Trying to defend the indefensible

My housemate and I have been friends for more than 20 years and on the way to the tube station last week, via memory lane, the topic of conversation turned to childhood.

We started talking about living with our parents, the things we used to annoy them and their, often failed, attempts at trying to rein us in.

All the standard fare got a mention. The ‘wait until your father gets home’, the grounding (usually lasting for just a few hours) and the often underrated, and now frowned upon, slap.

Then out of nowhere, he said: “Did you ever get accused of showing off?”

It was something I had long forgotten and brought back vivid memories of the hundreds of occasions when my Mum, trying to get me to stop acting up when we had company, would level the immortal accusation.

“All the time,” I said. “And it always worked!”

And it did. The words could make the most unruly teenager stop in their tracks and rack their brains for the best response.

But there isn’t one. And therein was its power.

What could you say that wouldn’t make things worse? Denying that you were showing off always made it look as if you were being nonchalant about showing off – thus making you look even more like a show off.

And admitting to it made you look arrogant. It was like saying “I am showing off. And what of it?”

There was even the schoolmate version. If your mates ever needed to bring you down a peg or two they could accuse you of fancying someone – the least appealing the better because whatever you said just made things worse.

It’s the golden ticket of controlling behaviour – I just wish there was an adult equivalent.