by Grace Brackenridge
I close the front door behind me.
"What was that all about?" asks my matronly mother.
"Oh, that spanking thing? I was trying to help little Ashley and her folks make a decision. I'll tell you this and it's no lie. Thirteen years old is definitely not too old for spankings."
"So you actually went through with it?" asks Mom, sitting down on the couch. "I made a pot of chamomile tea. Like some?"
"Please, with sugar. And yes, we went through with it."
I sit next to her, wincing slightly. She leans over the coffee table to pour the tea.
"Well," she says cheerfully, "were you able to convince Ashley to taste a little of the fruit from the spanking tree? Did she participate in your little demo?"
"Mr. Almond gave Ashley a good, hard one. We told Ashley that her dad would only spank her for a short trial period. But I don't think that genie is going back in the bottle."
"So you think Mr. Almond will keep on spanking Ashley?"
"Yes, it's inevitable. Mr. Almond is way too good of a spanker to ever give up the spanking brush. Mom, can I ask you a question?"
"Sure," she says apprehensively. "Unless, of course, it's something that will upset me."
My mother has a very delicate constitution.
"After you married Howard, did you guys ever consider maybe rebooting spankings? A teen reboot?"
"A teen reboot? You mean for you? Spank you?"
"Yes, start spanking me like Father used to do."
"No," says Mom thoughtfully. "I can't recall that we ever discussed it. Why?"
I shrug. "When you guys got married, I thought one of you might bring it up. Teen reboots of spankings is all the craze now. Especially with teenage girls."
"I did not know that."
"Yes, I even hinted to Howard once about dads and stepdads of some of my classmates. These girls still get spankings. But Howard just brushed it off."
"Grace, you were almost 12 when we married. You hadn't been spanked in nearly four years. I didn't see the need for a teen reboot of spankings."
"Well, what does Howard think?"
Mom looks at me blankly. "Frankly, Grace, I have no idea."
I tutor 8-year-old Ashley Almond. She lives walking distance from my house.
Earlier this evening, I'm wrapping up my tutoring duties up in Ashley's bedroom.
Downstairs, Mr. Almond discovers that Ashley had done something that he has specifically forbidden her to do. Her parents start arguing.
"What that girl needs is a good, hard spanking!" I hear him declare loudly.
I see the fright in Ashley's eyes.
"Did Daddy just say 'spanking'?" asks my little protégé worriedly. "Is he talking about me?"
"Yes, I'm pretty sure your dad is talking about spanking. Did you disobey your father?"
Ashley nods and hangs her head in shame.
"When I was your age, Ashley, and I disobeyed my father, he most definitely would spank me. Right on my bare tushy."
"Didn't that embarrass you? Bare bottom like that?"
"Everything about a spanking is embarrassing. That's the whole idea. The physical pain is only part of the punishment."
"Oh."
"But you know what, Ashley? I was lucky that Father gave me spankings. It was his way of showing he cared. And spankings are so quick. Do you ever get grounded, Ashley?"
"All the time!" she exclaims.
"Think of the free time you buy when you take a spanking over grounding. A spanking lasts maybe ten seconds to two minutes. So including the scolding, subtract maybe five minutes for a whole spanking from a 24-hour grounding."
"Okay," says Ashley. "That leaves me 23 hours and 55 minutes."
"All for the cost of a burning, singing, throbbing behind," I explain. "Spankings are the smart way to go."
Downstairs...
"Don't over-react!" Mrs. Almond demands. "Let's come up with something more rational. Ashley must be punished, but not with a spanking."
"And why not?"
"Because, Arnold, we don't spank children in this house."
"You mean anyone under 18?"
"Look, Arnold, that's not a good argument. In fact, you're hurting yourself. The child is 8 years old. Ashley has never been spanked. She'll be traumatized if we start her up now."
"Look," I tell Ashley, her big blue eyes even bigger from a primordial fear of corporal punishment. "A spanking seems like a big deal right while you're getting it. But later, you'll remember it differently. You'll remember it in a good way."
I give her a kiss on both cheeks. "You'll be okay, honey. If your daddy spanks you, it's really not the end of the world. It just feels like it."
I tiptoe down the stairs with my backpack over one shoulder; I almost make it to the door.
"Grace, honey, what do you think?" Mrs. Almond asks me as I reach for the doorknob. "Don't you think eight years old is too old to start up spanking a child?"
"Oh, Mrs. Almond, it's not my place to say."
"Of course she's going to agree with you, Alice," says a very exasperated Mr. Almond. "She's a child. Of course she's going to be totally opposed to spankings."
"No, sir," I say without thinking.
I put my hand over my mouth before I say something that will get me in trouble. Just the talk of spankings makes my heart pound, clouding my judgment. How very odd.
"What?" says Mr. Almond, turning to me. "What did you say?"
"Like I said, it's not my place to say. And I hope you'll let me keep on tutoring Ashley. She's such a sweet girl, and doing so much better at school now. No matter what I say, I'm sure I'll offend one of you."
"Don't worry about that, Grace," Mrs. Almond assures me. "You're a very bright and very creative young lady. A good role model for Ashley. I want to hear what you have to say. Let the chips fall where they may."
"Yes, spit it out, Grace."
"Okay, I can't say for sure about the trauma of starting up this late. But I have some ideas to help Ashley with her big transition. You know, help Ashley get ready for her first spanking. Help her psychologically. I mean, if you decide to go the spanking route."
"Grace!" exclaims Mrs. Almond. "I'm shocked!"
"Let her finish, Alice."
"When I was Ashley's age, I was still spanked by my father. That was the year he died. I'm probably what they call a willful child. Father was fair but strict. I always knew where I stood."
"Grace, you're actually defending spanking? What about all the research?"
"I know, Mrs. Almond. No question about it. Spanked children are more likely than un-spanked children to have slightly lower IQs and behave aggressively. They're more prone to depression, alcoholism, drug abuse, and domestic violence. In general, children should never be spanked. Never."
"Wait a minute!" says Mr. Almond angrily. "Whose side are you on?"
"That's what I'm trying to explain. I don't know if spankings are right or wrong for Ashley. I just wanted to share that spankings were right for me. Absolutely the right thing for me."
"Grace, there's more to your story, I'm sure," says Mrs. Almond. "Help me understand."
"After Father died, I just drifted along for years. I'd lost my compass. I was rude and disobedient to Mom. My grades dropped. I sort of drifted away from my friends. I tell you this to show that Father and I were very close. Or, at least, I felt close to Father. I took his death very hard."
"I'm sorry, honey," says Mrs. Almond, giving me a hug. "Continue."
"I remember waiting for Father to get home on those days when Mom thought I needed spanking. And by the way, Mom was usually right. I can't ever remember a spanking I didn't deserve."
I laugh nervously. "Anyway, my father was a very important and busy man. A prosecuting attorney. I always felt I was competing for his time and attention.'
I pause. But I might as well tell the whole truth. "I was insanely jealous of my mother. Not sexually, you understand. How gross is that? But I was jealous that she got to lie in the same bed with him. Be close to him."
For some reason, my eyes brim with tears. Big teardrops run down my cheeks.
"On spanking nights, I'd wait anxiously for his Lincoln to pull into the driveway. Not out of fear. More like excitement. It's hard to describe."
"Try, honey," Mrs. Almond coaxes me.
"If things went well that day at the prosecutor's office, he'd come up and interrogate me at length for my misbehavior or problematic attitude. A lengthy lecture. But the spanking would be short. Hard but over in a jiffy. If things went bad at work, the lecture was short but the spanking was long and hard."
"Ouch!" says Mrs. Almond. "That sounds excruciating!"
"It WAS excruciating. My father's spankings were intense, life-altering events. I always learned something new from Father's spankings."
"Honey, you miss your daddy," Mrs. Almond says sympathetically. "You're romanticizing something that must have been terribly traumatic at the time. Please name me one thing you ever learned from a spanking."
"Okay, one Thursday, Father had an awful day at work. I was eight at the time. Father's last year. I'd said something that Mom thought was rude. I didn't mean it that way. Anyway, I truly think she wanted him to just scold me."
"Well, what did he do?" asks Mrs. Almond.
"He didn't say anything. He came over to my bed and told me to get up. I did. He sat on my bedside. I pulled up my nightgown and went over his lap. Without one word, he gave me a terrible, terrible spanking. My hardest ever. That surprised me, because I really wasn't even expecting a spanking. When I recovered, he spanked me again. In all, I got three sets of spankings that night."
"How horrible!"
"You might think so," I explained. "But you'd be wrong. I sat on his lap and cried. When I felt a little better, I asked him about his day. Turns out he'd gone down to Huntsville to witness the execution of a woman he prosecuted."
"For a prosecutor, that should be a happy day," says Mr. Almond.
"Not this time. As I sat there sniffling, Father told me he doubted his own case against her. But it would be politically risky to request a reduction in penalty to life without parole. It would be political suicide to declare the woman innocent, based on a review of his own case. Father had to let the wheels of justice turn, even if Maria Elena Sandoval was crushed under them."
"How horrible!" exclaims Mrs. Almond.
"Apparently," I explain. "Maria Elena Sandoval started crying and screaming her innocence as they strapped her to the execution gurney. Father said the poor woman just panicked. It's got to be scary, waiting to die like that. Anyhow, Maria Elena was declared legally dead 13 minutes later, but Father said the whole thing was nerve-wracking."
"So what's that got to do with this super-spanking he gave you?" asks Mr. Almond.
"Father confessed the first spanking was just his way of letting off steam. Then he said he realized that he wasn't spanking me. Father was spanking himself. Father never said he was sorry for that triple spanking. We never discussed Maria Elena Sandoval again. But Father did thank me, knowing I would understand."
"Well, I don't," exclaims Mrs. Almond.
"Don't you see? I provided the bottom to help Father work through his issues. You see, Father trusted me with his secret. I told him I loved him. I said it must have been hard to watch that woman die, especially with her being so scared and all. I told him he shouldn't have done it, but that I still loved him."
"And what did you learn from that?"
Not to be reposted, reproduced or distributed, in part or whole.