The Great Ping-Pong War.

In "Confessions of an Erstwhile Child," an anonymous author expresses deep concern for a common 20th century paradigm: the accepted view of children as possessions, the forms of treatment endured by children in bellicose homes, and the lack of legitimate options available to obtain release from these lifestyles. The author describes his youth as being an only child observing his parents’ contemptuous relationship; furthermore, he explains his involuntary roles during parental quarrels, his focus on school and study to escape emotional pain, and the consequences that escape has had in his relationships as an adult. Elaborating on the pattern that distressed marriages take, he points out that children whom are consistently exposed to contemptuous relationships will either reject marriage entirely, or duplicate that form of relationship in their adult life.

Exploring historical and modern ideas, he formulates and discusses several remedies to remove children from the paradigm; for instance: monasteries taking in children as done in medieval times, taxation of parents harboring older children as practiced in colonial New England, petitioning for new parents, and adoption with legal procedures catered towards older children. As an erstwhile child, the author walks us through the paradigm, presents his concerns, and gives the reader his viable opportunities to consider.

After reading his article, I can only entertain one conclusion: much of the author’s childhood experience with his family parallels my own. My childhood, however, has an added aspect with which many people in modern western culture are unfortunately familiar: the proverbial exchange of children between divorced parents in order to fulfill a court-ordered visitation. In other words, a child becomes the weapon of choice for parents to enact their rage on, and solidify their animosity with each other in what I lovingly call The Great Ping-Pong War.

The Ping-Pong War, and its subsequent damage to my childhood memories, started for me when I was three years into life courtesy a court-ordered visitation bimonthly with my father, usually weekends. I feel that it is particularly unfair that one of my very first memories should be that of my mother trying to coax me into my father’s car in a supermarket parking lot, all the while screaming obscenities at him so he would ensure I am home in a timely fashion. I also remember in my seventh year on God’s green earth my mother firmly grasping a small bag of cookies from me, cookies I had purchased with my own allowance, and throwing them off our 2nd story apartment balcony at my father for a reason so asinine I fail to remember. I ferry these poignant memories of my early childhood with me from year to year, and they are numerous enough to fill one of those cliché self-help books should I ever be so inclined to write one.

The war took an interesting turn at age nine when my mother remarried and moved us all to another city, thus introducing new forms of ammunition for my parents’ weapon of choice: airfare and distance. If I hadn’t felt like a ping pong ball before, I certainly did now, gallivanting from city to city in a mad quest to keep both parents sedated from their perpetual and mutual animosity. The futility of that quest was apparent when I realized my parents would always argue on whose turn it was to assume the financial responsibility to ship me 260 miles. Six weeks with Dad in the summer season and two holidays, usually Christmas and Thanksgiving, the latter two exchanged on a yearly basis ‘to be fair’ to the other parent.

Fair? Not once was I consulted on my feelings of travel or where it was I actually wanted to be for those important holidays. Instead, I was the confused ping pong ball with a warhead attached; I was subject to the consistent infighting between the two people using me to hurt each other emotionally and financially, yet as their child, I was obligated to love them both. It is hard to respect your parents’ wishes and commands in this situation, and it is even harder to love them both without bias. In retrospect, I hardly see the Ping-Pong War as fair to the parents, and especially taxing and unfair to the child.

The war continues on to this very day, although it has taken a new tone as my age, intelligence, and counter-attacks come into play. The combat ensues through innuendoes, opinions, inference, and recollection of memorable events, which line the daily conversations I have with them in the same way tastefully softened indirect lighting would illuminate a room. No longer is it a war of financial attrition, but of intellectual bias, as they attempt to coerce me into agreement with their respective position against the other. Little do they know, however, that I have acquired my own weapon to deal with their belligerence: indifference, shrouded in a clever pacifist façade.

The author of "Confessions of an Erstwhile Child" presents his childhood and the difficulties he faced then and now quite well to me, even going so far as to state "I am a very cold-hearted man" in his article. I am certain I would view the world and relationships differently had I not had these experiences of my own, and perhaps I would not be cold-hearted in my opinions and dealings with life either. However, if given the opportunity to exchange this experience for something else, I would readily decline.

I believe adversity ultimately defines who we are through our actions and reactions to it, and through this experience I have gained immeasurable strength and wisdom. I have been taught how to treat and respect my own offspring, and have been given strength through childhood memories to cope when my ideals of treatment toward my offspring fail me. I refuse to put any child in my care and custody through their own personal hell: their own Great Ping-Pong War.