I hear someone calling my name. The voice is familiar to me,
because it belongs to my mother. It is already well after sunset and I still
have not made up my mind to go home even though I know that it will mean
trouble for me when I get there. Without fail, my mother will shout out my name
because even though I am not home, where I am playing with my friends is well
within view of home and she can make out my silhouette in the dusky light.
Sometimes, she will send my goody-too-shoes sister to call me home. She is such
a butt-kisser, always doing what she is told and being a good little girl. I
get so much flak because of her.
“I’m coming!” I shout back, annoyed to no end to have to
leave the fun I am having. I know I’m going to get a hiding and the thought
just makes me want to postpone getting home even more. As I make my way, I look
around frantically for the mound of sand that represents good luck so that I
can scoop a handful, toss one or two small pellets into my mouth and swallow
them, while at the same time throwing the rest over my shoulder. I must take
care not to look over my shoulder once I have done it, otherwise it won’t work.
This is how it has been done for generations by kids like me, kids who get into
trouble because they push the boundaries and make their parents mad. There is
no such mound on that short path leading home. I can just imagine it, she will
ask me to go and break off the wet branch that will be used to deliver my
punishment. I will do it too, because if I don’t, then someone else will be
given the task of getting it and if it is any of my siblings, like my sister,
they will use this opportunity to even some score over a wrong I might have committed
against them sometime in the past. I refuse to cry. She will not know that it
hurts when she lashes me. I know this will earn me severe words from her mouth
as she beats me, but I am just stubborn like that. I have this belief that she
enjoys hitting me and I want to contribute as little as possible to that joy.
As I enter the kitchen where everyone is, waiting for dinner
to be ready so they can eat and then go about their business, I can just tell
by the way my sister looks at me that I am going to get it.
“How many times must I tell you not to play away from home
after sunset?” she starts, hollering her anger out at me. She is holding a
cooking spoon that she is using to stir the dinner that everyone is waiting for
with red eyes. The fact that she has to deal with the business of disciplining
me means that dinner will be delayed and my siblings hate me just about now. I
keep quiet, looking down at my feet. She goes on and on about what a
disobedient child I am, how I try her patience and how much she wishes I could
be more like my sister. My sister grins like a Cheshire cat at this part and
has a smug look on her face. I wish I was a twin. Somehow I have myself
convinced that if I had a twin, she would be just like me in every way and we
would both be in trouble together, consoling each other after all the lashings.
I am told to go get the stick that will mete out my punishment this night.
Dutifully, I turn on my heels and walk out of the kitchen
and head for the vegetable garden, where there are peach trees and a few apple
trees. There is also an apricot tree. I am not sure which tree to pick my cane
from. They all look especially green and have fat branches that could do some
damage. I head for the apricot tree, as it usually has thin branches of all the
tree types there. I pick a long one, even though I know that that one will
bring even more pain because it will curve with my legs as it makes contact
with them. I am trying to impress my mother with how I pick the stick;
hopefully she will not give me too many strokes. I haven’t realized that, my
picking a good lashing stick is a sign of my insolence in her eyes. I haven’t
realized too, that my not crying when she hits me is another sign of my being
bad to the core in her eyes. She probably wonders what she did to deserve a
child such as me. The way she gets so mad at me, I can see her shaking from the
force of her anger. Even taking my time to come back does not seem to give her
enough time to dilute her anger but it is always my hope.
I re-enter the kitchen and she is ready for me. She is done
cooking and my other siblings, which includes my cousins, are cowering away in
a corner. They don’t want to get hit by mistake when those blows get delivered.
My sister on the other hand, wants front row seats to my humiliation. She wants
to bear witness to the many times our mother has had to discipline me because I
am such a disobedient child. We have a dining room set with 4 chairs and a
table. During dinner, some of us sit at the table while others will sit on the
bench, which is the only other piece of furniture besides the cupboards. Those
who sit on the bench use their laps as tables to put the hot plates of food and
we do what we can to shift these plates so that they don’t burn the same area
for too long. My sister always sits at the table, ‘because she is older and she
behaves’ while my younger brother is happy to sit on the bench because he eats
with difficulty if he is seated at the table as he is still small and reaching
his plate can be a challenge when he is sitting on the chair so he ends up
eating while standing. One of the older cousins also sits at the table, so only
the other cousin, the same age as me, sits with me and my little brother on the
bench. My little brother is the only boy so he often gets special treatment.
She delivers these blows while I dance around the room
because as much as I won’t let myself cry, each blow hurts and causes me to
involuntarily lift the leg that receives the hardest blow and so the other leg
gets it and I lift that one and because I cannot float, the previously lifted
leg then goes down and gets hit. All of them find my dance-like actions
amusing, but they won’t dare openly giggle, except my sister ‘the good one’. Sometimes
this is how sibling rivalry is born. Other times perhaps it is caused by
something else. Eventually, I cry and run outside to get away from the hitting.
She might decide to follow me and hit me some more or she lets me go.
We live right above a ravine and so we are close
to the place where our neighbors disappear when they answer nature’s less
liquid call. I then head down the ravine and stay there for as long as my
nerves can take it to see if she will be sorry and come for me. At this time, I
am desperate for a show of affection because I feel hated. Of course I will get
a fright at any and every noise around me because I am fearful. I end up
having to crawl back home with my tail between my legs because my plan has not
worked and I don’t have the guts to hold out. I am convinced that my mother
hates me. As much as I want to turn my nose up at her dinner, I can’t because
all that running and jumping around I have been doing all afternoon has made me
hungry and the smell of food makes the pangs even worse. I take my plate and
sit outside to eat, not wanting any consolation from my more sympathetic
siblings. I don’t even want it from my sister. At this point, I don’t want to
be consoled even by my mother. I hate all of them. I wish myself away from
there. I wish I was a powerful witch that could make bad things happen. After
I’m done eating, I wash my dish and put it away. For a few days after this
episode, I will do my best to be obedient and come home on time, but soon the
pain will be forgotten and I will be back in the same situation again.
