Featured image by Bruno /Germany from Pixabay
Opening her eyes she said “I told you what has become of this housing park. Personally I never cared one way or the other when it came to guns. Lots of people around here hunted. During pheasant and shotgun deer season you could find at least a dozen guns in the pickup trucks in our high school parking lot. Nobody thought anything of it. Of course teachers could still spank kids then. Despite all of the flower child studies, it does correct behavior. Yes, sometimes teachers just liked to spank one or two kids far more than they should, but the flower power generation threw the baby out with the bathwater.”
Sitting up she continued “You got a three day suspension for fighting in school back then. If your parents could put you to work for those three days it was out of school, otherwise in school. They believed in making kids work back then so they would appreciate just how easy they had it in school. Bullying wasn’t such an issue. If ass crackings and suspensions didn’t work, the teachers would find out who was doing the bullying and have enough of the other dudes correct the bully’s behavior, usually during PE. You can be the biggest guy in school, but, if ten to twenty other guys are told to put you down, and there wouldn’t be any punishment if you didn’t have to leave in an ambulance, that becomes a serous behavioral modification.”
Staring more intently into my eyes she said “it wasn’t just guys. Same thing happened to girls. At least it happened to Julie. When I was pregnant and having a really tough time staying in school, one of the teachers had some of the more athletic girls educate her.”
“Quite a few of the guys called them Bull Dykes. I don’t think any of them were lesbians, but, they fit the stereotypical build found in movies and on television. They also played every sport and stayed to workout more when practice was over. Julie got a lot more discrete with her bullying after that. Eventually she stopped. At least she did by the time I was as big as a house and obviously miserable. I don’t know if she was educated again or if the rest of the girls began to realize they couldn’t be a mom without going through what I was going through. However it came about, the bullying stopped. I never got to ask her. She barely said two words to me after she moved in here.”
“Oh, in fact” she continued in a surprised manner, “you know two of them aren’t lesbians.”
“How would I know that?” I asked.
“Melissa’s twin sisters were involved with that thing at the bar. I admit, it’s hard to tell the twin thing now, but that was them and their hubbies. We became friends after each of them got married. Doctors and hospitals can give you all of the books and videos on pregnancy they want. Nothing beats being able to talk with a girl your age who has gone through it” she said rather proud of herself.
I just looked into her eyes and remained silent. I could tell she wanted to go on a “proud mom” rant, but I opted to not poke that bear. I was already beginning to lose feeling in that arm again. When it finally sunk in I wasn’t going to tempt fate she returned to the prior conversation thread.
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