Life lessons

Q: How do you know when a punishment is really effective?

A: When it turns your kid into a grumpy, stomping little ball of anger.

Saturday was Consequence Afternoon. We didn’t find any uniform pants last weekend, and now, after Mark’s art show, we also needed a new shower curtain. So Mark cleaned out his fish bank in preparation, to the tune of a whopping $33.

I was sad he had to spend his entire savings on new pants and a shower curtain, but it didn’t seem to bother him.

“So what?” he said, unconcerned. “I’ll just get more money.”

And that attitude turned the tide against him.

See, when I was a kid, we didn’t learn “lessons.” We didn’t get warnings, timeouts, or “consequences.” We got beat, plain and simple. You acted up, you got in trouble, you got the belt. All my Dad had to do was touch his belt buckle, and we knew we were in for it. It instantly brought my brothers and I to tears and hurried apologies.We tried everything to make the spankings stop as quickly as possible. We even tried playing tough, pretending like the whooping didn’t hurt. (It only took one time to realize our parents spanked us harder when we laughed—after that, it was straight to tears.)

And so, because of Mark’s cavalier attitude, I realized I had to make him hurt a little.

Mark made it very easy on me. Two minutes after stepping into Target, he asked if we could look at video games.

“Sure,” I answered.

“Really?” he asked. He couldn’t believe I’d said yes.

I nodded and we walked toward the games. He lit up, pointing at the various games.

“Oh, look at that new Pokémon one!” he cried. “And check out the Tony Hawk one!”

He was so excited. I asked which one he’d pick first, and he pointed to the Pokémon one. “Then I’d get that one, that one and that one.”

“Cool!” I said. “How much do they cost?”

“That one’s $29.99, and that one’s $26.99,” he answered. Then he remembered the $33 in his pocket and said, “Hey, I have enough!”

I nodded and agreed. “Yep, you do!” Then I frowned, like I’d just thought of something unpleasant. “But you have to buy pants and a shower curtain with that money.”

And that’s when Mark turned into Stompy Mad-Face. He watched his Pokémon dreams turn into a uniform nightmare.

“Oh my God!” he cried. “I won’t have any money left for games! Nothing!”

“You might,” I said, hopefully.

“No, I won’t,” he snapped. “I’ll have nothing, not even one dollar! I’ll have ZERO DOT ZERO ZERO DOLLARS!”

The laughter almost won at that comment.

We ambled over to the boy’s clothes section, which was completely devoid of uniforms (a little late in the year, I guess). I finally found a pair of blue shorts for $7.99, and Mark cried indignantly, “What? EIGHT BUCKS for a pair of shorts?” He was downright offended.

I nodded. “I know, clothes are expensive!”

I grabbed another pair of shorts—this pair cost $10. I thought Mark was gonna have a heart attack.

“Eighteen dollars!” he cried. “FOR SHORTS. I won’t have enough for a shower curtain, too!”

“One thing at a time,” I answered.

He paid for his shorts and stomped out of the store. Target didn’t have shower curtains I liked, so we went to a different store.

Mark had $14 left. He did not look at any patterns at all—he went straight for the cheapest curtain they had.

“Look, $12.99,” he said.

I shook my head. “It’s vinyl,” I said. “I like fabric ones, like the one at home.”

I pointed at a pink curtain that said “Ooh la la.” It had poodles and purses and high-heel shoes all over it.

“How about that one?” I asked, laughing.

“Fine,” he said.

“You want to put up a pink curtain filled with girly stuff all over it?” I asked.

“I DON’T CARE!” he yelled. “As long as it’s cheap!”

I was cracking up. Now that I could see the punishment working, I prolonged it, holding up each different curtain, studying it, then putting it back down.

Finally, he picked one out and said, “How about this one?” He held up a shower curtain filled with monkeys eating bananas.

“You like it?” I asked, and he nodded. “Well, the bananas match the paint, and the trees match the brown towels I bought to go with the other curtain. Yeah, I guess it’s fine.”

“How much is it?” he asked. I pointed to the tag, and when I told him it was on sale (10% off), he broke into applause.

He was still five bucks short, but I advanced him the money from next week’s allowance. He was just happy to be done with it all.

And so, in the very near future, Mark will be sporting some new shorts to school, and I’ll join a barrel of monkeys in the shower. And hopefully the lesson will last longer than the shower curtain.