THAT DON'T HURT

 3889

Tonight, I was reflecting back on an experience from a very long time ago. (Can it be almost 70 years)?

 

I was seven or eight at the time, I suppose, and even then, I was quite a character. I presume my elementary teacher had said something about the way different substances burn, or I had watched a program on the subject on our 1950’s era black & white television with the rabbit ears antennas on top.

 

I have no idea what my parents were up to at the time, but I recall reaching into the kitchen closet one day, and pulling out a plastic bottle of alcohol, and a box of those long phosphorus tipped matches. Then, I opened one of the doors below the kitchen sink and grabbed an aluminum pie plate.

 

Walking out to the utility room, I set my unlikely treasures onto the washing machine. Now, I unscrewed the alcohol lid, and poured a few ounces of the clear liquid into the aluminum pan. (I recall my dad always pronounced this word as “alunimum." Do you recall this Wayne, Brent and Linda)?

 

At any rate, I was compelled to see what happened when alcohol burned. (Evidently, I realized that alcohol possessed different qualities than gasoline, and wasn’t explosive…. thankfully for me). Now, I pulled a red-tipped match from its sturdy box, struck it on the black side panel, and dropped it into the pan.

 

A beautiful blue flame danced along the surface of the flammable liquid. I had never seen anything quite like it. Like my own personal aurora. It was then I heard the back door open. And as you might imagine, the sound, (and the impeding trouble which came with it) startled me.

 

My left hand had been resting near the pie plate, and now I involuntarily bumped against it. The flaming alcohol spread across the surface of the washing machine, and poured down its sides!

Pt. 2

 

I was totally unprepared for this development, and didn’t have any idea what to do to remedy the catastrophe. Looking to my right I saw my father’s excited visage. He screamed as loud as I had ever heard him scream!

 

“Royce! What the h_ _ _ are you doing?”

 

Without waiting for a rhetorical answer, he continued to pummel me with decibels.

 

“Move outta my way!”

 

Now, daddy grabbed a throw rug on which I had been standing, and began to smother the flaming alcohol. First in one area, and then in another. He realized that slapping the fiery inferno with the rug would only spread it throughout the utility room, and potentially the entire house. (Had I been there alone, we might have lost our home).

 

Daddy spoke again. His initial shock and awe turned into resolve.

 

“Royce, what on earth were you thinking?”

 

(and)

 

“March yourself into your bedroom.”

 

And as he was mouthing the last couple of words, my father reached towards his waist, and stripped off his black leather belt.

Pt. 3

 

As I ran through the back door, it seemed the blood had drained from my mother’s face.

 

“Henry, what do you think you’re going to do?”

 

As daddy rushed past her, he responded to her question.

 

“Erma, that son of yours was playing with alcohol and matches in the utility room. He came close to burning the house down!”

 

Daddy was just steps behind me. I had already assumed the “grab your knees and grit your teeth” position. There could be little doubt about the fate which awaited me. I think it was the first time he ever applied the ultimate penalty to my hinder parts.

 

Now, my father wound up like a major league pitcher, and brought “Old Glory” down on my rear end. Talking about Old Glory, I could see the stars and feel the stripes! And now, once again, that old belt performed the second of the two things which belts do best. And then, a third whack!

 

Just as my dad was about to give me a couple more pops for good measure, I turned my head to the right, and exclaimed,

 

“That don’t hurt!”

 

Daddy paused in mid swing.

 

“What did you say?”

 

I repeated myself.

 

“I said ‘That don’t hurt!’”

 

Suddenly, that old black leather belt fell from my father’s hand, and lay crumpled on my bedroom floor. Without another word, my father turned, and walked away.

Afterward

 

I don’t recall a second infraction (well, let me retract that statement), but I don’t recall a second, third or fourth “whoopin” with that thick black strip of cow hide.

 

I never did give my father the satisfaction of saying,

 

“Well, honestly, in retrospect those three licks hurt ‘like you know what,’ daddy!”

 

But based on his inability to repeat that particular method of discipline, it was obvious it hurt him more than it hurt me.

by William McDonald, PhD