Almost Famous

I’m sitting at work today and I get a text message.

“Won 8-2.”

It’s my oldest, dropping me a note from his tennis match. I text back, “Sweet!!”

I get a response. “Dork.”

When I pick him up I ask, “Why am I a dork?”

“Two exclamation points. That’s stupid.”

I make some smart-ass comment and he says, “See, that’s why people hate you.”

Which is true, it’s just most people hide it better. I’m used to it by now, so I just laugh and think how each passing day brings me blessedly closer to the grave.

We get home. My middle kid, the one with a band concert tonight, is nowhere to be seen. I yell his name.

No answer.

I yell his name again.

Still no answer, but I see his shoes so he has to be somewhere. Even he isn’t enough of a pinhead to run around the neighborhood in his socks. At least not while it’s raining.

I scream. “Goddamnit, where the hell are you?”

My youngest peeks his head around the corner. “We’re in the computer room.”

“Turn that stupid thing off,” I say. “We have to eat and your brother has a concert. Are you coming?”

From the look the youngest gives me I may as well have asked him to eat raw squirrel. Which I did a couple of years ago, to similar effect.

I yell the name of my middle son again. Face red, blood pressure dangerously high.

“What?” I finally hear.

“Turn that freaking thing off and get up here,” I shriek. “You have to eat, get dressed, and get your instrument ready.”

“Why are you always yelling?” he asks.

It’s 6:00 p.m. and I already need a drink.

He eats, puts on his concert clothes (after much arguing over whether he has to wear a shirt with a collar, which he does), and grabs his instrument. Off we head to middle school.

Sitting in the auditorium, a half hour before the concert starts, I’m accosted by an neighbor with strong views on a public works project. We talk street construction, liquor licensing, property taxes. This is the interesting part of my life.

The music begins. I can’t see my son, he plays an instrument that lands him in the back, but I know in theory he’s somewhere in the auditorium so I feign interest. Where do they get these pieces? Ringtones are more interesting. I have a headache, which isn’t getting better as the night goes on.

I meet him in the hall after the concert. “You guys sounded good.”

“We were awful,” he says.

Define awful, I think. “No really, it was good. Especially the part where your section had a solo.”

He looks at me skeptically, convinced I’m lying, which I am. The only people they sounded good to were me and the other the parents in the auditorium.

We get in the car. I turn on the radio and an old Bob Marley song is playing. It’s great. I liked his concert more.