Your story from Ben, entitled Life with the Turners, reminded me of my own childhood. I grew up in New Jersey, and my mom and dad were pretty damn cool. I got a good allowance, I had a lot of freedom and I could always count on them to back me up. However, even though my parents were – and still are – cool, I still got spanked from time to time. It was the 60s and 70s, after all!
The issue that got me in most trouble was my reluctance to shave my face in my early and middle teens. I hated the feeling of the blade on my face and I hated razor rash. My mom thought that a young man with just a few whiskers should shave regularly to ’help them grow in’ and we butted heads over this. Eventually, when I was 14, Mom gave me an ultimatum – shave every Sunday evening, and if I didn’t, she would spank me on Monday morning.
I took this as a challenge and figured she was bluffing – but I was wrong. At 6am the next Monday, Mom woke me up with my dad’s razor strop in her hand and told me to get into position. I obeyed and she gave me 14 swats on my bare butt. It was painful – but I still refused to shave.
And so, the weekly spankings began. Every Sunday, I would refuse to shave, and the next day Mom would give me my age in swats with the strop across my bare bottom. My first period class on a Monday was American History with Miss Benjamin, who one week, to my complete embarrassment, she noticed that I was squirming in my seat ‘like you’re sitting on a nest of fire ants’. She ordered me to sit still and believe me, both sets of cheeks were blushing!
Even during summer vacation, Mom kept up this battle. We took a two-week vacation to France and I have a vivid memory of sitting on my burning butt, eating a croissant in the breakfast room of the hotel.
I turned 15 and I kept up this disobedience. Even when I turned 16. Then one day I found a cute girl who begged me to shave off my scrappy beard. So I did – and the spankings stopped!
Now, Mom and I are both stubborn as mules and I would be willing to bet she would otherwise have kept up these punishments until I was 25 – she’d have been calling me at college and threatening me with the strop!
So, you see, Ben wasn’t alone in facing weekly strappings!
Contributor: Brian