(gap: 1s) In the gentle village of Thistlebank, where the morning mist curled over the gorse and the kirk bells tolled with steadfast regularity, lived two brothers—myself, a lad of eight, and my younger brother, still round of cheek and innocent of heart. Our parents, upright and God-fearing, were the very picture of respectability, and in our home, Sunday was a day set apart, sacred and solemn as the Queen’s own birthday.
(short pause) On Saturday evenings, Mother would lay out our Sunday best with loving precision. My jacket, pressed and neat, my shirt starched to a crispness that would have pleased any schoolmaster, and my socks pulled up to meet shoes polished to a mirror shine. My brother, in his miniature suit, looked every inch the cherub, though his halo was often a little crooked.
(pause) Father, tall and dignified, would don his best suit, his hair slicked back with Brylcreem, while Mother, in her sensible skirt and pearls, bustled about the kitchen, slippers tapping on the flagstones. The breakfast table was a sight to behold: steaming porridge, toast soldiers standing to attention, and a pot of strong tea sending up fragrant curls of steam. We sat together, as families ought, the only sounds the ticking of the clock and the gentle clink of spoons.
(short pause) But boys will be boys, and on this particular Sunday, mischief found me. As my brother and I fidgeted in our seats, I, with a twinkle of naughtiness in my eye, seized the tomato sauce bottle and gave it a hearty shake in his direction. Alas! The lid, not properly fastened, flew off, and a great red splodge of sauce landed squarely on his freshly pressed shirt.
(pause) The sight was so comical, so utterly unexpected, that laughter bubbled up from deep within me. My brother, mortified and sticky, began to wail, his face crumpling in distress. The merriment died on my lips as Mother’s eyes flashed with a look that brooked no argument.
(short pause) Father, ever the peacemaker, tried to dab at the stain, but it was Mother who ruled the roost. With the swift authority of a general, she rose from her chair, her lips pressed into a thin, determined line. In one motion, she took me firmly by the arm and led me from the table, her grip as unyielding as iron.
(pause) I pleaded, my voice trembling, “Please, Mother, it was an accident!” But Mother was deaf to my entreaties. She reached for the armless wooden chair by the fireplace—a chair well known to all children in our house, for it was both a seat of comfort and, on days such as this, a place of reckoning. She dragged it to the centre of the room, the legs scraping ominously on the flagstones.
(short pause) With practiced efficiency, Mother sat and drew me before her. In a trice, I was upended over her lap, my face inches from the cold kitchen floor, the scent of linoleum and coal dust filling my nose. My shirt tails were flipped up, my dignity abandoned, and her left hand pressed firmly into the small of my back. Then, with her right hand, she began the spanking.
(pause) The first smack landed with a sharp report, stinging fiercely. Another followed, and another, each one a lesson in obedience. The pain was immediate and hot, a fire kindled on my backside that no amount of wriggling or pleading could extinguish. I kicked and squirmed, my fists pounding the air, tears streaming down my cheeks. Mother’s discipline was swift and sure, her sense of justice unwavering.
(short pause) The spanking seemed to last an age, though in truth it was but a minute or two—an eternity to a chastened child. At last, her temper spent and my bottom ablaze, she released me. I was told to stand by the fireplace, my clothes still tangled about my ankles, while she restored the chair to its place and went to assist Father with my brother’s change of clothes. The room was quiet but for my sniffling, the air heavy with the scent of discipline and regret.
(pause) There are moments in every childhood that are etched forever in memory—lessons learned not from words, but from the sting of consequence. This was such a day. When we finally set off for church, I walked gingerly, the starched fabric of my shorts chafing my tender skin. The hymns seemed longer, the pews harder, and the sermon more interminable than ever before.
(short pause) Yet, as I sat there, shifting uncomfortably, I could not help but reflect on the curious mixture of love and discipline that shaped our lives. Mother’s justice was swift, but her care was just as fierce. In the quiet hush of the kirk, beneath the stained glass and the watchful eyes of the congregation, I learned a lesson that day—a lesson as old as time.
(pause) For in the end, dear reader, it is not the sting of the spanking that lingers, but the knowledge that actions have consequences, and that a mother’s love, though sometimes stern, is always true. And so, I resolved to be more careful, to think before I acted, and to remember always the lesson of the red sauce and the wooden chair. For such are the small, hard lessons that help a boy grow into a good and upright man.
