The Corner
I was no stranger to childhood punishment. Trouble seemed to follow me everywhere I went. I thought my punishment was the cruelest, most inhumane and unjust punishment that any child could have. No child was punished the way I was, or at least that’s how I saw it. I was always getting in trouble with the police by my own doing, which I really thought happened because of other people, especially my brother.
My mother‘s choice of punishment was standing in the corner. I had to stand completely still and completely quiet for a minute for each of the years of my life. Ten minutes would seem like ten hours. I would have to concentrate not to move, because I could never stand still. I could not make one sound. I had to stand in the corner of our dining room. I had to stand up straight with my hands behind my back. This was the worst torture ever, and I thought I was the only child that suffered this way. If I broke the rules, more time would be added or the time would start over.
This did not seem to be my little brother’s punishment, and I thought this was a great injustice. He did not get in trouble much, or that’s how I saw it. My sister never got in trouble. She did a little “mouthing-off” in middle school, but that was straightened out. It seemed that I was the one that got all the punishment. I was the one that got in trouble all the time. Did my brother rat me out? I truly believed so, because I never witnessed him getting punished. I would learn later in life that he was punished by having things taken away, because he could watch a tree grow. Standing in the corner would not work for him.
I remember telling my mom one day that I would design a round house so no other child would have to suffer this kind of torture of standing in the corner. I told her one time that my nose was pointy from standing in the corner so much. There was the rare occasion when my mother was going to let me out of the corner early, and I would tell her that I was going to keep standing in the corner. This drove my mom up the wall. I did learn later in life that standing in the corner is a universal child punishment. I was speaking at a church in Ukraine, and two older women were laughing about my stories of standing in the corner. That’s when I realized all the beliefs I had about me being the only child to suffer. Now I can look back at that time and laugh. My family and I laugh a lot.