UNJUSTLY PUNISHED

Jenny enjoyed hearing Mother and Daddy tell about things that happened during their childhood. Some of this was way back in the late 1800’s, and when Jenny compared it to the arid, dusty, grayer, browner world of the 1930’s, she thought that their lives must have been far different from hers. Crops and gardens grew in abundance, colors were brighter, the earth was rich and fertile, and every day must have been exciting. Children were polite and obeyed their parents, people dressed in wonderful clothing, there were many brothers and sisters, and a child never felt lonely. Some things were worse though, and the bad things along with the good things, gave an interesting texture to the stories her parents now told.

“Tell about the time you got a spanking because of the fan,” Jenny would beg her Mother, following her around the kitchen while she cooked dinner, or cleaned the house, or tended the fire.

“When I was 5 years old I had a beautiful fan. It was the only pretty thing I had that was all mine. It unfolded to show a picture of a pretty little girl with bright flowers all around her. When I fanned with it , I felt a pleasant cool breeze on my face. My oldest sister, Ada, who was 6 years older than I was, had a friend named Caroline over to visit one hot summer day. I was unfolding and admiring the fan, and Caroline grabbed it and said that now it was her fan and she was going to take it home with her. I said she couldn’t have my fan and started to cry and chased her around the room trying to get the fan back. When my Mother heard the fuss I was making, she said I shouldn’t be noisy and rude to guests, and she turned me over her knee and gave me a hard spanking. Some of the other children snickered behind their hands and I went into a dark corner and sobbed for a long time. “

“Did Caroline take the fan home with her?”

“No, she didn’t , but after that, I couldn’t look at my fan without thinking about the spanking and feeling that I was a bad child.”

“But that wasn’t fair. I wish she would have spanked that mean old Caroline.”

“No, it wasn’t fair, but my Mother was so busy she didn’t think she had time to ask any questions.”

“Didn’t she care about how you felt?”

“She cared a lot more about what other people might say about how she was raising her children.”


“Are you still mad at her?”

“No. She did so many other good things that I forgave her, but I will never forget that unfair spanking.”
Jenny was glad Mother wasn’t like this. Once, when Jenny was four, Mother was reading the newspaper, and everything was so quiet that Jenny went over to her Mother and screamed in her ear. Mother gave her a stinging slap on the face and said, “Don’t you ever scream in anyone’s ear. It might break their ear drum or cause them to go deaf.” A few tears came into Jenny’s eyes. Although she hadn’t meant to do any harm, she now felt very foolish and knew she deserved this slap. It took her by complete surprise and was the only time Mother had ever punished her.

Dad too, remembered something worse than this from his boyhood. His parents had a large family of 4 girls and 6 boys. They lived in poverty on a neglected farm. As soon as the boys were old enough to do farm work, his father put them to work in the barn and in the fields and he dressed in his good suit and retired to the living room where he sat around and read all day. That was what boys were for. You put them to work so you could live a life of ease. Jenny’s Dad was the second oldest son, and by the time he was 14, he had learned the rudiments of farm work and handling the farm animals.
Most of Dad’s narratives were told over the dinner and supper tables.

“Tell us about that beating your father gave you,” Jenny and Margaret would say. This was one of their favorites.

“When I was about 14,” Dad began, “I was plowing in the north forty. It was a fine summer morning, and I thought if I plowed 2 more rounds, I could get finished by dinner. I was hungry and my stomach was growling, but it was cloudy and I couldn’t see the sun, so it seemed earlier to me than it was. I thought I had plenty of time and that my father would be so surprised and proud of me because I had gotten it done so fast. When I brought the horses in to the tank by the barn, my father was there waiting for me.

’Young man,’ he said, ‘You're an hour late. Just what have you been doing?’

‘I’ve just been workin’ my butt off, that’s what, while you’ve been sittin’ around on yours.' Then my father said, ‘Don’t you be insolent with me. I’ll teach you a lesson.‘

He was getting madder all the time and then he picked up a stick from the ground and beat me unmercifully across the back and shoulders.’

‘You can just go without your dinner, too.’"

Jenny’s Dad never forgot nor forgave his unjust punishment. Though he was always dutiful toward his father, after this he could feel neither respect nor affection for him.

Jenny felt certain that Dad would never punish her unfairly. She had only gotten one paddling from him. When she was five, one long winter evening she sassed him on purpose just to see if he really would paddle her as he had Margaret the times she sassed him back. He turned her across his knee and paddled her with the back of the hairbrush, but not very hard. Jenny knew she had that coming to her.