DADVENTURE: Texas Day Reading Disaster

"Daddy, why were you wearing a napkin around your neck?"  Ri-ri asked with such disdain in her voice that my stomach knotted.  It was the most dispiriting criticism I've gotten since the Houston Chronicle declared my first play to be the dramatic equivalent of the process of evaporation.

I was flattered to be invited back to read to my daughter's class.  My first visit was pretty successful, IMHO.  I was able to pick my own material, and I went to the standby -- Baloney, Henry P.  Kids laughed; I read a couple more.  So I wasn't shocked that I got the return gig.

I was asked to come back and read for "Texas Day."  Do New Hampshire school kids have "New Hampshire Day?"  Does "Illinois Day" exist?  Here in the Lone Star State, the school children perform a pledge to both the federal and state flags each morning, and it just get loonier from there, culminating in Texas Day when all the kids wear boots and hats.  You kind of have to live here to get it.

So I got invited back to read for Texas Day.  I didn't get to pick my own material, but was sent a stack of Texas-themed books, and when I arrived at the school I was informed that by "class" they meant the entire first grade.  AKA 125 6 and 7-year olds.  I had them for 45 minutes.

When they told me this, I about soiled my chaps.

If I had been able to get those for my costume, anyway, but as my daughter pointed out, I was a little weak in that department.  Like any self-respecting native Texan, I always have boots in the closet, thought I prefer flip-flops.  Straw cowboy hat -- got it.  But I'm light in the western shirt and bandana department.  So I improvised.  Napkin was the closest thing.  I choose maroon.  I thought it would be very Roy Rogers, but I guess it was more Fred Flintstone.

I got really into the reading, multiple voices and accents, broad gesticulations.  I even had some choreography for the kids to represent the stampede that Pecos Bill saves the town from.  The kids were very quiet, as if they were watching a grown man lose his mind, so I kept getting louder.

When it was all done, they applauded, which was nice, but I noticed that none of the teachers would make eye contact.  Ri-ri bounced up, gave me a big hug, and asked if she could go home with someone else.  A friend.

Artists take risks.  Maybe a more subtle approach was called for.  Maybe a red faced man shouting in a strange voice and getting pretty sweaty is not most first-graders idea of entertainment.  Personally, I think it was the napkin.


Clay's column, Dadventure, published twice monthly to Gather Essentials: Family, is a sure-fire guide to raising flawless, perfectly behaved, and always obedient children.  Yeah, right.
 
Clay is the co-author of Filmmaking for Teens: Pulling Off Your Shorts, an award-winning playwright, and the Chief Creative Officer at DadLabs.com, a fatherhood website.