True Punishment

      Once upon a time, when I was a mere youngster, my family and I lived in neighborhood and I had a lot of neighborhood friends.  One day my friends came over and proceeded to convince me to climb the fence with them in order to explore the creepy abandoned trailer that was hidden in the shrubbery a little ways from my house.  Now, being the upstanding little girl that I was and knowing that my mother had told me multiple times NOT to go anywhere near that trailer, I decided that it was best for me to write my mother a little note telling her where I was and to not worry about me. 
      I remember practically shaking as I wrote the note, left it on her dresser, and followed my friends over the fence.  I remember approaching the tall wooden fence that surrounded the trailer's yard and hoping, wishing, and praying that it contained a fairy world on the other side instead of what I knew would really be there. I remember walking into the trailer to see it completely trashed with graffiti covering the walls. I remember the sound of my mother's panic whistle as I raced back home. I remember the guilt and what I know understand is apprehension as my mother told me to wait until my father gets home for punishment. Most of all, I remember how long it took for dad to get home, how long it took for him to bring it up, and just how extremely terrible I felt waiting for that punishment to arrive.

In the end I learned that true punishment is knowing that you did something that disappoints your parents and that waiting for the spanking is worse than actually receiving the spanking.