Teased

As a result of a childhood scarred by sibling rivalry, I do not like to be tickled, and I do not like to be teased. Don’t call me by my middle name in a sing-song voice, don’t threaten to bury my favorite doll in the sandbox, don’t call me Olive Oyl, don’t hold me down and tickle me. I don’t like it – and by the way, Dr. Seuss, I don’t like green eggs and ham either.

We’re familiar with the scenario – we have our personalized details, but the plot is the same.  And, much like bullying, the more the victim whines, cries or complains to mom, the more the teaser teases.  Not the happiest of childhood memories for any of us, I’m sure. (Note to self: don’t be too quick to forget the role of the bossy older sister in the rivalry). P.S. we get along fine today.

The mental health worker in me realizes that tickling and teasing can be actions a person in power foists on someone with less power. It may start out with good-hearted intentions, but all too often teasing ends up being a kid brother to bullying. I was curious to see what the experts had to say about this, so I did some research on the subject, and I discovered Dr. Dacher Keltner, who has developed a definition of teasing: “an intentional provocation accompanied by playful off-record markers that together comment on something relevant to the target.”

OK. Putting it into everyday language, teasing is either words or actions designed to provoke another person, and what separates it from bullying is the marker – the smile, the laugh, the irony, the sing-song voice, the exaggeration. Peter Gray, another expert on the subject, suggests that teasing has valuable purposes - it can express acceptance, promote humility, and can be used as a means of correction and social control or a test of social relationship. I don’t know, Dr. Gray – I not sure my brother’s teasing expressed acceptance or promoted humility in me –I thought it expressed an “I don’t like you” attitude and promoted humiliation in me.

I’m feeling somewhat teased these days, not by my brother anymore, but by the promise of spring. Yes, I know we’re a few days short of the official first day of spring, but it definitely tickled us with its warm fingertips as we basked in a 70 degree day this past Sunday – It was so warm the temperature broke a record – I read about it on the front page of the T-G so it must be so.

Ah, spring, you are such a tease. You tempt us with the pale blue crocus arising in the midst of the winter-ravaged yards. You whisper your promise in the fragile paperwhites that cluster near the fence. Bathing suits on the racks at Wal-Mart, a cardinal in our maple tree, and lots of traffic at the A&W – surely the days of winter are numbered. Now would someone please inform the snow-maker that it’s time to pack it in for the season?

The promise of spring makes me wonder if the lovely Madelyn Simone is old enough yet to read bits and pieces of Burnett’s “The Secret Garden.”  Do you remember the line when Colin asks Mary, “Is the spring coming?’ and she replies, “It is the sun shining on the rain and the rain falling on the sunshine, and things pushing up and working under the earth?” What a perfect description.

Yes, springtime, you’re provoking me, but unlike the teasing of my brother so many years ago, I can accept your taunting, because I know that by March 20, the Vernal Equinox, Old Man Winter will be officially banished from these parts as you send him on his way. I’m so ready. I’m ready to pack away the boots and parkas. I’m ready to fly a kite. I’m ready for March Madness to start, cheering on our Buckeyes and Lady Eagles. And I’m more than ready to proclaim, as Rainer Maria Rilke did so many years ago, “It is spring again. The earth is like a child that knows poems by heart.” Ready or not, spring is on its way!