| t h e • k l e p t o | m a n i a c

Although people usually assume they are making their own choices, I believed my short-lived kleptomania episode was unconsciously triggered by a Disney movie I was continuously watching on our borrowed and old Sony Betamax VCR.
Though in all fairness this wasn't my favorite Disney movie of all times, the whole Robin Hood idea stuck with me like glue.

As a ratherish solitary child, I got pretty creative with my toys which were either ordinary household items or raw materials from nature, like dirt turned into mud pies I ate without hesitation. Scientists may have many speculations about this intriguing need of eating mud I on the other hand, don't have any opinion, I just enjoyed it very much.

Instead of focusing on a behavior that was deemed unacceptable, I forged my own version of the story where I only stole the objects for me, as I needed new and advanced toys now. Backed by strong rationale and with no strong sense of inconvenient guilt I was innocent as a dove unless proved guilty.

Tennis balls could hurt the enamel from the dog's teeth, therefore I began stealing yellow tennis balls soaked in dog saliva for their own safety. I always had a short and sweet backup story as an apology for my sticky fingers. The things I stole were not so diverse. Usually I would steal the same object multiple times, such as the same shoe from the same vendor. Much to my mother's dismay and mortified looks, I kept bringing back and forth the same Puma shoe. It is sufficient to say I was a strange but very prolific child.

Fortunately for me, that phase did not last long and as soon as I turned 7 it stopped abruptly and surely enough the episode disappeared into the macrocosm of my subconscious. However, it did resurface back in my uni years when I ran back to a vendor and had to invent an apologetic story such as how I forgot to pay the bottle from my backpack because I have arthritis and couldn't hold it in my hands. In my defense, I was four days past my bedtime.

I am also a very bad liar.