Some months ago, one of my island cousins shared a pic with the rest of us on What’sApp about being a wooden spoon survivor. While I was not a wooden spoon victim as a child, I can fully appreciate the creativity of mothers, particularly black mothers when it came to driving the point home during a spanking. Of course you’ve heard comedians over the years sharing the rhythmic commentary that accompanied the whacks and the crowd’s raucous laughter from having heard that song in their own home. That may have actually been the original rap when you think about it. Yet I digress –
I only received three spankings that I can remember as a child. They were all administered by my mom and truth be told they were all hilarious – at the time — because of her method and selected Weapons of Mama Destruction.
The first was just straight hand to the rump. It was the afternoon of my graduation from kindergarten. I was four years old. (They let me attend school early because I had a late birthday and my dad put on the serious campaign.)
We were having a graduation party of course! We always had parties. The ceremony had been splendid. My best friend Leslie Alexander and I were the class secretary and treasurer respectively alongside the two cutest guys in class who were the president and vice president. (Don’t think I don’t want to say something about woman power and why couldn’t we have been in charge right here but… it was 1963)
The four of us “class officers” all had speaking parts during the graduation.
I had on my first fabulous cap and gown. My hair was all abuzz with Shirley Temple curls and my dress was simply stunning – chock full of crinoline! So when we got home from the school, all of my mom and dad’s friends and my aunts and uncles and cousins and godmothers and… well, just everybody was at our house and the food and beverages were flowing but I didn’t have any friends there. Hmmm. What could I do to remedy that?
I was at the front door with the screen door open communicating with my friends from the block about when I could ditch this party and get outside to play and WHAM! While the front end of me was talking, my story was rapidly changing to “I don’t think I can come outside now” as my mom was handling my back end.
Yes, she was doing it in a rhythmic way.
Did/n’t/I/tell/you/to/stay/in/this/house?!!
Point taken. I stayed in the house. No tears! The crinoline absorbed the shock. Frankly, I was a little embarrassed at being spanked at my own party.
My second WMD encounter happened a few years later, around age seven or eight. We had moved to another location and at this house my mom had flower beds everywhere around our yard.
The backyard in particular was bordered with every manner of roses. The other beds contained things I can’t pronounce but know when I see them. Further in the back there was a good climbing apple tree and right next to the entrance to the back porch there was a bed of daisies. Hundreds of them were squeezed in there together right under the window of the breakfast nook which looked out onto the backyard.
It was a pretty hot summer that year in Cleveland – well, the two weeks of the year we actually have summer. I was chilling in the middle of the grass in my wading pool which someone had been kind enough to fill for me. One of my
“cousins” was over. (We weren’t actually related but our mothers were friends so that’s just how it happens. It’s easier to call somebody a cousin than it is to explain the rest. Also, I’ll be honest, I didn’t necessarily consider them my friend because there was always some manner of trouble when we were together including the time they purposely dropped my dog off of the top bunk bed at their house instead of placing the animal in my waiting arms. This day would be no different, though I will admit, it was my idea from the beginning.)
While lazing in the pool, I noticed the daisies over there and mused about how pretty a few of them would look floating on the water. So, I went over there, plucked off a few heads and they did look rather nice in the pool. Well, a few more and a few more and I had help… about this time my mom drove up in her minty green rambler convertible that she had recently bought for $50. (I swear she never ever put the top down and we only had the car for about six months. She was one of the original Ohio non-drivers.) She parked the car, smiled and waved at us when she walked past us and went into the back porch door.
About two minutes passed and I heard an audible gasp through the window of the breakfast nook then a flurry of furious mom was coming through the porch door, scooping up a handful of daisy stems on the way to the pool and WHAM!
In case you’ve never been spanked with daisy stems, they’re actually too short to really hurt and the daisy heads and the water in the pool protected me from any potential injury. The big difference here is my mom didn’t spank my “cousin” unlike getting into trouble at their house where the mom and big sister there always capitalized on the opportunity to lay hands on me. Needless to say, I always protested visiting. I cannot say I’m sorry we lost touch over the years. Where this situation is concerned though, the spanking was nothing compared to how many times she lamented aloud over the loss of daisies when we came into the driveway to see just a sea of green stems as a reminder of my folly. Ugh! When I reached my teens, the idea of hearing about something repeatedly often made me wish spanking was on the agenda instead just to kill the conversation.
The last WMD encounter I had was around age 11.
My dad’s aunt had given my mom some bracelets way back when they all lived in New York. They were two bangles and my mom always said she was holding them for me. One day she actually let me wear one along with my other bracelets I had been collecting. Of course, during our visit with friends all of the preteen girls got together and did what we usually did which was to admire each other’s jewelry and yes – make some trades. She had said they were mine after all.
It wasn’t until the middle of the night, in the middle of a sleepover with me and about three friends camped out in sleeping bags on the living room floor that my mom realized the bracelet hadn’t been returned when she heard from her friend about the trade. I actually laughed when she woke me up with a two belt whacks asking about the bracelet. I think it was hysterical laughter. This was my first belt encounter and the sleeping bag was a great buffer. Three spankings and no scars – very fortunate!
Now years later, without my mom here anymore, I put myself into her shoes and realized that even as I explained the trading, it must have been very hurtful to her that I had given away something obviously sentimental to her in exchange for a piece of jewelry that didn’t mean much to either of us. This was just plain my fault totally and while my mom forgave me, it took me a while to forgive myself.
I guess that last spanking wasn’t so funny after all.