morality

some of the memories that i have of visiting my grandpa & grandma's
house were of the childhood spankings that were sometimes unavoidable
by my dad. grandpa was a gentle man, at least toward us as he was well
up in age by the time of my collective memories. grandma was as nice as
any grandma could ever be, and one or the other would always take up
for us and say "Now Charlie, you shouldn't hit those babies". sometimes
he would listen, but sometimes he would just say that we were
his kids, and if we needed a whipping, he would give
us one. and one we got. over, and over, and over again until we were
just too big anymore. many whippings were born of just plain anger, and
the receiving end of one was not a good place to be.

i will not go any further into how this affected us psychologically,
all of us in different ways, but it definitely had an effect on our
personalities. it's perhaps one of the biggest reasons that i chose not
to whip my children. so much for the violence begets violence theory,
which usually does hold true.

i also recall a particular incident in which i probably needed some
sort of behavior adjustment and didn't get it;...i was standing in
front of the television program of something that my uncle, my dad's youngest
brother, really wanted to watch( i wanted to watch something else) and
no matter how much he pleaded, i wouldn't get out of the way, so he
asked grandma to make me move. my dad, being the short tempered sort
that he always was, overheard and chased his own brother out of the
house with a hammer and down the street. it's a good thing he could run
faster. later, after things calmed down, we all had to load up in the
car and go looking for him, i felt so bad for him because of my
mischievousness, that i still haven't forgotten it. i loved my grandpa
and grandma, they were such a positive influence on our lowly lives.

moral of this story? don't hit your babies, it hurts more than you will ever know, and you will learn to regret it in the end.