Smacking. A story from the 3rd draw down.

If smacking is outlawed will the kitchen finally bid farewell to mums trusty wooden spoon? Many predicted its demise with the introduction of the kitchen whiz. I know my brother and I hoped that would be the case, but as long as the wooden spoon was needed to fulfill its role as mums last line of offence, there was always a special place for it in the draws next to the stove, third one down.

Our mum rarely dished out physical discipline. Like George W dispatching another aircraft carrier to the gulf, mum would employ the slow count to 3 as a scare tactic. But sometimes, when things had gone to far. When mum felt she had no choice but to send a message. When escalation was inevitable. She would reach for the spoon. Actually, she would usually make us go and get it. That in itself was enough to send shivers through my stubbies.

The old man was different. He could be pushed to the point of retribution faster but his performance was more about the buildup than the results. It always began with the reddening of his face and that gave you precious seconds to evacuate. His weapon of choice was a jandal because they were always in easy reach. What wasn’t so easy was jumping out of his armchair while trying to remove a jandal at the same time. In much the same way a tornado will run out of puff so did Dad. The eye of his storm seldom lasted all the way across the lounge and down the hall to the front door. But on the rare occasions that two fronts combined to form a super tornado we discovered it was better to bend over and take the full force of the gale. Well, it was more of a howl. The old man’s jandal blow was all show very little bite. His huffing and puffing combined with the cracking smack of jandal rubber on bum sounded impressive but inflicted very little pain. There were two tricks to taking the jandal. One, you had to stand very still. If the old man didn’t have his glasses on, or they had been sucked off in the vortex of his rage he could miss your bum and connect with upper thigh and that did hurt. The other trick was to time your howl. Too soon and it felt fake and unprofessional. This was always frowned upon when my brother and I carried out a post wack analysis in our bedroom. The other reason for ensuring the howl was well delivered was the fear that dad might discover his faded blue jandals weren’t quite the weapon of terror he thought he carried underfoot.

The wooden spoon was different. That little sucker hurt and mum was a master at delivery. Mum hated smacking us. ‘This will hurt you more than it hurts me,’ was always included as part of the pre smack ceremony. And looking back I think she really meant it. If the wooden spoon came out and it wasn’t covered in cake mix we knew we had gone too far.

The late 70’s was a great time to be a kid. Not only did we get a fondue set and a colour TV, but someone bought mum a bright purple wooden spoon. It wasn’t even wood it was plastic and obviously wasn’t bought by another mum because what my brother soon found out was that while the new purple beast looked great, and the sound of plastic on bum made an intimidating clacketty type noise, it lacked the cutting sting of old faithful. I don’t how mum discovered this. Maybe another mother mentioned it at a Tupperware party, but the purple beast didn’t last for long. Much to our distress our mum let my sisters add it to their collection of sandpit toys and our old nemesis was promoted from retirement under the greaseproof paper in the bottom draw next to the stove.

We don’t have a wooden spoon in my house. But that is more a reflection on the importance my wife and I place on kitchen utensils and the kitchen in general than an opinion on the physical discipline of children. The few times I have felt the urge to reach for my jandal it has been more a reflection of my loss of control rather than the need to deliver a short painful lesson and that’s the wrong reason so I collapse back into my armchair. The most effective method of punishment I’ve found is the old, but reliable ‘No TV for you’. Amended for the modern age to include Playstation, Game boy, portable DVD player, story telling bear, tamagoochi, pixel chick, virtual pet, or any other battery operated device that may have been bought into the house that I am not aware of.