Playing by the Rules

The wonderful thing about growing up in the sixties was, you always knew where you stood in the bigger scheme of things. There were rules and as a kid, you were expected to obey them. Not ask for clarification, not lobby for a family group decision or ignore them in hopes of a more favorable decision by a different parent. We were raised with rules, and we were expected to instantly accept the rule and move in the direction of its conclusion. And, there were a lot of rules. Family rules, moral obligations, socially accepted norms, but most of all were the common sense rules.

The common sense rules were vague and covered most of the things that our parents had not discussed with us individually. These rules were expected to have as much consequence as anything already covered. Should you come to the intersection of do or don’t do in your daily experience, you were expected to know what your parents expected you to do. Often times these intersections gave a teenager great pause. From the viewpoint of a 13 year old, it was difficult to discern exactly how your parents would react. Or so, that’s how our pubescent thought process would decide the journey.

My family lived about 30 blocks from the municipal swimming pool. Most days we were there when it opened for business. We were allowed to eat lunch there, but under no circumstances were we to be late for Supper which was served at our house promptly at 5:30 pm. On a good day we could cover a block a minute on our walk, meaning we were about 30 minutes away from our house via the shoe leather express. One day my new battery operated watch ceased telling time.

Reaching one of those intersections in life and wanting to continue another few minutes with my buddies, I reasoned that this would serve as the perfect excuse to grab a few more minutes of uninterrupted pleasure. On the way home I rehearsed my speech, that was to be presented to my parents. I practiced the look of astonishment on my face when I realized that my watch was no longer keeping me out of trouble. I arrived at the back door of our home about the time my little brother (lb1) was heading out to the backyard to use up the last couple of hours of daylight. The look in his eye and the smirk on his face telegraphed the mood that I was about to encounter. Arriving into the kitchen and noticing that the supper table had been cleared, I began, what was now, a well rehearsed soliloquy on the unreliability of these new battery operated watches.

The look of astonishment that I had mastered bounced right off my mother’s back because she was washing dishes. Half way through my dissertation about watches and their unreliability my Mom, without turning around, calmly instructed me to go see my father. It was beginning to dawn on me that I had moved up to level two of my house rules infraction. You see Mom usually handled the light discipline. Inadvertent curse words, yelling at lb1, or forgetting to take out the trash were in Mom’s bailiwick. However, if the discipline had elevated it’s self to level two punishment, Dad was tasked with the implementation of the deed.

My Dad was an emotional punisher. He took the whole event personally. It was if I had jumped out of bed that morning with the express intention of offending him. Having committed level two infractions before, I knew better than to waste a lot of words. When I arrived into the living room my Dad was reading the newspaper. Without waiting for his attention, I began my 30 block rehearsal. He continued reading and I continued with the explanation of what had caused this dasterdly deed. He lowered the newspaper as I was coming to my closing argument. It was the watch’s fault. I could see his face was getting red but he was remaining remarkably calm when he asked the one simple question that I had not been prepared for. “Why didn’t you ask someone what time it was?”

I had 30 blocks to prepare my excuse but the answer to this one simple question had not been factored in during my preparation. My answer came out much quicker than I expected, ” I didn’t think of it”. “Well”, he thundered, “that’s the only thing that I have heard so far that brushes anywhere near the truth”. I was then instructed to go to bed without supper. Knowing when to leave a bad thing alone I started up the steps, when he instructed me to give the watch to him; since I was unaware of how to work it. Surrendering the watch and moving toward the steps before his famous back hand that ended all disagreements, presented itself, I was in bed in record time.

I had all night to think about whether my extra fifteen minutes in the swimming pool was worth it, having missed Mom’s Fried Chicken. The next morning I was the first one to breakfast and nothing was mentioned about the drama of the evening before. Mom was customarily cheerful and Dad was reading the Morning newspaper. I ate quickly and tried to get outside before anything else was mentioned. Just as I was hitting back door, my Dad announced that he really liked his new watch. I caught the look on my Mom’s face and I thought she was going to laugh out loud. I didn’t act like I heard anything and hit the back yard in full stride.

As I have aged, I realize that old habits die hard, as such, I am seldom late for our supper hour even today. Also, I do remember that the punishment that was actually more annoying than anything, was the explanation I had to give every time one of my buddies asked why I wasn’t wearing my new Timex.