I should have really withdrawn from such a private and intimate conversation, but I lurked just around the corner of the next room and began to eavesdrop on the call. It seemed that Mary had taken her daughter Dawn shopping for a new fancy formal dress and she had acted up in the shop, complaining about the style of her intended new clothes. She was basically running around the shop and crawling on the floor while having a tantrum. Eventually, Mary must have decided discipline was necessary. She turned her daughter around with her bottom to facing her, then smacked Dawn several times with her open hand. However, Mary had followed up the ad hoc discipline with the threat of a proper spanking when she got Dawn home. As soon as they arrived, Mary put Dawn to face the wall, to both think about her misbehavior and ponder the punishment which would inevitably soon follow. After Dawn’s new clothes were put away, Mary had gone to the dining room where her daughter was in disgrace. She removed the hairbrush she kept for spankings from the dresser, pulled out a straight-back chair and called Dawn to her. She put her across her lap, and went to work with the hairbrush.