Monday, March 9, 2009

unfortunate son


Okay.

I wonder sometimes if I am a bad person.

Yesterday, I was kind of catapulted into a black-nano universe... like, the opposite of Drew Smith reality.

First of all, we had planned for quite some time to take my daughter, Chiara (who I am bent on marrying off to Jake from Stupid Blog Name), out to Pasadena so she could meet author Lisa Yee and get her copy of Absolutely Maybe signed.

You know... the yin to my yang bit... it's the whole girl book thing... and anything I can do to get her excited about reading is a done deal, even if it means playing pretend princesses and wearing pink wigs once in a while.

Okay... a little back story: The day before the Pasadena event, I was gone all day because I drove down to Santa Monica to watch some rugby matches (which is an incredibly manly thing to do on a Saturday). My son, who is fourteen (and not betrothed to anyone at the moment, although I have found myself thinking more and more frequently that a) he's about 6-foot-three; and b) wow... he really is going to need to find a bigger place to live pretty soon), hasn't bothered to change out of his pajamas since Friday night.

I wonder what that would be like.

No... wait... it is, after all, an integral commandment in The Code of Boy to do that kind of stuff. Ahhh... okay, I have decided that I, too, will NOT GET DRESSED for two days beginning tomorrow morning.

Anyway, my son, Trevin, was frantically typing away at a research paper about 2 hours before our departure to Pasadena. Oh yeah... still in pajamas.

Drew: Do you have to finish an entire essay?

Trevin: No. A research paper.

Drew: How long?

Trevin: Three to four pages, double-spaced.

Drew: Oh. That's nothing. What's the topic?

(Were this, indeed, a screenplay, there would be some very cryptic and tense music at this moment)

Trevin: It's about what women think, and what they would say about the world if they could see it today. We had to pick a famous dead woman from a long time ago and write about what they'd think about the world today.

Drew: Anthropomorphism with chicks??? For a fourteen-year-old boy??? GAH!!!

Trevin: Are you choking, Dad?

Drew: What class is that literary bowel movement for?

Trevin: English.

Drew: Does your teacher ever have you write about famous and dead men?

Trevin: (laughs) Um... no. Why? Did men ever contribute anything to literature?

Drew: Finish that paper, son. Even if you're still in your boxers, I'm dragging your ass down to Vroman's Books and getting you some Hemingway. GAH!!!

[exeunt omnes]