In which I am blown away at how quickly this happened

When did I lose control? Where is the mother of days like these and this one?





I just spent 10 minutes vacuuming the kids' rooms while they attacked me with legos from the hallway, laughing at every menacing threat I could concoct.





When did I become the loser substitute teacher...the old lady who lives with 12 cats...Gil Buckman?





I'LL tell you when. It was when we decided not to spank our kids (the real kind of spanking -- with belts and all) like we got when we were young. Why is that? I'm not scarred from the whuppin's, I don't have issues with my parents -- what makes me so against beatings, uh I mean, spankings?





If I'm honest with myself, I'm just tryng to impress the Parents Magazine mommies who do everything by the book. I'll bet we wouldn't have quite as many scarred walls, broken pieces of furniture, destroyed antiques and heirlooms as we do had we opted to take the spanking route in the first place.





Then again, there's really no way I could go through with it. I'd probably screw up and let the belt go all loose and not slap correctly, then I'd have to try again, at which time I'd also likely fail, and by then they'd have already left the room. aaaarrrggghhhhhh.