Arm scratching in Baltimore
By Tiffany Winn Rueckert
A beautiful analogy that sheds some insight into a worrisome situation
Please go upstairs and clean your rooms I tell them. Nothing. I say it again a little louder and add a firm “now” to the end of my plea. They crawl upstairs to their rooms as I follow behind. They slowly start to pick up clothes, stack books. I walk away. I go about my business downstairs. Minutes pass. Upstairs I hear giggling and then music.
“Are you cleaning your rooms???” I shout from downstairs.
“YES!!” they shout back.
More minutes pass and I walk upstairs. They aren’t cleaning. All three are wrestling around on the ground. I get a bit louder and turn off the music.
“Why do you not respond until I get loud and add threats?” I yell at them.
I tell them they have ten minutes to clean up their room and whatever is not done after ten minutes is going into a trash bag. The room is clean in ten minutes. Three things go into the bag.
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I’m standing in the backyard talking to a friend. Tommy screams “Moooommmmy!” and his fingernails scratch my dry skin. I glare down and my friend says “Oh, my.” Four white claw marks span the length of my forearm.
“Why did you scratch me Tommy??”
“Because you didn’t hear me! I was asking and asking and you didn’t hear me!”
“But Tommy, you know when Mommy is having an adult conversation you need to wait until I am done”
“But remember, I am hungry.”
And then I remembered that I had told him that I would go in and make dinner when he had told me he was hungry 20 minutes earlier. I had been sidetracked when a friend stopped by and dinner was far from being done.
And then I remembered that he really hadn’t had lunch that day because mom was running errands and had thrown a few apples and crackers at him and his brothers.
He had gotten louder and was giving me a threat.
Crud.
I get it.
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I do not condone arm scratching or yelling at your parents. I do not condone yelling at your kids or resorting to threats. I do not condone breaking windows, looting or throwing things at others.
I also do not condone not listening when someone is trying to ask you nicely the first, second or third time. I also do not condone not following through on what you say you are going to do. Empty promises, sidetracked resolutions.
There has been a lot of arm scratching happening in Baltimore this week. I think because I can see this dichotomy in my own life I can understand how it happens on a bigger scale, when more is at stake. Sometimes when you have heard empty promises and experience has taught you to not trust, you get firmer and you get louder. Sometimes you do things that aren’t nice.
Crud, Baltimore.
I get it.
“Are you cleaning your rooms???” I shout from downstairs.
“YES!!” they shout back.
More minutes pass and I walk upstairs. They aren’t cleaning. All three are wrestling around on the ground. I get a bit louder and turn off the music.
“Why do you not respond until I get loud and add threats?” I yell at them.
I tell them they have ten minutes to clean up their room and whatever is not done after ten minutes is going into a trash bag. The room is clean in ten minutes. Three things go into the bag.
-----------------
I’m standing in the backyard talking to a friend. Tommy screams “Moooommmmy!” and his fingernails scratch my dry skin. I glare down and my friend says “Oh, my.” Four white claw marks span the length of my forearm.
“Why did you scratch me Tommy??”
“Because you didn’t hear me! I was asking and asking and you didn’t hear me!”
“But Tommy, you know when Mommy is having an adult conversation you need to wait until I am done”
“But remember, I am hungry.”
And then I remembered that I had told him that I would go in and make dinner when he had told me he was hungry 20 minutes earlier. I had been sidetracked when a friend stopped by and dinner was far from being done.
And then I remembered that he really hadn’t had lunch that day because mom was running errands and had thrown a few apples and crackers at him and his brothers.
He had gotten louder and was giving me a threat.
Crud.
I get it.
--------------
I do not condone arm scratching or yelling at your parents. I do not condone yelling at your kids or resorting to threats. I do not condone breaking windows, looting or throwing things at others.
I also do not condone not listening when someone is trying to ask you nicely the first, second or third time. I also do not condone not following through on what you say you are going to do. Empty promises, sidetracked resolutions.
There has been a lot of arm scratching happening in Baltimore this week. I think because I can see this dichotomy in my own life I can understand how it happens on a bigger scale, when more is at stake. Sometimes when you have heard empty promises and experience has taught you to not trust, you get firmer and you get louder. Sometimes you do things that aren’t nice.
Crud, Baltimore.
I get it.
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Copyright © 2015 by Rent's Due Publications
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, click a button on any page to send email with details of the request.
