Frank’s school is great for him. He’s developing socially, he enjoys the kids, and he loves going but it’s not without it’s comical moments. Mind you we are talking about my sense of humor so my definition of comical moment and your’s may vary slightly. Please skip this post if I just described you. Ok, for those of you who don’t mind laughing at little kids here goes. We get a letter from the school alerting us to a musical program the Older 2’s class will be doing in honor of their mothers for mother’s day.
As I drop Frank off in the morning on the day of the “musical” Frank’s teacher tells me the deal starts right on time so get there a little early to grab a good seat. She gives me some inside info on where Frank will be sitting so we can sit in a good spot to get pictures. She then mentions to be prepared for Frank to get a little upset when he sees us in the room and he may start crying or come running to you, or just melt down in place. She says it happens with two or three kids every year.
I’m not really worried about Frank. He may not sing or do the routine, but I figure he’ll just stand there with a dopey smile. Miracles upon miracles Tracy, her mom or Grammy as she’s known in these parts, and me actually get to the school about 15 minutes early and get a great seat. Spitting distance from where Frank will be. His class gets to the door in single file. Frank sees us and I can hear him say “there’s my daddy.” When he sees Tracy he makes a move like he might come to us. We give him the hold sign and he stands fast. His lip quivers ever so slightly and I thought, “no way, he’s going to cry.”
He didn’t. Somehow he pulled it together. He took his seat and after about 5 minutes he starts waving his arms all around and doing some weird sign language. Thought he was taking a fit. Turns out the program started but one kid in Frank’s class was crying so loud we couldn’t hear the music or their singing. One girl at the other end starts wailing and then we got two community criers in the middle of the pack.
You know the ones; they hear other kids crying so they think something bad is about to happen so they cry too. So that’s all funny enough. But then the kid in Frank’s class who started all this gets led away by the hand. He cried all the way to the back of the room. Still couldn’t hear a freaking note of music or singing. But the sight of that kid being led away just cracked me up for some reason.
So the whole day I’m thinking I’m a heartless bastard but I’m still chuckling. However, when we watch the video of it later that night, guess who’s busting a gut over it all? If you guessed Tracy and Grammy, you get a year of no income tax. Stay on the line and our operator will take your information. Yeah, Mommy and Grammy were quite tickled over the offending crier being led away like a lamb to slaughter.
The funniest part for me was the look on the kids face. Suffice to say he just looked resigned to his fate. Like, crap I’m crying, I guess this is curtains for me. He even had his hand up in the air for the teacher to take it before she reached for it.
In the words of Mater, that immortal tow truck from the movie Cars, “I don’t care who you are, that’s funny right there.”
The star and his paparazzi.
Frank's Place 
Aww, how cute! When I was in school, the first grade class always had a special part during the Christmas pageant– we had to dress up as angels and sing some song about angels (shocker!). The night of the pageant, guess who had a total meltdown backstage that required Mrs. Hemler to go get Mommy from the pew and collect her neurotic six-year old? This gal.
Yes, Kathryn and I still remember Daddy and I sitting there at the beginning of the program, and wondering why we can’t find our “little angel”, until Mrs. Hemler came to get me.
Ha! Well for better or worse it looks like Frank may be developing his mother’s love of performing.
Seriously Fran, anytime you can quote Cars and make it applicable to your life is awesome. Quite frankly, we are sometimes shocked how often it happens! Great post about the crier!
Thanks Sarah. You know, sometimes I have no idea where this stuff comes from. Probably late nights and way too many diet cokes.
OMG. I read this at work and laughed out loud. (of course it was very quiet here at the time!) I had tears in my eyes. I knew Frank would be a great performer. It runs in the family!!!
Yeah he gets it from both sides, doesn’t he. Frank and his buddy Shep, who Frank calls Sheppy, carried the Older 2’s class. They were almost like synchronized swimmers. The others, minus the kid who was crying, had better things to do than perform the moves and sing.