If you have daughters, you'll understand the Pinky Swear. If you only have boys, you're one of the very lucky and/or chosen ones whom God Himself has smiled upon, and Who has crowned you with many blessings, holding you harmless from the cruel and unusually strong punishing (ever so eternal damning) of the Pinky Swear. It is, by far, the strongest swearing that can be sworn. It is, by far, the ultimate, the one and the only thing that cannot willfully be broken without such depth of betrayal, and justly, if it is broken, the one breaking it will suffer a deserved eternal damnation in Hell. Everyone knows this.
When I was a little girl my sister Lindsay was the Pinky Swear keeper in our family - don't ask me why, I was never quite clear on the matter as to how it was that she became so important, or what must have happened to other Pinky Swear keepers in our lineage. Surely, there would have been more than just one. I can't tell you how many times yours truly was banned from the backyard, thrown out of the treehouse by the scruff of my neck, down an 8-foot wooden ladder that my dad had made and had attached thankfully at an angle so I would sort of roll down it on my way to the pit of Hell, which was my due punishment as I was cast out of Lindsay's sights.
My mother, for her part, a solid and devote Baptist Christian woman, absolutely assured me over and over again that since I had already (at the age of 6) given my heart and soul to Jesus, I was not going to actually really go to Hell and burn but Lindsay may cause me to feel like the outcast that I apparently was. Why was I being cast out of the tent, the treehouse, the woods, the creek, the room, the porch, or any other place where all of us kids could gather and play together? Because I had at some point in my life, whether knowingly or not, engaged in a Pinky Swear with my older sister not to betray her trust, or not to tell something about her to someone who she hadn't said I could talk to, and low and behold, it only took a few minutes of me being a part of their group before I was picked up and shoved off or out of wherever it was that we were. Me, the damned.
A Pinky Swear is, if you do it correctly, designed to bring out the best in two souls who have decided to spend quality time together and do so in utter honesty. It was created by little girls obviously, and no boy is even allowed to Pinky Swear, but a man can Pinky Swear with his own daughter. He is forbidden, by Pinky Swear Code, to try and Pink Swear with anyone who isn't his daughter, or with someone who doesn't have their own daughters. There must be rules, there must be codes, and everyone knows that. It just is what it is, and you don't try and change things; OK? It's a thang.
Why am I bringing up an ancient and ever-so-immeasurably important ritual? Because my own granddaughter is old enough now to be initiated into the Pinky Swear world of truth-telling; and I just want her to understand that she is never (and I do mean EVER) to feel that she will be utterly banned to Hell for anything she may or may not do after she has taken the grand oath of the Pinky Swear. It's a schtick, we get it, it's not really damning, but it is to a degree in that I won't trust you ever again if you actually break a Pinky Swear with me. You may not die, burn, toast, or rot in an everlasting flame but you will be forever banished to the laundry room during family dinners. I mean, there has to be some sort of penalty, right? Makes me wonder if that's why Gramma Edwards kept the pies out in the laundry room so Papa would have something to eat should she point her fierce index finger into the air and force him to stay out back during supper; that or it could be because he lit up a cigarette in her house and knew the consequences of his actions - - Papa was smart like that. He liked pie. He knew he could have supper, light up, and be thrown out faster than a gnat can blink. PIE!
To this day, and I mean this, I have no idea if I ever actually swore with my big sister what she swears we swore. I really can't tell you if we did or didn't. In our house, if Lindsay said it happened, then it happened up until the minute you could prove otherwise. She was the say, and that's all that was said. I wasn't allowed to like the singers or actors I wanted to like if she liked them. I wasn't allowed to breathe the air she was breathing if she wanted me to stop breathing. Big sisters have the power and the only power I had over Lindsay was our even bigger sister Annie -- I would get put out of the treehouse and make my way to Annie as fast as possible; rules are rules, you abide by them. I had an ACE! Annie liked me. Mike was no help, he was my big brother, but Lindsay was bigger and he was a boy.
To this day, and I mean this too, I don't believe I've ever broken a real Pinky Swear. If I have, I hope I have sufficiently been forgiven and that I won't find myself begging St. Peter to let me into the gates of Heaven after the Rapture -- I'm told Pinky Swears are one thing that can keep you out, but also unpaid Library fines. I made fast and sure to pay those off whenever they came about. Again, Mom assured me it would be OK, but hey, you just need to cover your ass from time to time, don't ya? Sometimes I think that the court systems would be so much more honest if they just made all the women who were going to testify or ask questions to Pinky Swear that the things they were about to say were/would be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, but then again, they do say "So help me, God" don't they? That should be enough.
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