My Aunt Gracie was my dad’s older sister, by about 12 years. I had a great relationship with her and her three boys, Joseph, Patty, and Johnny – especially Johnny, as he was only about a year older than me and we were like brothers. I spent many weekends staying with the family and sleeping with Johnny in his bedroom. Aunt Gracie loved me as much as any of her boys and treated me like a little prince as well. One weekend when I was staying there, Johnny and I foolishly decided to steal some of Aunt Gracie’s cigarettes and go smoke them in the woods. I was nine, so Johnny would be 10. We both eagerly took them and smoked them. Unfortunately, the cigarettes both made us really sick and we ran back to the house, where we promptly threw up. The middle brother, Patty, heard us retching and alerted my aunt that something was wrong. Aunt Gracie saw how sick we had been and demanded to know what had made us that way. Shamefacedly, we admitted that we had taken the cigarettes. It was clear from her face that Aunt Gracie was shocked and definitely not amused. Nevertheless, she first attended to our immediate medical needs. She gave us some liquid anti-nausea medication, which calmed everything down. When she was satisfied that we were feeling better, she put us both in the bath, as the cigarettes (and our reaction to them) had left us smelly and sweaty. Once she had finished bathing us, Aunt Gracie dried us off, put us in our pajamas then told us to go to her own room. We both knew that we were in for it’. After a while, Aunt Gracie came into the room with a large wooden spoon from the kitchen. Johnny gasped when he saw it. Right at the foot of the bed was a vanity table and bench. Aunt Gracie sat down on the bench, facing us boys now sitting very gingerly on her bed. “Right, boys – whose idea was it to take my cigarettes and smoke them?” Johnny blurted out” “It was Eddie’s idea, Mom!” I was shocked because it had very much been a joint venture. Johnny had thrown me under the bus – he had two older brothers who constantly did the same to him, so he knew exactly what he was doing. Aunt Gracie motioned Johnny to come over to her, and he did, very unwillingly. She pulled her son across her lap and began spanking him with the spoon, right in front of me. He didn’t take it well. Because he was the youngest child in the family, Johnny generally got away with many more things than an older child would, so I guess he wasn’t spanked that often. I, on the other hand, was the eldest in our family – I was spanked for pretty much everything! As the wooden spoon began to do its job, Johnny began to sob and just looked at me. Aunt Gracie finally finished and let her son up from her knee.  I had never seen anyone else spanked before this, so I was curious. Aunt Gracie told Johnny to sit back on the bed, and then called me over to her, as it was now my turn. My aunt pulled me across her lap and showed me the spoon. She knew I had never been spanked with one before because she knew everything about my spankings from my parents. Then she began to spank me. In all honesty, the spoon didn’t hurt as much as Mom or Dad’s hand when they spanked me. It did sting, for sure, but it was bearable. I looked over at Johnny and he was grinning at me. He must have been thinking: “Eddie watched my spanking – now I’m watching his.” By this time, Aunt Gracie had used the spoon on my bottom to about the same shade as her son’s, but because I was dumb and didn’t cry, she began to spank me again, this time with her hand. I looked over at Johnny – he was staring at me as Aunt Gracie robustly slapped my bottom. I finally began to squirm and cry somewhat, so Aunt Gracie let me up and told me to sit on the bed next to Johnny. She then lectured us both about what we had done. “Don’t you boys ever do anything like that again,” she thundered. “If you do, neither of you will sit down for a month of Sundays!” Aunt Gracie then dismissed us, and told us to get to bed. We walked out of her bedroom and ran into Patty in the hallway. He had probably seen (or at least heard) the whole performance as his mom’s bedroom door had been open the whole time. In spite of the pain and embarrassment, the whole episode only really caused all of us to bond even closer. Johnny, Patty, and I were like older brothers, and Aunt Gracie was like a second mother to me. Now both well spanked, we went into Johnny’s room, and obediently put ourselves to bed, even though it was only about three in the afternoon. Later, Aunt Gracie called us down for dinner and let us watch TV for a while after we had finished eating. I truly thought that would be the end of the matter – but unfortunately for my bottom, that wasn’t the case. A couple of days later, when Dad came to take me home, Aunt Gracie told him what had happened. To be fair, Dad was fine with the status quo – I had been well punished and he felt the matter was closed. The problem was that Mom didn’t feel the same way. I think she felt like she should have been my disciplinarian, not Aunt Gracie, in this matter. The day after I got home, I was in the tub taking a bath, when Mom came in and said: “Eddie, Aunt Gracie told me everything that happened with you and Johnny and the cigarettes. I am going to spank you when you finish your bath.”  I was shocked and started to cry. I said: “Aunt Gracie already spanked me.” Mom didn’t answer but just turned and walked out – I felt it was so unfair. After a few more minutes, Mom ordered me to get out of the tub, dry myself off, get dressed, and come into her room. I was still sobbing but there was nothing I could do. I obeyed and sheepishly walked over to her room. Mom was sitting on her bed, waiting for me. The bed was a very elaborate king-sized with a wooden headboard, shelves, and matching end tables – very fancy and pretty high off the floor. Without saying another word, Mom pulled me across her lap and perfectly balanced me so my legs were dangling off the floor in the air and my head and shoulders were down so far that I was getting dizzy.  I tried one last time, sobbing as I protested: “Aunt Gracie already spanked me and I said I was sorry!” Mom very firmly replied: “That does not count, my boy.” She began spanking me hard and fast and the pain was immediate. When Mom finally ended the spanking and let me up. She turned me towards her and said: “Eddie, I talked to Aunt Gracie about this. She did not spank you enough. You were such a bad boy! Do you understand?” “Yes, mommy,” I blurted out. Then she said: “Do not tell Daddy about this, or I will spank you again.” She turned me away from her to get a good long look at my super-spanked backside, then  said: “Go to your room – and don’t come out until I tell you.” I ran into my room and stayed there until I got the OK to come out. I kept thinking how unfair it was that Aunt Gracie spanked me more than she spanked Johnny, and then I got another spanking from mom for the exact same thing. Much later, when Dad came home and we were having dinner, he could see that it was very difficult for me to sit in my chair. He looked at me and asked if there was anything wrong. “No, no!” I again blurted out. Dad looked confused but didn’t say any more – I think he realized I had been over my mother’s knee. Nor was this the last time I was spanked in front of another child. I got my bottom warmed by Mom in front of my little brother because I had hit him in the head. It was well deserved and he was happy to see me get it, judging by his expression. But the absolute worst experience was with my grandma and a very large clothes brush – again, it was well deserved. To this day I still don’t really understand why I was such a brat, even though I was spanked at least once a month for at least seven years. I only remember the most severe spankings, but those I recall like they happened yesterday. On another occasion, I got a spanking from Mom which was so hard I couldn’t sit down afterward, because it felt like I was sitting on a campfire. Mom interpreted this as disobedience and I was spanked for a second time. After the second dose, I somehow forced myself to sit, even though it felt like I was perched on a volcano.