Long Term Effects

When I was young, the typical response to a quarrel between children was that we had to do a chore together. If we could not do it without fighting (or even bickering, depending on which adult was supervising), we had to do another. For all we knew, it might go on all night. Maybe even forever. I don’t recall that this settled so many arguments between us children.

What it did do was force us to keep our disagreements to ourselves, or at least out of sight of the adults. Many were the times we whispered threats about what we would do to each other later, after the chore was successfully completed. And don’t think just because we were being forced to cooperate we meant any of it. Because we didn’t.

Oddly enough, we rarely followed through with any of those threats. Mostly because by the time we were finished, the life had somehow gone out of the thing and it just didn’t seem that important anymore. There was always something that looked better to do.

One might suggest that this old-fashioned form of correction was stifling to our individual personalities. Maybe even damaging to our psyches. Well, it was. It wreaked havoc on our tempers. Practically devastated our selfishness, and almost did away completely with the temptation to argue in public places. The fact that – to this day – I rarely lose my temper, dislike arguing in public, and have a rather high tolerance for working with difficult people is purely a coincidence. Really.