march of the irritating (but adorable) toddler.

M_ had her first movie-in-an-actual-theater experience this weekend; on sunday we took her to see March of the Penguins at The Charles, along with about 150 old people. seriously, the median age of the audience at our showing was like 80. the old dude sitting next to us had about 5 hand-knitted afghans, a cylinder of oxygen, and what appeared to be an attending nurse with him. in any case, things went okay; M_ made it through almost 3/4 of the film before the inevitable breakdown, and -- prior to the previews running -- treated the filled-to-capacity captive audience to several heartfelt renditions of “mary had a little lamb,” “the alphabet song,” “row, row, row your boat,” and “the itsy bitsy spider.” she actually got up, went to the front of the theater, and stood before the curtain singing at the top of her lungs. people clapped at the end of each song, spurring her on, as jamie and i (initially) laughed and (later) became increasingly embarrassed. we tried to lure her back to her seat with popcorn and lollipops, but nothing could compare to the thrill she was getting from public performance... eventually jamie had to physically wrestle with her to get her back to where we were sitting.

shortly thereafter a nice older lady came up to us and asked if “one of the parents of the star” could open a bottle of juice for her. as jamie was fighting to get the screw-top off, this woman leaned closer to me and said “i have three daughters, and one of mine was just like that when she was little... she became an actor.” i nodded and smiled, but in my mind's eye terrible images of a yet-to-be-realized future were flashing: jamie and i supporting M_ well into her 40s (while she of course continued to live with us), enduring bad dinner theater for the sake of being supportive, plotting the inevitable drug interventions... though i guess there's still time to encourage an interest in medicine or even, say, plumbing, right?

Comments

[ccaruso]

oh dear...if this is the case, you might want to start telling her how cool it is to be poor, what a great meal ramen noodles make (every night), the ins and outs of selling your plasma and the transcendent joys involved in waiting tables.

[jenB]

she could move to CA and work as an Actor/Plumber?