adult fear of chalkboards

So this post is mostly for my siblings. No one else will get it or laugh as hard! This past Sunday I went to my mom's ward to play the flute while she sang, and then I stayed and attended Sunday School-Gospel Doctrine-where she is the teacher. I have the same calling in my ward, so we talk about the lessons together. She was up there just chatting away and then did something that took me back to my very early days....and I just about SHAT in my skirt!!! She grabbed a piece of chalk and wrote on the chalkboard!!!!! GREAT BALLS OF FIRE! The look of her writing and the sound of the chalk on the chalkboard just about caused me to have a mini stroke.

Imagine in your mind the biggest chalkboard EVER--then double it! That is what hung on an ENTIRE wall in the kitchen of the house I grew up in. Oh sure it was great when I was really little to draw pictures and work on my numbers and letters, but as soon as you were old enough to talk back to my mom, your name went on the board--and never left, until you physically left!!! I am the 5th of 8 kids with a 5 1/2 year gap between me and my younger sister. So I was the youngest of the older 5, and then became the oldest of the younger 4--make sense? Does to me. So I experienced varying versions of the chalkboard between all the kids. Anyway, your name was placed in order of age. Underneath your name, my saint-of-a-mother would list the things we needed to accomplish in the day it looked something like this:

Megan

feed chickens and gather eggs (no, really, we had a small chicken farm)

feed rabbits/dogs/cats (we always had pets)

sink

clean room

make bed

k-job ( kitchen job as per day of the week and last number of the day's date--my dad made up this chart)

practice flute (1/2 hour)

practice piano (1/2 hour)

And that was the list of the things to be done BEFORE we went to school. Our after school list looked like this:

Megan

x-job (extra job i.e., vac stairs, hall, and living room, OR wipe all cupboard fronts in kitchen, OR clean out fridge, OR mop kitchen floor etc.)

homework

practice piano OR flute (1/2 hour)

k-job (same kitchen job as per chart)

I mean our entire lives focused around the chalkboard. We weren't allowed to go anywhere or do anything with friends unless both lists were completed and......wait for it......ABOVE our names was completed as well...Dun Dun Dun.....ABOVE our names is where we accumulated negative points for not finishing our jobs, sassin' back to mama, mumbling, not making curfew, and most of all trying to get in the last word! Oh I am laughing right now thinking back on this. When I was the youngest of the 5, negative points were in increments of -10. So you'd get a -10 above your name for each thing "done wrong," or not done at all. I can't remember who holds the record for the highest number above their name, but it was in the high thousands! Whatever your accumulated number was, was the amount of items of clean laundry you had to sort. Ya, it pretty much sucked. We would have to have above and below our names cleared or crossed out before we could leave the house. There were times on special occasions (last minute date, last minute football game, last minute invite from a friend) that you were allowed to leave the house without above your name being cleared, HOWEVER, the number above your name DOUBLED! HELLO! We're talkin' party Friday night and then spend all day Saturday in the basement folding laundry. You knew mom was especially angry if she put the letter "I" next to the number. That. Meant. Ironing! (insert evil laugh here). We had a huge box of my dad's and brother's dress shirts that was somehow ALWAYS full! That took a lot longer than sorting clothes. When I became the oldest of the youngest 4, there was a "cost of living" adjustment and the -10 turned into increments of -20, -50 and in some cases -100. WHOA! But we also could get positive increments of the same amount for outstanding work or attitude. The chalkboard later in its life, also threatened time amounts above your name. That represented the amount of time you would have to go and WEED a certain section of the front or back yard. What a riot huh? I mean now it is. Back then...not so funny. But then it kind of became funny as a certain brother may or may not have cared how many "clothes" he got above his name and just wanted to annoy my mom by trying to get in the last word, last breath, last sigh, etc... I was there. It was ugly. :) I also remember a time, with a different brother, that my mom actually crawled across the kitchen bar to get to him! Awesome! Can I get a Thunder Cats? Wa Oh! I should have started with a disclaimer that my parents are flippin' awesome and did a great job! We just had a very intense work ethic. Don't worry the chalkboard "worked" year round. Ya, there was no summer off for him or us. It was a rite of passage when the day came that you either moved out of the house or got married, and picked up that eraser and removed your name from that old-school green dusty chalkboard. I'd like to say there were tears shed, but I'm pretty sure there weren't, and if there were, they were tears of sheer joy.

Funny huh? I could on and on, but I will stop for now.