A small step back in reflection...

After finishing the last post I started thinking back to my early adolescence and it struck me that I would need to give a little more detail about the circumstances that turned me into the horror child from hell :-) so here is a brief outline of the personalities that molded me in my youth.

Father (real father remember :-))
I've already mentioned that he is the artistic type, complete with brooding good looks and temperament. In addition to all this he is quite posh, came from a fairly well off English family where education was the most important rite of passage. He is also very liberal and surrounds himself with quirky yet incredibly interesting people.

20 years ago*, he had some less desirable character traits. He was a snob, had an intense aversion to Afrikaans and he preferred the company of woman who were a lot younger than him (not illegally young but definitely young). He also had absolutely no concept of discipline both for himself and his daughter. His way of dealing with bad behavior was to turn it into an adult conversation, to be dealt with on adult terms.

Dad (step-father remember :-))
My dad couldn't have been more different from my father. In fact he epitomised everything that my father despised. He was Afrikaans, from a working class family and happy with his lot(and ultimately the lot of his step daughter).

20 years ago** his approach to parenting involved extreme discipline ranging from simple grounding right through to serious spanking. He definitely came from the school of 'children should be seen and not heard' and he took the job of step father very, very seriously. I suspect that there was a bit of overkill involved there but who could blame him huh?

So baring the above in mind, I entered adolescence a little confused. On the one hand I was treated as a young adult who's opinion was seriously considered at all times and who never received any kind of discipline and on the other I was subjected to regular spanking for my 'smart' mouth and opinionated ideals.

I guess the differences in parenting created the ideal opportunity to manipulate things to my best advantage, especially as none of my parents ever spoke to one another.

Things began to get seriously out of control around the age of 13 when life at home with my mom and dad was at its worst. My dad had taken to drinking a fair amount and his relationship with my mom had soured resulting in massive arguments and much name calling. My sister (the first child from my mom and dads marriage) was 6 at the time and I spent a lot of time trying to protect her from their problems. On one occasion I can remember my mother coming home at around 6pm having worked overtime to get some extra money in. My dad was convinced that she had been having an affair and told her so in no uncertain terms. The more she tried to explain where she had been, the worse his anger became and the resulting argument began to spiral out of control. I remembered him saying to my mother that she could take me and leave and that she was no longer welcome in his house and I remember this as being the first time that my lack of fear for confrontation came to the fore. I entered the room and stated very clearly that he was the unwelcome one and that it should be him packing his bags and leaving. His reaction was unprecedented, he unceremoniously picked me up and threw me against a piano in the room. I don't remember the exact words that he said, but I know they were very unsavoury. I also remember that my mom didn't do a thing.

The following day, I phoned my father and told him what had happened. I expected that he would immediately fetch me and claim his right as a father. Unfortunately it quickly became apparent that this idea definitely didn't fit into his plans. Instead he said that he couldn't intervene in my mom and dads problems and that I should just stay out of their troubles. This was the first time that he had directly put his owns needs before mine. This was to be the first of many disappointments...

VP

* I have to clarify that he is a very different man today. Circumstances have changed so much that he is completely unrecognisable as the man that I have described above and I now respect him in many ways.

** Again, to clarify, my dad has since become a wonderful father and is also unrecognisable as the man I have described.