Sketch 16 - From David Pratt

FAMILY HISTORY OF PRATT/SHIRK LINES

SKETCH 16: Family Discipline

Dad’s usual discipline was to speak to each child privately in a firm but kind voice.  I have never forgotten a time when I was about 5 years old.  It was a hectic Sunday morning in our home in Wenatchee.  We all scurried about to get ready to go to church.  I felt put upon and informed Mom that I was not going to church.  I retreated up the stairs and sat down on the step just in front of Anne’s bedroom door.  It was dark and I was determined to sulk.  My big old Dad climbed the stairs, sat down beside me and put his arms around me.  I knew that he loved me and that he would not force me to go, but that he would be disappointed if I did not go to church.  I have been going ever since.

My two brothers, Richard and Leroy, learned early that they could not outrun Dad.  We three brothers all agreed that there was one line we could not cross.  Dad would not tolerate our sassing, or as we would say today, the verbal abuse of our mother and his sweetheart.  Here is Leroy’s version in his own words of how he learned that lesson:

“When I was about eight years old, our family lived on a farm in Central Washington State.  We were twenty miles from town, the only road a single dirt track.

“My best friend, George Goodwin, lived over the mountain about five miles away.  One day he came to visit.  He rode a horse which we tied up at the corral.  We were having a great time down behind the apple packing shed practicing our ‘cussing.’  The only problem was my little sister Ann kept begging to play with us.  I realize now that she must have been a lonely little girl, but being big boys, we kept chasing her away.  She would run to the house crying and tell mother her troubles.

“Finally, mom came out on the porch, called me, and said, ‘Oh son, let her play with you.’

“In an effort to prove to my friend what a big man I was, I said, ‘Oh go to hell, mom.’  Then the whole world fell on me.  I thought dad was out in the north forty, but it turned out he was just around the corner, and here he came.  He looked as big as a battleship under a full head of steam, and carried a stick that looked as big as a baseball bat.  He grabbed me and got my full attention with that stick.  After he had properly impressed me about how unwise it was to curse my mother, he threw the stick away, sat down and took me in his arms.  I saw that he was weeping, and he said, ‘Son, I love your mother so much, I just can’t bear to see her abused as you have just done.’

“The pain of the stick soon left me, but the pain in my heart from my father’s voice has remained with me to this day.

“I was never rude to my beloved mother again.  I look forward to the day when I step through the veil called death, and find my dear parents waiting for me to escort me to that God who gave me life.”