Little Boy Blue and A Tale of Two Injuries

All Hail the Music Man!

 Ian is now in his second week of performing as one of the adorable little prop children in the local high school production of the Music Man.  I say "prop" because that's what he essentially is.  He comes out with his "family" in all scenes with the townspeople, and then again at the end with his trumpet and over-sized band uniform along with a bunch of other children to wow the townspeople with their miraculous new-found music skills (he doesn't actually get to play the trumpet, although he could).  But it's a great no-pressure part!

Although he didn't think so when we were in the midst of all the rehearsals.  The "one or two nights a week" seemingly promised by the director turned into every night from 3:30 to 7:00 when the rehearsal schedule was actually handed out.  This conflicted with Ian's basketball practice.  Ian loved participating in basketball.  I tried to see if the director would let him come late to a couple of rehearsals, but no dice.  When Ian realized that he couldn't go to any more basketball practices there was weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth of biblical proportions, and I couldn't say that I blamed him.  But we were so far into the play that I didn't feel right about pulling him out.  Fortunately his basketball coach was VERY understanding, and Ian was still able to participate in his Friday games in spite of not being at practice.  Now that he's actually performing in the play, taking his bows, and hearing the applause, he seems a lot happier.

In the program, they list all of the cast with their picture and a short snippet that they write themselves about why they're in the play.  Ian's snippet cracks me up.  All of the other cast, including the kids, talk about how excited and grateful they are to be in the play, and their pictures feature big, glowing grins.  Ian's picture is his typical  no-teeth, casual smile, and what he wrote after giving his name, age and school of attendance is this:  "I auditioned because my music teacher said I would look good in the play.  It is hard to be in the school play as a kid.  I have to miss sports, but it is okay because I am having a lot of fun.  I would like to thank my family for supporting me."  Kids are so honest.  He does look good, doesn't he?

Now, I don't know what obsession my kids have with knee injuries, but remember Meriel's crawling stint that I blogged about a while ago, due to a knee injury involving the trampoline?

Meriel, not content to heal on the couch.

Well, now Declan's doing it too.  Actually, his knee injury occurred because some child who will remain nameless and who was repeatedly told NOT to pick Declan up, well, they didn't listen, picked Declan up, and dropped him. 

The leg that he appears to be dragging is actually the one that is NOT injured.

When I noticed the crying continued past the usual amount of time, I realized we were probably dealing with either a sprain or a break.  I took him in to check it out when he still wouldn't walk on it the second day.  The X-ray receptionist told me something weird.  he had been X-rayed on that exact day one year earlier (doctor was concerned about loose hips).  Freaky!  Thankfully it was just a sprain with not much to do but wait for him to heal.  He's been quite frustrated because he's not used to sitting still.  I found his forced confinement a little relieving.  But there's little rest for the weary.  He rediscovered crawling by the afternoon of that day and then by the evening he started to take some hobbling steps.  It was both cute and pathetic. 

When he's not crying, he still takes time to smile.

You know, I only had one big injury growing up.  I sprained my knee.  I feel bad knowing that I passed this defective gene on to my children.