrase, it basically means that when your child has done wrong, make him repent with a series of high pitched yells. And boy, did she take that line to heart. For mom, that was her cue to re-enact some of Tyson’s finest moments.

Initially I would get minor treatment for having constant opinions but I soon learned the tricks of the trade. When I fell to the floor pretending to be paralysed, she’d normally stop. Moments later, my room would be filled with roars of laughter coming from yours truly. What I didn’t see approaching was that the older I go, the more valid her licence became to thrash my hind quarters. That would normally end with me talking in tongues, vowing never to do whatever it was that I’d done. Needless to say the next week I’d do it all over again.

When I reached high school, I realised I had legs that sprinter faster than hers, so I used that to my advantage. If I saw a hammering coming, I’d bolt for the door and take off in the direction that had the longest straights. It was no secret that I could run faster, but mom smartened up and found ways to get around her son who had suddenly discovered that he had a fondness for athletics.

One particular day I’d let my delinquent ways get the better of me. According to memory, it had something to do with escaping the school premises without consent. Nowadays they call this bunking. Anyway, mom heard of my Houdini tendencies and planned an ambush on me – an assault of such relentlessness that it left me breathless.........