Jellybean is a Peanut

I sat down at my computer at 8:00 AM today and pondered out loud, “What am I going to teach today?”
“You are going to teach the second day of Credit Union Fundamentals,” Beth answered.
“Mmm-hmm,” I said. “I meant, what I am going to teach about. Hmmm.” I looked over my agenda, even though I knew the answer. Yesterday I left off with Safety and Security. That mean it was time for… “Compliance. My favorite.”
Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not kidding. Compliance topics are my favorite. Goodness knows I like a meaty discussion about Regulation DD.
“Meg goes to the doctor to get her first sonogram,” I added. “She’s going to call me with the results, since I’ll be in class.”
“I hope it’ll be good news,” Beth said, then corrected herself. “It’ll be good news. It has to be good news.” Beth is a fatalist, a “It’s written in the stars” type person. She rubs a statue of the Buddha for good luck, although she hides it when her mom comes over.
 
Class began at 9:00 AM. Seven people. Not the brightest bananas in the bunch. Three temps working for Collections. Three tellers. One Marketing designer. It’s an eclectic group to teach Compliance, but I began with the basics. Let me see, the general order goes like this, with as much acronyms I can muster: How regulations get started (U.S. Congress, POTUS, the Fed, FDIC, CFPB, NCUA, etc.), NCUSIF, TISA/Reg DD, Reg D, GLB Act, FACT Act…
I was just finishing talking about Adverse Actions and the FACT Act after an hour and a half we broke for ten minutes. Quick—back to my office to check my phone!
I popped my head into Beth’s office. “Hey, break time.”
“You got a phone call,” she said. “I was tempted to pick it up, but what am I thinking? I can’t take that call.”
I nodded and picked my phone. Meg left me a voicemail: “Hey, it’s me. It’s good news. Look at your cell phone.”
I pressed “3” to delete the voicemail, and rummaged in my green messenger bag for my cell phone. Sure enough, there was a text message, with picture. I unlocked my screen and read the words, but kept glancing at the picture. A black and white sonogram of what looked like a black oval in the middle, with some greyish white stuff towards the upper left. Like so:

 Jellybean is a Peanut
Meg: The dark oval is the gestational sac, and the grayish peanut at the top left of the sac is the baby. 🙂 Heart rate 128. And it’s in the uterus. 🙂
I excitedly didn’t read Meg’s explanation and assumed the whole dark oval was the baby. Later, I re-read her words, squinted, and noticed that yes indeed, there is a grayish peanut in the dark oval, where the yellow arrow is.
I showed Beth. She laughed when she saw the grin on my face. She looked at the picture. “I’ve got to admit, that creeps me out a little bit.”
“Me too… but that’s my kid in there!”
The ten minutes passed, I put my cell phone away and walked back into the classroom, where the trainees were filing back in. “OK,” I said. “Let’s finish up talking about the FACT Act.” My face was still beaming, which probably creeped them out, too. Did I care though? Nope. I’m going to be a dad.
 
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” I later told Meg when I came home.
“No father does. It’s something you learn on the job,” she said.
“I hope I’m going to be a good father.” I wasn’t looking for a compliment. I’m genuinely afraid I’m going to screw it up. How will I handle the tough days? How will I handle punishment, discipline, or the teenage years?
My father’s no great example. I was punished a lot. I deserved it some of the time, although there were times when I was blamed for things I didn’t do.
Once my sister accused me of stealing a cluster of fake grapes off her furniture—I’m not kidding. I was sent to my room for five hours for “lying” when I denied that I had. A month later, my sister found the grapes, which had fallen behind her dresser. (Whenever I walk into Crate & Barrel, I grumble when I spot fake fruit on their kitchenware.)
I got spanked a lot. Sometimes with the hand, but a lot of times with a wooden kitchen spoon. My mom used the spoon to cook with. I’d get in trouble for something during the day, and my mom would tell me that she’d tell my father when I got home. It was like being on death row. There wasn’t anything I could do to convince her not to tell Dad. I never tried begging her not to. I never tried to convince or bribe her. It was too late if she said she was going to tell him, and she always did. I’d go to my room and sit in my misery, awaiting the firing squad. I’d sometimes read the Bible, hoping that my parents would notice I was trying to be a good Christian. It never worked.
Dad would come home, and I’d be summoned to their bedroom, or to the living room. A lecture would ensue—“You need to stop lying.” “You need to stop talking back to your mother.” “I expect you to behave.”
Then the spoon would appear in my father’s hand. I don’t remember my mom fetching it, but I do remember her often saying, “If you can’t learn with your ears, you’ll learn with your behind.” He’d make me bend over his knee. I’d squirm and cry, gulping in air with great sobs. He’d hit me with the spoon on my butt, hard. Three times usually, sometimes more. “You may go,” he’d say solemnly.
I’d leave the room, my butt stinging. Sometimes he’d accidently hit my legs, so they’d usually smart too. I’d sniff, trying to dry my tears. My mouth was dry. The long wait until Dad came home for the punishment was finally over. I’d escape to my room and stare blankly at my Legos, at my other toys, my books, my Bible. I’d wonder how tomorrow would fair.
Sometimes I was lucky and got just his hand instead. I think he learned that this didn’t have as large an effect on me, so sometimes he made me pull my pants down so he could spank me without the material dampening the affect.
Occasionally I would be sentenced to just go to my room and not come out. I’d often be in my room anyway, but when I wasn’t allowed to leave, it was horrible. It felt like I was cut off from the world. All alone, I’d sit numbly waiting for the minutes to tick by on the clock. As I heard my mom cooking dinner, I’d wonder if I would be allowed to eat with the rest of the family. Usually I was, although I’d have to sit with my family, my dad across the table, knowing that I probably would still have to be Talked To, and maybe punished still. I’d eat without an appetite and hope to escape any further reprimand.

As I grew up, being sent to my room wasn’t much of a punishment. I’d listen to music and play with my Legos. I still had to face my dad when he came home, but at least I didn’t have to sit in misery while I waited. My mom found out though, and took my Legos away for a month. (She later apologized, and said that it was wrong that she took my personal belongings, and allowed me to haul my buckets of Legos back to my room.)

Once, when I got in trouble and was awaiting my Dad’s punishment, I sat in my room and got the idea of putting on extra pairs of underwear. I slid on two more layers of tidy whiteys. When my dad arrived home from work and spanked me, it didn’t hurt so much. I felt proud, but didn’t tell anyone.
The worst corporal punishment I received came when I was summoned to my parents’ bedroom to be disciplined. Instead of the wooden spoon, instead of his hand, my dad walked into the closet and got out a wide leather belt. He made me bend over and he whipped me three times with it. I’m not sure which was worse—the pain as I leaned over sobbing, or the feeling of betrayal that I felt.
Goodness.
I didn’t mean to dredge up all these memories.
Meg and I have skirted around the issue a number of times. She’s convinced that my dad was abusive when I was growing up. I’ve never really agreed with her. I don’t know what the norm is—he’s the only dad I’ve known. I never considered him physically abusive. I thought that he was doing a parent’s job, to discipline his children as “head of the household.” Children don’t always behave and some sort of discipline is necessary. Is it a kind of Stockholm syndrome though? Am I defending him because he’s my father and there’s a biological and cultural bond that makes me want to defend him?
But when I think about punishments and discipline, I don’t want to be that guy. I don’t want Meg to tell our child, “You’re in trouble, and I’m going to tell your father when you get home.” I don’t want to be dreaded, to be the father who has to take out the wooden spoon, pull down pants and smack children on their butts. I’ll never whip anyone in my life. I’ll never forget that day I felt the leather belt on my skin. How could my child ever deserve to be treated with such coldness?
I suspect my dad wasn’t a good role model for me, and I’m afraid more than anything else that I’ll inadvertently end up treating my dear, sweet child like my dad treated me. I know my child will test me—all children test their limits for what they can get away with, what their authority and boundaries are. How will I face this?
I’m not my dad, I keep reminding myself. I’m going to love our child fiercely. I’m going to love it so hard it hurts. But when the child tests me, when the child misbehaves on purpose—those are the times I am going to try, with every fiber of my being, to resist being like my own father. When the child tests me, I will test myself.
But still, I worry. Meg says that we’ll probably worry the rest of our lives—for the safety of our baby, for his or her wellbeing. I worry about that, but I worry about myself, too.