The Time to Put Away Childish Things

These hands. Yes, that’s what I said. These hands. I used to fight a lot. My brothers would tell you that I was a bully (to them). I don’t see it that way though. I felt like I had to demonstrate dominance. I was outnumbered as the only girl, and the middle child. As a middle child, balance and order must be maintained. I needed to keep them in check.

It wasn’t that I only subjected them to abuse. I feel like I also provided discipline. I was not going to have our parents get home to find our assigned chores undone or let them catch us breaking rules. My parents believed in collective punishment. I hated whoopins’. So, it was going to be my brothers and not me.

I also was my brothers’ keeper. I didn’t care who it was. Don’t mess with my brothers! I was the only one that was going to bust them upside the head. And I lived by that.

By the time my youngest brother joined me in high school, I settled down. It wasn’t because they were bigger. I still didn’t care about their size. I would just get more violent and started to introduce small weapons or scare tactics. (This sounds really awful as I read this back). But, I feel like I started channeling my energy into other things, like sports, honor roll, and my friends.

I remember the last fight I had with my oldest brother, I think he was about 17. He tried to kill me. I do believe that if he was able to catch me, I would not be here to type this. I don’t remember what it was about, but I do remember how it ended. I ran to his room and locked the door. Mine didn’t work because my father had kicked my door in one day when I called myself locking him out of my room because I didn’t like something he said to me.

There are no children locking doors in a black parents’ house

Anyway, so when I ran to my brother’s room that idiot in his zest for murder kicked a hole in the door! I do not remember ever being so afraid in my life. The rage he had for me and my fear I had for him ended immediately! In a split second we were both united against a common enemy. Our dad. The thought of him coming home to find a hole in the door and what that meant for us snapped us back to reality. We came together like never before that day and patched and painted that door so that he never knew.

This was also the beginning of my newfound love of being a fixer upper came from. I was so impressed with my skills. I knew exactly what to do and how to fix it from watching my dad build things.

The last time my little brother and I fought he was 16 and we were the same height. He finally had a growth spurt over the summer after 9th grade. Anyway, I again don’t remember what we were fighting about. I remember the outcome. I was at the bottom of the steps. He was standing on the second step looking down at me with all the contempt he could muster. I punched him in his face, and this bama punched me back in the face. With his left hand at that! He’s a lefty and he never hit me with his left. This meant that he was actually trying to hurt me and establish dominance. Oh hell no!

After the hit, we locked eyes and I punched him right back. I knew that I could not back down no matter what. He was not going to change the order of things. I matched his contempt and raised him one. He was so frustrated with my m.e.a.n-ness (mean evil and nastiness as coined by my dad) that he stormed off up the rest of the steps and I cried out,”I hate you!”

Anyway, those were my last fights. I preferred to focus my energy on athletics and school. My brothers will tell you that I lived off of my reputation though and that’s why I no longer fight but I will say I was able to more positively channel my energy since we all got healthy doses of ‘act right’.