the devil

Just the other day, my meow encouraged me to confess on all the bad things I’d ever done to my brothers as a kid and the recollections caused me to wonder if, as a child, I was a little demon sent to destroy earth.

OK, confession time, if only to return me a clearer conscience and a better chance at going to heaven.

I have 2 younger brothers, 2 years younger, and 5 years younger. We were wee kids. We invented fun games… we thought they were fun games… our parents banned them, at least, if they were to know about them, they would… we played them anyway… sigh… OK.. Here goes…

Regretful Incident No. 1
We had this game where we take turns being the blind man. One other person would hold the hand of the blind man and walk a great distance. E.g. from bus-stop to home. Being older, and therefore, more cunning, and less trusting, I often had my eyes only partially closed.

One day, my youngest brother was the blind man and I was the guardian. As a banned game, it was played on the silent and we walked behind our parents on our way to our granny’s. After a great many “step up, turn left, cross drain”, my mom suddenly turned to talk to me. Struck by guilty conscience, I totally forgot about my 4 year old “blind” brother and allowed him to walk hard into a wall! It was a very hard knock right on the forehead and he even bounced back a little.

As it was a game played on the stealth, he didn’t dare to cry. Being the chicken I was, I told my mom I didn’t know why he was so stupid to walk into a wall…

Regretful Incident No. 2
The family went to the shopping mall and parents had to do some serious (read: boring) shopping. 3 kids decided to hang around. Us 2 older kids decided that the escalator looked like a great toy to play with. Upon encouragement by the big sister, me, the toddler joined in pure innocence: the running up of a downward escalator.

However, in the excitement of the moment, the 2 older kids decided to do a race and the good sister, me, forgot all about the baby. Toddlers don’t have good balancing abilities. So it should not have been a surprise when he rolled down the escalator… and got all cut up. Being the chicken I was, I told my mom he ran by himself to play on the escalator and 2 of us did not manage to stop him in time.

There are a few more.. well, next time.