About a bajillion years ago, my brother’s favorite album was called, ‘To Russell, My Brother Whom I Slept With‘. As the much older sibling, he thought all those tricks Bill Cosby played on poor Russell were incredibly funny, and decided to use them against his innocent baby sister (ME!!). I truly believed that I was adopted and the police brought me. I was traumatized. A lot.
There was another part of that album where Cosby talks about “the belt”. It went something like, “The Belt was nine feet long, eight feet wide, and it had hooks on it that would rip the meat off of your body if it ever hit you…” Although my Dad never one time spanked me (much less whipped me with a belt), he did threaten it on occasion. One time in particular I remember vividly…
Dad ripped his belt from the loops and it dramatically whooshed through the air. Mom was on the couch to witness the beating my brother and I were about to receive when Scott whispered, “the belt…” to which Mom replied, “it’s 9 feet long and 8 feet wide…” Dad wasn’t a fan of Bill Cosby and he just didn’t get the inside joke — but he knew he’d lost some momentum and became even more dramatic. He told my brother and I to line up and prepare to be beaten (not in those words, but at the time, I was pretty sure it was going to leave a mark).
My brother said, “Give me Shelley’s whippin’ too Dad. Don’t whip her.” (Neither of us got “the belt” by the way — but it would’ve surely been less painful than the standard “I walked 10 miles to school barefoot and was thankful to get an orange for Christmas and you kids don’t appreciate blah blah blah” lecture we received instead.)
So tonight as I’m following the Misty Croslin saga with Art Harris on Nancy Grace, I hear more recorded jailhouse conversations that reference Misty and her brother (who are both in jail). Talking about bail, I hear Misty say to her father, “get me out first.”
So that is a big ole’ character flaw in my book — and it has nothing to do with Misty being uneducated. My brother and I knew to look out for each other first when we were mere children.
(Taken at about 1:00 AM — the snow is about ALL gone. Yippee!)