My friend Tim and I had been on the outs over something stupid and it came to a head right at the start of noon recess on a warm and sunny early fall day just after the start of fourth grade, when we were both 9 years old. He said something smart to me, I pushed him, he smacked me across the face, and we were soon rolling around on the ground. Our teacher had seen the whole thing from the start and had us apart before a crowd could even form around us. Mrs. Nelson led us back into the classroom, where she had us talk out our problems. Tim and I made up within a couple minutes, and we thought everything was fine, but that's when the lecture started. After probably about five or six minutes of being scolded about fighting, Tim and I were both softly crying. Mrs. Nelson finished up the lecture, and once again Tim and I thought everything was alright, but then she went over to the windows and closed the blinds. Our teacher had us bend over opposite ends of her desk, and she spanked the daylights out of both of us with an eighteen inch wooden ruler. First she gave Tim a couple hard smacks, then came around and smacked my butt a couple times. When she went back to Tim's end of the desk she gave him four or five, and came back and gave me the same. All in all we probably each got twenty to twenty-five smacks, maybe thirty at the outside, but we were both bawling before it was over. Mrs. Nelson was young (it was her first year teaching), and she spanked really hard. When she was done with the spanking she had us stay in position until it was time for the other kids to come in from recess, before she sent us to see the principal.

After another lecture about fighting on the playground, I got my paddling from the principal first with Tim watching. Mr. Wayne had me bend over the front of his desk and hold onto the opposite edge. Then he moved his desk chair out of the way so I could see the clock mounted very low on the wall behind his desk – the big round school clock with a red sweep second hand. After he was satisfied that I was properly in position, he went to the cabinet on the other side of his office and got the big paddle out. He got into position behind me and rested the paddle against the seat of my jeans, with the second hand at about the six. As the second hand approached the twelve he drew the paddle back, and when that red second hand was straight up at the twelve the big paddle smacked my bottom really hard. Then there was the wait, watching that red second hand moving ever so slowly around. When it was about at the nine he started to draw the paddle back again, and when it returned to the twelve the second hard smack came crashing down across the seat of my jeans. The dozen smacks I got with that big paddle seemed like the longest twelve minutes of my young life, but it did end and Mr. Wayne guided me up and sat me down in the chair next to Tim. After a couple minutes I had settled down a bit and my crying was easing, then Mr. Wayne got Tim into position over the front of his desk. Tim's paddling went just as mine had, then Mr. Wayne sat him back down beside me. After twenty minutes or so he sent both of us back to class.

Right before it was time to get ready for the bus ride home Mrs. Nelson presented Tim and I each with notes to take home to tell our parents about our fighting and our spankings. I knew what that meant for me, and I pretty well suspected that it meant about the same thing to Tim. Getting into trouble at school had always meant that mom would spank me as soon as I got home, and dad would give me another good one later that night.

Since Tim and I only lived about a mile apart, we rode the same bus. The other kids who hadn't teased us at all in class, or even at afternoon recess, were merciless on the bus. And of course by that time all of the older and younger kids knew about what had happened to us too. They taunted us about our spankings and our crying, about the way we had squirmed and shifted in our desk chairs all afternoon, about how red our little asses must be, and about what we were both probably in for at home. At Tim's house, he ran away from the bus crying, and the bus driver told everyone to knock it off before we continued on toward my house.

When I got inside with my note, mom gave me a good bare-bottom paddling and made me sit in my room until supper. When dad got home from work he came to my room and I had to tell him all about what had happened. Then of course he told me he'd be spanking me later, but he didn't say what he was going to give me.

After supper and before dad had told me anything about how much of what I was in for, Tim's dad pulled into our driveway with Tim in the car. My dad talked to Tim's dad outside the front door for a minute or so, then came in and told me we were heading out back to the spanking post. We met Tim and his dad outside the back door, and we all walked up to the fence line together. My dad and Tim's dad both cut ash switches, and Tim and I both bent over to get whipped. For some reason we didn't get our butts bared like I always did for my whippings. I don't know if my dad and Tim's dad had talked about it first or not, but we got the switches on the seats of our jeans. They started off with Tim's dad switching him and my dad switching me probably 15 or 20 licks each, then they traded off so Tim's dad switched me and my dad switched Tim about 10 times each, then they traded back and finished up with probably 15 or 20 more. As soon as they were finished Tim's dad tossed his switch onto the brush pile, said thanks and good-bye, took Tim by the arm, and headed back across the garden to his car. Tim was looking out the side window and I gave a little wave as they started down the road toward home. Dad sent me to my room, and told me sternly that I had to sit in my hard wooden chair facing the corner until bedtime.

When bedtime came around, dad sent me back to the fence line and gave me a good whipping with his doubled belt, and he did bare my red and welted butt for that. Both Tim and I had trouble sitting still in class the next day, and Tim told me that he had gotten a good belt whipping on his bare ass before he went to bed too. The teasing on the bus ride home was pretty bad again that afternoon, but the next day there was a sixth grade boy who was obviously nursing a sore and tender butt so the teasing shifted to him. Of course Tim and I joined right along with it, being resilient as kids are.