CRITICISM VS DISCIPLINE
Sometimes we live through
situations that take years to sort out, at least that’s what I’ve been
thinking. We make decisions in the heat of the moment that prove to be good or
bad only in the playing out of events over time. I’ve been thinking of my
parents and the way I was brought up. In particular the mistakes they made.
This will undoubtedly sound as criticism in spite of the fact that I think my
parents did the best they could, that they loved us children and tried to be
good parents to me and my brothers and sister. My mother in particular made
many sacrifices for us. I could write a book about how much I owe her.
ALONE AND LONELY WITH MY FAMILY
An incident when I was
maybe 10 years old started this line of thought. My mother, sister, and I often
visited my mother’s family and took dinner with them on Sundays. Grandma
Shumpert was always old and walked like she endured pain in her hips. Living
with her were two unmarried daughters and an unmarried son, all of them complex
if not inscrutable characters.
On this particular day, we
sat at the dinner table, but I didn’t take food on my plate because of a
stomach problem of some kind, don’t remember what exactly, which my mother knew
about. Somebody pressed a dish, say beans, on me and I said something to the
effect that I couldn’t eat beans. My uncle took offense, said if I couldn’t eat
food his mother had prepared for me I shouldn’t be at the table. I hadn’t meant
that I didn’t want the food or that it was unpalatable. I meant I had a stomach
ache, and I waited for my mother to explain. Silences at our tables were
common, but this one was loaded with enmity. That my mother didn’t defend me
left me alone, as if she too thought I shouldn't be at the table whatever the condition of my stomach.
If my uncle ever said anything else to me the many times I
was in his home, I don’t remember it. Though he's long since deceased, he’s still something of an enigma to me,
a stranger who didn’t befriend me in spite of the many times I was briefly in
his presence. He didn’t stay in the house when we visited nor did he have
conversations with my mother. He used to sit outside under the shelter of the
tool shed on a tree trunk stool most of the time and smoked. He was short
with receding hair. Never married. I have no clue what he thought about
anything. He seemed to avoid not just me but all of us children, but got along
well with Grandma (who’s another story). If he had an emotional life, I have no
clue to what it was. Others of the family have said he worked hard as a farmer
especially after my grandfather died. I haven’t thought of it before, but he
was the only man in a house with three women, only one of whom worked, and she
was a beautician. In those days, my aunt worked in another woman’s salon and
made $.50 tips. My uncle must have provided the resources they all lived on.
Anyway, back to parenting,
in particular that of my parents. In terms of discipline, my father took the
switch to me. Once I was sent to a bush in the yard to pick the switch he used
on me. My mother used the fly swat. But they were not strict with me nor with
my brothers and sister. I can’t remember them ever punishing any of my siblings
with switches or the fly swat. Maybe I was the incorrigible child. My mom once
said that she could hardly punish my younger brother David because my sister
cried more than he did.
EVERYTHING CHANGES, EVEN THE PAST
It’s only come to my
attention years after the fact that we four children had different experiences
in our family. Each of us had unique relationships with our parents. It’s
almost as if we developed in different worlds. Perhaps I’ve suppressed some
memories that have been coming back to me. In particular, the time David ran
away from home. I’d never seen my mother so distraught.
David got into a dispute
with my father, I don’t remember what it was about, but by the time he was in
high school he was expected to mess up, regardless of what he did. Anyway, my
father ordered David off the place. And he left. We heard he went to Florida.
My mother wanted to go after him, but what could she do? How could she find a
runaway? She couldn’t even drive. She was furious with our father. My brother
eventually returned. It must have been an edgy time for both him and my father.
Just because I had a
reasonably happy childhood in our family didn’t mean that my brothers and
sister did. It’s taken me years to realize this. What’s more, though my eyes
saw as a child, I didn’t comprehend what was going on. David’s experience in
particular has been a closed door to me for years. I can only guess at what my
older brother and younger sister experienced in our family.
ZERO IS NO NAME FOR A KID
The thought at the bottom
of all this rambling is that I hope I haven’t made some of the mistakes my
parents made. In particular, I hope I didn’t mistake criticism for discipline.
For whatever reason, my
older brother took sinister amusement in David. He mocked him for sucking his
thumb. Ridiculed his athletic attempts. He could always find some reason to
make fun of David, who was “Cotton Top” as a kid and graduated to “Zero,” after
a brainless character in the Sad Sack comics. The label stuck and many people
called him “Zero.”
My father didn’t protect
David from his older brother’s derision. In fact, he seemed to ignore it. I
have to wonder if my older brother was acting out some hostility my father
couldn’t or wouldn’t express.
My mother was exasperated
by my older brother’s conduct and sharply criticized him, but in spite of all
that she said, he continued to belittle David. So it was that my older brother
came in for badgering and criticism with no clear direction that he was wrong
to treat David the way he did. To this day, he has no idea of the hurt he
inflicted on his brother.
The result has been that
David has had to get away from his older brother to have any self-respect. He
lives far away and I hope he’s happy. My older brother is as much a victim of
the family dynamic as is David. He’s lost a brother he loves, and, in many respects, it’s the fault of our parents. It would break my mother’s heart to read what I’ve
just written, and I couldn’t have written it if she were still alive. My father
would be hurt, but he’d think I had it wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment