Peter’s mother visited Margo’s Hair Salon every fortnight and as a result, knew the proprietor, Margo very well. As well as the usual soap operas, holidays, celebrity gossip and current affairs conversations, Peter himself is often the subject of their biweekly chats. Like many sixteen year old boys, he gets up to mischief once in a while, but since he got in with a certain ‘crowd’, his mother fears he’s headed down the wrong path.
“When he was little I’d threaten him with a dress… which always did the trick.” she reminisces. “But he’s too old for petticoating.”
“Petticoating?” Margo asks.
“You know… a naughty boy plus a pretty dress equals a good boy.” Peter’s mother replies.
“You put him in a dress when he was naughty?” Margo quizzes, clearly taken aback at the revelation.
“Yes, occasionally… more often than not just the threat of a dress would curb his behaviour.” she replied. “You must have heard of petticoating?”
“Well… I’m familiar with the concept, but haven’t heard it called ‘petticoating’ before.” Margo replies, “…and I had no idea people actually did it.”
“Only when he was really naughty. He used to look quite sweet in a dress… obviously he hated it but…”
The door opened and a customer entered. Margo welcomed the lady and asked her to take a seat. Margo changed the conversation to one more ‘mainstream’ as she finished Peter’s mother’s hair. Before long she was finished. Peter’s mother paid, booked her next appointment and left.
A fortnight later, she returned to Margo’s. “Good morning Heather, how are you?” Margo asked.
“Fine thank you.” Peter’s mother replied.
As Margo begins doing Heather’s hair, the usual small talk begins and it doesn’t take long before Margo brings up the ‘petticoating’ conversation again. “You mentioned you used to put your son in a dress when he was naughty, but if he hated it so much, how did you actually put him in it?”
“Well, the first time he flat refused to wear it a threw an enormous tantrum… I’ve never agreed with corporal punishment so I wasn’t prepared to physically force him in to it.”
“So what did you do?”
“I waited a few days.” Heather replied. “…then one Sunday morning he woke up to find the dress was his only option.”
“And he just wore it?”
“It was either that or spend the day naked.”
“What was it like?”
“Just a plain frock I found in a charity shop. Nothing special, brown plaid with short sleeves and a belt I recall.”
“Did he have just that or did you buy him any more?”
“Oh after a while he had quite a few.” Heather replied. “On several occasions he’d be playing up in town and I’d threaten him with a ‘dress day‘, which usually stopped him in his tracks… but occasionally he’d go too far so I marched him into the nearest charity shop and buy him his next frock right in front of him… he never knew when he’d end up wearing it but he knew it would be soon.”
Margo smiled as she visualised the scene. “Did you hold them against him in the shop?”
“Of course… I think he hated that more than actually wearing it, and I made it perfectly clear to the assistant that it was for ‘him’ because he’d been naughty.”
“It must have been a very humbling experience for him.” Margo said. “Did you make him wear knickers too?”
“Oh yes… but they didn’t come from the charity shop.” Heather replied. “Girl’s shoes and socks too.”
“Poor thing… it sounds delightful.” Margo replied. “When was the last time?”
“Oh… it’ll be around the time he started high school, so five, maybe six years ago.”
“And you haven’t needed to petticoat him since?”
“Well he was getting too old for it and it was only necessary on the odd occasion.” she replied. “Once every month or two I guess… plus once they’ve got a games console, the threat of losing that is usually enough.”