The Afternoon I Didn't Go Straight Home

There was a time or two I was an independent little cuss.  Yes, me.  I rebelled.  I remember a time I decided that after school I would go to Robbie Bloch's house to play.  I decide all on my own.  And so I did.  Trouble was, I was a second grader.  And I didn't call my mother to let her know where I was.   Of course it didn't occur to me she would worry.  I knew were I was.  And it was 1958.  Nothing bad happened to little boys in 1958.  At least not that we heard about.  Not is suburban Detroit.  So I had a good time playing whatever we were playing and finally Robbie's mom was making dinner and wondered if I shouldn't be getting home.  "I guess," And so I left to head home.  It must have been late spring because it wasn't anywhere near to get dark.  So I just started back on my usual route home when I saw a familiar figure in the distance.  It was my father.  He was not happy.

Suffice to say I got a bit of a whipping with a thin switch on the way home.  Across the back of my legs.  Didn't hurt much more than my pride.  It began to sink in that what I had done was not a good thing.  Even though we didn't have cell phones, I did know our landline number by heart.  And our address.  We had to learn it in case we ever got lost.  But I wasn't lost....

But my folks didn't know that.

I was grounded for sometime after that.  I think I saw why what I had done wasn't exactly right, but, still.  Okay, it was wrong.  And I never did it again.  To this day I still feel like I need to let someone know I'll be late coming home.  Of course my dogs, Ching and Mig, don't care, even though they do scold me when I get home; mostly because they are hungry I expect.

My mother hugged me oh-so-tight that night at bedtime.  It was then I realized just how worried she and even my dad had been.  Although it was a foolish thing to do, it was also nice to see just how much my folks loved me.  

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