Day 7 = The Perils of Being the Bratty Youngest

At some point early in our relationship, long before we were ever married, my husband revealed to me a not-so-shocking bit of information about myself. Based on his own keen observations of my behavior, and the obvious fact that I am the third of three siblings, he informed me that I was a prime example of the common species "bratty youngest". He specializes in recognizing the unique set of character traits that are exclusively reserved for the last little one to leave the womb. His expertise in identifying these hot-headed, impulsive, spoiled individuals comes from the fact that he himself is the calm, reliable, responsible middle child. Excluding one uncharacteristic outburst in the the middle of ninth grade, I was surprised to discover that he had never, ever given either of his parents any significant amount of grief, certainly not by bratty youngest standards. When I first observed this mythical creature in his native habitat, I was astounded. No matter how many tricky situations came his way, this guy was an absolute rock. For years, I watched in awe as he gracefully sidestepped every possible parental disagreement that came his way, without raising his voice even one time. This sort of feat is practically unheard of in the land of the littlest child.

For example, I once went on a "date" with him that included involuntary participation in a grueling outdoor endurance challenge being hosted on the lawn of his childhood home. Despite my efforts to rabble rouse, I soon found myself standing in his parent's front yard with a strange object in my hand called a rake. Being the bratty youngest, I had witnessed others using this awkward garden tool, but the correct way to maneuver it was completely foreign to me. Luckily, I am a quick study. Imagine yourself stranded deep in the middle of a 500 acre deciduous forest that has never been harvested. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to remove every last crunchy dead leaf bit, knocking out a minimum of 100 acres before breaking for lunch. I thought I could handle it, until I began to notice the startling amount of floodlights that had been installed around the borders of the property. It was obviously going to be a long day and an even longer night. In order to avoid sacrificing the next seven days of our life, we would have to press on through to the wee hours of the morning. The only interruptions to this overwhelming, monotonous, leaf-slogging drudgery would be brief pauses for hydration, a few high protein snacks, and a handful of thirty-second pee breaks.

When faced with the enormity of this annual task, the bratty youngest part of me wanted to bust my trusty rake in two, launch it into a nearby ravine, and stomp off to my room in a huff. The only problem? It wasn't my rake and I didn't have a room there. Besides, these people were not my parents, who were required by law to love me, no matter how bratty and awful my behavior actually became. His family had a choice when it came to their level of fondness for me. So, with that thought in mind, I half-heartededly began pretending to push around a few leaves. Not to mention, while I had taken a few moments to ponder my options for escape, the unflappable middle child had already raked up a fairly impressive, Everest-sized mountain of leaves. My own efforts had contributed approximately sixteen. To make matters worse, my future spouse maintained a 100% complaint-free work environment, even whistling a jolly little tune to himself while he cheerily raked away. In a genuine display of bratty youngest-ness, I felt like clobbering him with my rake, but I remembered once again that just like his family, he too had a choice when it came to keeping me around. So, without another peep, I grumpily continued to rake deep into the night.

Eventually what started out as some kind of proving ground for the new girlfriend morphed into a somewhat pleasant annual family tradition. I'm not going to lie about it by saying that I actually looked forward to the backbreaking chore each autumn, but I sure did grow to love the company. Perhaps I am finally beginning to reign in my bratty youngest ways. Of course, there are still some days when little miss bratty britches threatens to rear her ugly head, but most of the time I can successfully persuade her to put a sock in it. To those who have fallen victim to my undeniable bratty streak, I truly apologize, especially to my parents who continued to keep and love me, even when it might have been preferable to send me packing. An adolescence of cruel child labor in the coal mines was probably well deserved.

Also, I would like to thank the two guys who first handed me a rake. The first one was my own father. Despite taking a bit of poetic license in my story, of course I had held a rake before. However, the duration of my raking efforts never lasted very long. The sole purpose of our endeavor was for entertainment, not lawn aesthetics. My dad and I would only continue raking long enough to gather enough leaves so that throwing ourselves into the pile didn't risk bodily injury. After years of living in the controlling confines of the city, where anti-leaf propaganda was allowed to run rampant, leaf maintenance at our house had gone the way of the dinosaur. My dad's signature technique was to run them over repeatedly with the riding lawn mower until they were chopped up into little bits, then allow nature to do the rest. We enjoyed this kind of freedom, because without breaking out a pair of binoculars, none of our neighbor's lived close enough to analyze the leaf count in our yard.

Unfortunately, my future in-laws didn't enjoy the same luxury as their homestead was an island of leafiness in a sea of leaf-loathing neighbors. These nearby folks were an aggressive lot who weren't afraid to threaten your livelihood, your home, or your children if you didn't have a comprehensive leaf management plan in place. Fear of retribution by an angry mob is the real reason that I found myself helping out with the annual leaf clean up, not some kind of prospective daughter-in-law hazing program. With a mixture of relief and sadness, the annual family raking ritual has long been contracted to an outside bidder. While I am hardly sad to have abandoned my former rake wielding post, I would give the sun, the moon and the stars to spend one more day of raking in the company of my husband, my son, and my dog, with my father-in-law serving as the foreman of our motley little leaf-gathering crew.

Happy Father's Day to my own fantastic father, who is still willing to throw himself into a pile of leaves, in spite of the fact that he will most certainly regret his exuberance the next morning. To my incredible husband, I promise to continue to work on banishing my inner brat. Thank you for seeing all that I am beyond my bratty birthright. And, to my amazing, late father-in-law, thank you for all the laughter and bits of wisdom that you shared during our crazy leaf-raking marathons. Each of these men have dared to brave the brat in his own unique way. Finally, though the last few paragraphs have been fairly dad-centric, I would be remiss if I did not also mention my mom in a post about being the bratty youngest. Amazingly, she has always managed to love me anyway, bratty bits and all, and for that I will be forever grateful. It was only because of Father's Day that the boys stole top billing. No worries, there is probably not enough space on the entire Internet to handle the massive volume of writing that I would need to do in order to atone for the snarky transgressions of my youth. Until next time.

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