Speaking of misbehavior and whatnot, every family has its own, often weird, way of doing things, such as discipline. In BCM’s family, Mom was the recorder, and Dad was the enforcer. So, every day, Mom would dutifully record all BCM’s transgressions (real or imagined), and when Dad got home from training young men to die in Vietnam, he’d have to go up to my room and beat his youngest boy’s bare ass with a belt. Dad was pretty blasé about it, showing up with a resigned “let’s get this over with” expression and belt in hand. “You know what we have to do.” Then the beatings would commence, tears would follow, along with welts later.

To this day, BCM still remembers these beatings, but not a damned thing he did to deserve them. Well, that’s not entirely true. He does remember salting the keys of the organ he was forced to play. Years later, after reading up on how and when to discipline, BCM realizes that his parents’ approach was probably the worst.

At least until he met his wife, whose parents put cigarettes out on her and broke her arm with a broomstick. Still, whether psychotic or chaotic, they weren’t useless; parents can always serve as bad examples.

Dinner at BCM’s house was like feeding time at ape house — at least when his brothers were there. The family had the dinner time mantra of “grab it and growl.” Imagine what it must look like when a pride of lions rips apart a wildebeest, then imagine that with plates, forks, and knives. Hands reached across the table, often onto each other’s plates, and sometimes entire platefuls of food were stuffed in the mouth before swallowing. The brothers perfected the technique of distract and snatch, so often BCM’s meal came to a relatively quick and mystifying end. Mom could not dish up the food fast enough, and resorted to cooking for quantity and not quality.

Mom was further constrained because she only appeared to know about 4 meals to make – beef stroganoff, stuffed pork chops, sweet-and-sour chicken, and meatloaf. Apparently, Mom had to learn to cook as she went and pretty much relied on recipes that were cheap and easy to make in quantity. BCM liked the stroganoff, though the meat was usually more gristle than actual meat; several times, he almost choked to death on it, but at least the food made it to his mouth.

Anyway, thankfully for everyone, BCM went off to kindergarten. That way, his beatings could be done by educated professionals, and his mom and dad’s hands could be cleansed of his crimes. BCM’s elementary school was an imposing three-story brick edifice. It was a quintessential “factory” school that turned out students like factories produce “widgets.” Next to it was an asphalt playground for kids to fall and skin their knees, knock out their teeth, and otherwise mangle themselves. In fact, if you have ever watched “A Christmas Story,” then you know what the school looked like. BCM’s first introduction to formal education was interesting — he wrote many letters backward and spent an inordinate amount of time trying to tie his shoes. In fact, BCM didn’t figure out how to tie his shoes until 4th grade.

This was also his first encounter with black people. Though the schools were desegregated in the late 60s, no black people lived in BCM’s neighborhood. This wasn’t too surprising because the town had a pretty small (single-digit percentage) minority population. Nevertheless, he made a good friend at school who happened to be black. It wasn’t a big deal since they were just kids. But when they were on the playground one day, BCM’s friend fell and skinned his knee to the bone. BCM was amazed that his friend’s bones were white; He’d assumed bones were the same color on the inside as on the skin on the outside. Time passed, and BCM moved on to middle school.