Being the youngest of seven, you learn a lot about what you can and can not do to a frazzled woman with seven children. The oldest kids didn't get away with anything. Mom was still young enough to chase them around the house, and I mean that literally. Round and round and up and down until her hand or foot finally caught up to their behinds. Once Dawn was running away from Mom through the living room, kitchen, dining room - around and around - trying to avoid a spanking. Fearing the inevitable, she grabbed a book off a table and shoved it in the back of her pants - while running. When our Mother finally caught up to her and smacked her behind, her hand hit the book instead and they screeched to a halt as Mom screamed in anger pain. That only made Dawn's face turn pale white as she realized she may have avoided THAT spanking, but NOW she was gonna get one of those spankings that landed a smack on the butt with every syllable; "Don't (smack) You (whack) ever (whack) EVER..."
With her first few teenagers, she was still full of energy. She raided rooms and hunted for evidence of cigarettes or drugs. (She never found Renee's stash of cigarettes in the plastic horse's ass!) She strung strings with empty cans and created a "sound trap" on the cellar stairs to catch teenagers sneaking out at night. (eh hmm Dawn.) She interrogated friends and boyfriends, their parents, their school bus drivers. She bugged telephones, read diaries - relentless detective work. Filthy room? She was far past yelling or grounding. She loaded the entire contents of their room while they were at school and took it to the dump, as promised. "You want to treat it like a dump, a dump it is!".
But, alas, seven kids will eventually catch up with even the liveliest Mother Hen. As the years went by, she became increasingly less ambitious when it came to punishment. By the time the fifth and sixth became teenagers, she was pretty choosy as to which crime required action.
Heidie must have been feeling pretty confident that Mom had been worn down enough the day she decided to pull off a prank.
We'd all piled into the car to head out to Duff's Restaurant - the town's only all you could eat buffet. "Get Stuffed at Duff's!". Heidie, Renee and I jumped in the back seat, Dad drove and Mom was in the passenger's seat. Heidie and Renee were unusually quiet back there. I wondered why they were staring so intently at Mom as she reached into her purse and pulled out her cigarettes. I can still see it in slow motion - seeing Mom in the passenger side mirror slowly put the cigarette in her mouth and light it. Heidie and Renee staring intently, half-smiling and half biting their lips.
Just before my Dad backed out of the driveway - BANG!!! There was a flash, a puff of black smoke, my mother screaming, Dad slamming on the breaks and the roar of laughter from Heidie and Renee. Slowly, Mom turned around with her face all black - the whites of her bulging eyes turning right to the two of them. Heidie had placed an exploding cigarette cap in Mom's cigarettes. Once she realized what had just happened, that big old heavy black purse of hers came flying up over the front seat, swinging furiously at Heidie and Renee, while I - the innocent baby of course, almost peed from laughter. I don't know what was funnier - her black face with a broken cigarette hanging out of it, or my sisters getting whacked with that bag.
