Chapter 2
Is old age creeping upon me or do I need a trip to a good psychoanalyst? Maybe it’s the weather! Something’s up anyway! Lately it seems all my three-member brood wants to do is bicker, feud and tattle—and in that order.
Momma she did that… No, I didn’t!… Yes, you did and you hit me, too… Mother is she SUPPOSED to be having a tea party on her bed with REAL water… and so on and so forth throughout the eternal day!
There were three of us and we did do more than our fair share of the bickering and the feuding. But we most certainly DID NOT tattle.
We couldn’t! Since to do so would nearly always implicate all of us and likewise, we would all receive the punishment!
Besides when WE feuded there wasn’t any of these gentle little slaps and THEN blood curdling screams to try to convince Mother we’d been three quarters killed.
No siree, when we drew back to lay one on, we meant business and IF the other one got up, he hurt too bad to scream!
The whipper usually convinced the whippee to mind his manners for a while anyway.
ONE time my LITTLE brother and I had a disagreement that developed into a first-rate feud.
I think I was thirteen and he was eleven.
Since he was about as tall as I was he thought he might commence to tell me what to do.
I rather EMPHATICALLY convinced him otherwise.
After he regained his breath and a few days had elapsed, he decided to tear up my sister’s mud pies.
With the help of a nice length of two by four, she convinced him not to do that either.
Oh, well, at least my three aren’t quite as good at feuding as we were.
I suppose they have to throw in the bickering and tattling to make amends, so they’ll grow up normal brothers and sisters.
And with my luck, IF I did go to a psychoanalyst, I’d probably end up with an old maid who would inform me that it was all the JOYS OF MOTHERHOOD! !!