Frenzied Psychopaths.

I love reading, I love words, and I love writing.

I also never stop thinking. The majority of my thoughts - as I have divulged - are pretty much fluffy filler, but because my brain revs like a kangaroo on crack, it also produces a vast array of interesting (I think) thought snippets, which are usually unconnected from each other, but which keep me entertained and mulling, until I can resolve them. Each and every one.

The thing is, sometimes I go into overload, and I end up thinking about a much too large variety of different things. THEN, I freeze up when it comes to writing something, anything, because HOW DOES ONE CHOOSE BETWEEN THEM? It would be like lining up your children and saying: "That one. I choose that one to be my favorite, and worth my time."

What usually happens then, is I just wait until one train of thought makes itself known as the most insistent one, and I write about that. I know it's not fair, but usually the child who makes the most noise and causes the most problems gets the most attention. So it is with thoughts.

I don't not write because I have nothing to say, but because I have too much.

I need to talk about how essential men are.

Because, over and over, during the past few days, as I have walked to Harakopio, and trudged to Koroni, and gotten myself elbow deep in paint, this memory keeps coming up.

I don't know why, but it won't go away.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

About a year or so ago, I ended up babysitting some of my younger siblings for a few days while my parents went somewhere and partied wildly for the weekend.

Haha.

I believe I was in charge of the three littlest girls and the baby boy - which, honestly, is not as big a deal as it sounds. Typically, they are all very well behaved and are great at entertaining themselves. One evening, as I was popping corn in preparation for movie night, a scream of tremendously high pitched proportions rent the air in two.

One of the girls had kicked another one in the stomach.

And she tried to lie about it.

And she showed no remorse.

Thinking that this certainly needed some big gun punishment, I banned her from the family movie and told her she had to clean her room instead.

She dissolved into utter hysteria, but I remained strong, and pushed her into her room and slammed the door.

About five minutes later, as sobs and gasps escaped down the hall, I was wracked with guilt.

It was too harsh a punishment, I decided. After she cleaned her room, she could come out.

Only, she made no attempt to clean her room, sneaked out, and tried to hide in the corner and watch the movie unnoticed.

Since she obviously had no sense of remorse, I figured that my initial punishment had to stand. No movie for her. No way, sister.

Five minutes after that, I started to waffle. The kid was tired. Of course she was testy. And she was probably missing her parents. Maybe it would be better to have a heart to heart, get at her real motivations, see what was really going on, and then let her watch the movie.

I pictured us on her bed, in cozy conversation, as I softly opened her bedroom door.

She whipped around to face me and screamed "I hate you so much. You are the meanest, worst person I know, and you are so unfair. I didn't even do anything that wrong."

Furious, I slammed the door in her face and sat on the stairs.

The kid had turned into a psychopath. OBVIOUSLY kicking sisters in the stomach is normal behavior. OBVIOUSLY sneaking out of consequences is not a punishable offence. OBVIOUSLY, I was the worst person in the world for installing some boundaries in her young life.

I shook my head in shock. What a psycho. She could stay in there till dinner TOMORROW with NO FOOD.

About three minutes later I was wracked with guilt. Again. Of course she reacted that way. She reacted that way because my punishment was too harsh, for something that, while admittedly bad, was done because she was tired. She wasn't really responsible. I had to try and talk to her again.

I poked my head in her room.

"You are WORST SISTER EVER. I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOUR FACE AGAIN."

This child is a stubborn beast when it comes to admitting any wrongdoing.

Probably about two minutes after I slammed the door yet again, I was withering away in despair over how terrible I was being to her.

At which point, my brother walked in the front door, fresh from not dealing with the drama of the evening.

I grabbed his arm and explained the situation to him. "Greg. What do I DO?"

"Umm. She is a brat. She thinks she can get away with anything. She needs to stay in her room." He looked at me like I was crazy.

"But, she was really tired. And maybe it was too big a punishment in the first place. Maybe I was unfair, and she is justified in being mad at me."

"Mary. Being tired is not really an excuse. She kicked a little girl in the stomach. And she lied about it. She needs to learn that there are real, hard consequences."

"I guess."

***Long Pause***

"Umm, well, maybe she could come out halfway through?"

He looked at me with raised eyebrows. "Seriously?"

"Ok then. You deal with her. I obviously can't."

"Fine."

I smirked to myself. He would fold. No doubt about it.

He walked down the hall, into the room from which occasional death moans were escaping, told the miscreant that she was being a brat, and needed to suffer the consequences and shut up about it, closed the door softly, grabbed a bowl of popcorn, and settled into the movie, without a flicker of disturbance crossing his face.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

And this is why we need good men.

Typically, women lead with their feelings, men with their heads.

Let's not get into gender stereotype arguments here because this is true.

One is not better than the other - a child really needs both sides of the equation. The world really needs both sides of the equation.

BUT - sometimes we need one more than the other. This was one of those times.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

I couldn't get over the fact that I felt bad, terrible, guilty, and the devils spawn that my sister was missing out on something she really wanted. I just wanted to feel good, and I wanted her to feel good. It hurt ME too much to give her what she needed.

But the bare facts are that this child needed a check on her behavior, because in order to become a fully functioning member of adult society, she had to learn that certain behaviors are totally unacceptable. Like kicking. And lying. And screaming. And disobedience. Otherwise, yes, she would be raised into a little psychopath.

Beyond that "being tired" is not really an excuse. Part of growing up is learning to deal with life in a civilized fashion, no matter what comes up, no matter how we are feeling.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some bitter uber feminist, ranting about the same-ness of men and women is reading this, muttering about how she could be as mean as a man, no problem. I am sure she could.

I, on the other hand, am rather happy to know about the soft spot within me, that shying away from the infliction of pain, even if it is necessary.

In this world I am inundated constantly with the message that men and women are pretty much interchangeable and that men might well be unnecessary. A little voice inside me cries out "Not True!" but has a hard time believing it, and grasps desperately for proof.

That voice gains affirmation and strength when I reflect on that soft spot. In some odd way, it affirms my femininity.

At the very least, women need a good man to protect that softness - that essence of being a woman - from being crushed and warped in the process of giving parameters to stubborn little wills.

The world does not need an explosion of frenzied, entitled psychopaths.

Because....imagine that.