[continued from previous message]   
      
   > my poem or anything I've told you about it later, as well. I can   
   > understand how desperate you are to change the subject to that poem of   
   > mine - if you do succeed, of course, I'll just move things to a new   
   > thread and leave this one open to write in after you've moved on.   
      
   Is that why you and your Donkey create so many threads on the same   
   topic?  To avoid addressing points that you don't want to (or can't)   
   address?   
      
   I thought it was just to create so many repetitious threads that your   
   adversaries will eventually give up and allow you to get in the   
   all-coveted "last word."  (Another childish conception of "winning.")   
      
      
   >> My mother would   
   >> never have treated me in such an unloving manner.  Hell, I'd tie up her   
   >> guests while they sat in the living room chairs, and she'd just laugh   
   >> and tell them I was just having fun -- which was quite true, although   
   >> her guests often failed to appreciate it.   
   >   
   > You'd "tie up the guests" a la Red Chief and your mother would laugh at   
   > them? I suppose you didn't get many repeat guests.   
      
   For once, your suppositions are correct.   
      
   >> My father was also handsome, in a dark, Sicilian kind of way.  He was   
   >> even more intelligent than my mother, but since he worked all day, he   
   >> wasn't as involved with us as my mother.  He did make time for us   
   >> though, taking us fishing, digging for antique bottles with me in the   
   >> woods behind our house.  He rarely hit us when my mother was alive --   
   >> and then, only when we did something really bad ("Wait till your father   
   >> gets home!").  He suffered an emotional breakdown for two years after my   
   >> mother's death, during which time he was prone to bouts of physical   
   >> violence. I always stood up to him, but a 12-year old boy can't do much   
   >> against a 47-year old man.   
   >>   
   >> After the first 6 months, his violent outburst gradually became less   
   >> frequent, and had stopped altogether by the time two years had passed.   
   >> He felt bad about it, and did his best to make it up to me for the   
   >> remainder of his life (he passed 11 years after my mother).  He even   
   >> bought me an MG! He died when I was 23.  He'd been disabled by a series   
   >> of strokes three years prior to his death, and I returned from the Navy   
   >> to take care of him.   
   >   
   > That last is interesting. Is that what you meant about "finally getting   
   > the upper hand" in your relationship with him?   
      
   No. It isn't.   
      
   I don't recall the "upper hand" statement, but would assume I was   
   referring to my having reached an age-height-weight where I was better   
   able to defend myself against him.   
      
   >> Unlike the self-admittedly autobiographical narrator of your poem, I've   
   >> never wanted to go back to my childhood home and burn it down.  In fact,   
   >> I was deeply saddened when the new owners made it over, making it almost   
   >> unrecognizable.  I often daydream about buying and putting it back the   
   >> way it was in the 1960s and 70, with all of the flowers and blossoming   
   >> bushes and trees my father planted.   
   >   
   > I've read that is the normal response to unresolved issues from one's   
   > childhood: wanting to go back and fix it all up. But that wouldn't make   
   > for a very dramatic ending to a work of fiction and remember, as I told   
   > you, I was writing dramatic fiction, not autobiography.   
      
   I didn't say that I wanted to fix up my broken childhood, George.  I   
   said that I wanted to restore my childhood to *exactly* the way it had   
   been when I was young.   
      
      
   >> Except for my mother's untimely death and my father's consequent   
   >> breakdown, I had an excellent childhood -- insofar as my relationship   
   >> with my parents went.  We were far from rich (lower middle income at   
   >> best by my grandmother's estimation) but my parents spoiled us rotten.   
   >> We had a swing set, a jungle gym, a swimming pool, and a tent in our   
   >> back yard, dozens of pets, they turned their den into a toy room and   
   >> filled it up with toys (my father built us a huge three compartment toy   
   >> box to keep them in, and grew up thinking that we were rich.   
   >>   
   >> In many ways, my childhood was as far removed from yours as possible.   
   >   
   >> But, yes.  During the time of my father's breakdown, I have no doubt   
   >> that I endured far more severe physical beatings than you ever did.   
   >> Best of times/worst of times, as Charles Dickens would say.   
   >   
   > That is not what you said earlier, MMP. In the quoted text you   
   > distinctly mention that you fled from and fought both your parents.   
      
   You are conflating two separate portions of my childhood.   
      
   Before the age of 12, I often received corporal punishment for things   
   that I did.  And I have to admit that I did some *extremely* horrible   
   things, and well deserved any punishment that my parents would have   
   dished out.   
      
   However, I did not submit to the punishments, but ran... and, when   
   inevitably caught, fought tooth and nail against my parents as they   
   attempted to administer said punishments.   
      
   I do not wish to get into the gory details here, but suffice to say that   
   I made Patty McCormack look like an angel in "The Bad Seed."   
      
   From the ages of 12 - 14, I was defending myself against the physical   
   blows of my father, who was suffering from an emotional breakdown due to   
   my mother's death.  I was not being punished at that point.  I was   
   simply an unwilling outlet for his frustration with fate.   
      
      
   >>> thanks. I have no idea if anyone will even read them here, aside from   
   >>> you and I, but if I don't get them down then no one ever will.   
   >>   
   >> Enjoy yourself psychoanalyzing the above.  And, speaking of literary   
   >> characters, my Grandmother always compared me to O. Henry's "Red Chief."   
   >   
   > It may be good background material, but for now it will just go into the   
   > file with all the rest.   
      
   I have left my childhood behind me, George.  The good and bad memories   
   alike, have little to no bearing of the person I have become half a   
   century later.   
      
   If, otoh, my psychological reading of you is correct, your childhood   
   experiences have left you with permanent emotional scars, which cause   
   you to see others as untrustworthy, scheming, lying, egomaniacal,   
   power-hungry "thugs" who are forever conspiring to bring about your   
   undoing.   
      
   You seem to know enough about psychology to grasp how such an outlook   
   might stem from a lack of trust in the love, and intentions, of one's   
   parents.   
      
   --   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)