The Real Ugly Truth

My mother has always been kind of a free spirit. She does deep breathing exercises, practices Buddhism, and practically swears by herbal tea. This attitude of hers lead her to make, and accept some pretty “eclectic” friends. When I was younger, my mom would have these friends over at the house all the time, one in particular. Her name was Gene. She was this massive black woman with a booming voice, and—as I had heard years later—quite a temper. (My father told me that she was arrested once for assaulting the local judge’s daughter with dinner plates. Charming.) Anyway, she would visit often and always make a scene about how “grown up” I was, or how “aDOOOHrable” I looked in a certain dress, etc. It was becoming too much to handle. So one day when I had caught wind that Gene was coming over to visit—again—I made the decision to rebel.

As Gene’s car pulled into the driveway, I ran inside, looking around desperately for a place to hide. I came into the living room where we had a big old-fashioned organ against the wall. Aha! I dropped to the floor and began to crawl over the pedals, making sure not to hit any of them and reveal myself. Once I was more or less comfortably concealed behind the organ, I began to listen for my mother. After a few minutes, the front door opened and the excited voices of my mom and her friend came tumbling into the living room. A beat of silence.

“ALEX!” my mother called for me. “COME SAY HELLO TO MS. GENE!”

I stayed stone still. Her voice lingered in the air as they waited for my reply. Obviously, it never came. Then, the real search began. My mother was up in arms, screaming for me. It was apparent that she was scared stiff. Soon, my dad, mom, Gene, and my sister were all running around the house looking for the M.I.A five-year-old. I knew I should have felt guilty, but I was actually very pleased with myself. I ended up staying behind the organ for about an hour until someone, Gene actually, had found me. I was immediately yanked from my hiding spot and passed to my mother, who hauled ass with me up the stairs to my room. After we were behind closed doors, she let me have it. It was the most traumatic experience of my life up to that point. Always having been a good kid, I never knew what it was like to get chewed out by your irate and recently scared-to-death mother. It wasn’t fun, I’ll tell you that.After my stern talking-to, I was marched back downstairs to make a formal apology to Gene. I was even forced into kissing her on the cheek. The horror.

All in all, it was not a successful ending to the day. However, everything up to that point was exhilarating; empowering, if you will. So, naturally, I got right back out there and found an even better hiding spot. It wasn’t because I was some demon child, or because I enjoyed scaring my mother, or that I was stupid. It was because I enjoyed pushing the limit, and also probably because I have never been good at associating consequences with actions.  So even though my mom, free spirit that she was, had put the fear of God into me that day, it didn’t stop me from continuing to act out. This leads me to the moral of the story: you should always beat your kids, because yelling at them doesn’t do a goddamned thing.