"the jam is live in effect and I don't waste time off the mic with a dope rhyme" - C&C Music Factory, "Gonna Make You Sweat'

Gonna Make you Sweat

Think back to when you were young. Do you remember your Christmas concerts? Dressing up in new clothes, gigging with the person next to you in line, searching for your mom or dad in the crowd? I always loved preening, loved singing, loved the recognition.

My 3-year-old, apparently, is no different. Tonight was his very first concert. He was super pumped for it. He'd been asking me every morning for a week if it was the day for his concert, and he was always disappointed when I said no. This morning, though, I affirmed his suspicions. I herded him off to the sitter and went off to work.

When school was out, I ran up to Walmart to get him dress shoes. I already had a pimp little dress outfit for him, complete with vest and tie. Then I picked him up and went home to get him ready and eat an early dinner. The paperwork specifically said to not be at the school before 5:20 - it mentioned this several times - because it was important to allow them time to set up. At 5:15, then, SC and I got into the car and drove the 3 blocks to his school. We met his dad there and walked him inside.

It was packed. Those people had to have been there at least an hour early. They were jealously guarding seats at tables throughout the entire gymnasium. We took SC down to the green room and handed him off to his teacher (who gushed to the other teacher "Oh, Deb, look at him! He has a vest and a tie. He is SO CUTE" . She's not a very gushy person, so I felt good). Then PsychoEx and I went looking for a place to sit. We saw plenty of open seats, so we'd go up to that table and ask if anyone was sitting there. The people would look away and mumble, or say "umm... maybe... uhhhh...." and a couple, before we asked, directed their small children to put coats over the chairs. It was very rude - and if you know me, you know that I hate rudeness. After a few minutes, I commented loudly, "It's okay, someone will let us sit down. These are CHRISTIANS, right? They wouldn't be hypocritical."

All that got me was dirty looks. Hypocrites don't like being called hypocrites.

Eventually, we found seats in the back (far, far back) and got ready for the show. The 3 and 4 years olds marched in, single file. The first 20 or so looked around, terrified, at all the people and kept marching straight ahead. And then, SC came walking in. He was confident, strolling along, looking around. He saw me and I grinned and waved. He shouted, "Mommy! There's my Mommy!" very loudly, and the whole gymnasium laughed. He kept telling people (loudly) as he walked up, "My Mommy and Daddy are back there." When he got to the stage, he sat down and immediately began waving at me again. The other kids were waving to their parents by then, too, so the stage resembled a parade float.

Eventually, the show started. The kids began to sing their first song, and you couldn't hear them. Well, you could hear one of them. Guess who that was? Yeah, my kid's voice rang out loud and clear. He didn't know all the words, either, so he just made them up. "Up on the housetop, floofy flaws... out jumps good old Kooky Kaws..." He also stood up and began dancing. Now, I'm not talking about swaying to the music or doing some dance step. Some of you guys have seen me dance. It was like that - all weird, with strange hand motions and tons of butt action - but it was his own version of it. He does this neck twist thing; I don't know, it's strange. I began laughing hysterically; the whole room was howling after a few minutes. I heard parents around me explain to their guests, "Oh, that's SC. He's a hoot." and I thought, great. My kid's a fucking celebrity with the upper-class snotty Methodist crowd. Sweet.

I don't think SC knew the second song very well, though. The other kids were doing some hand motion, and SC just stick a finger up his nose and sat there, mumbling along. I kept trying to mime "PULL YOUR FINGER OUT OF YOUR NOSE EWWW" but he selectively chose that time to ignore me. At one time, the little girl to his left got a little too into her hand motions and SC elbowed her in the side, hard. She was a little trooper, though, and kept performing. And, don't you worry, SC kept digging.

By song 3, SC had either (a) dislodged the monster in his nose or (b) decided that he missed the allure of performance. This time, he continued his dance, but he pulled his dress shirt out of his pants and showed everyone his belly as he gyrated. Laughter burst out of the crowd, and I thought, "Oh no, I'm the mother of THAT kid." Luckily, his striptease was short-lived, and he pulled his shirt down and finished the finale with the other students. At that time, parents were invited to come up and get their child, or to help them find their seats on the floor. A special show for the kids was to be put on from the youth group.

I went up and got SC, and we settled into seats in the back. The youth group put up a barrier, slipped behind it, and started a musical puppet show. I was kind of impressed - their puppets were a lot better than I could have made. SC watched for a minute from my lap and then took off running towards the front of the gym! I jumped up and hissed at him to come back, but he ignored me. When I saw that he had no real plan to come back, I ran after him. His chunky little ass moved faster than  you could believe, and before long, he was yelling, "It's fake! There are people behind there!" and heading for the barrier. He got closer and closer, and I ran faster and faster, and I had almost grabbed him when he dove behind the barrier. The puppets fell behind the stage, as the one puppet master fell down and fell into the other one. SC yelled (from on top of them) "I knew it! Let me play!" as the two high school kids brushed themselves off, laughing hysterically.

After I apologized profusely and got SC away from the puppeteers, the show began again. SC was annoyed that I hadn't praised him for his skeptical review of the magical puppets. I was horribly amused by the whole thing. I tried so hard to not shake with laugher as I walked past those assholes who wouldn't let us sit with them.

I might send my kid to a Methodist preschool, but he is not religious (ask him who Baby Jesus is, and he'll say, "some kid who got born in a barn!"); I might pay a lot of money for him to go there but I am not rich; I may consider myself one of the more academically gifted people in this town but I am not snooty. It seems like no matter where I am, I stick out in one way or another. I feel bad that I've apparently taught SC the same set of rules for life, but I like who I am, and I think he'll like who he is, eventually, as well.

And if not, he'll be educated enough to get a good enough job to pay for an excellent psychiatrist.