stage fright

Ohdearohdearohdearohdearohdearohdearohdear.

Tomorrow is the draahhhma camp finale — our little musicale production.

(The whole saga began here. Continued here. Induced traumatic flashback here. And fell flat here.)

But 30 sweaty hours, 16 wanna-be “actors,” 14 drama queens (of both sexes), 9 unruly boys, countless bossy parents, and 1 floor roller later, the day is finally here.

So I will sport my “No Refunds” t-shirt and plop a paper bag over my head. I will cut eye holes in a Macy’s bag this very evening and then cover them with clear plastic, so I can both see through the bag and vomit into it, if need be. I will offer no explanation, because I think it’s pretty self-explanatory.

I will storm the gates of heaven and implore the God of theatre to make that little floor roller stop twiddling around on his arse. And tomorrow, I will tell that vexing boy what I’ve longed to tell him for two weeks now: that he is a beastly, beastly boy, that Jesus doesn’t like floor rollers and that if he puts his little arse on that floor one more time when he is not supposed to, he will KNOW MY WRATH!

But no matter what may go horribly awry, there’s always my secret favorite moment in the show and it’s a sure thing. I know I can count on The Kid. Because The Kid is unstoppable.

It happens during “Day by Day,”a melodically insipid little number that tries one’s patience. But The Kid is magic. Now it’s hard to stand out in such a tame, cotton candy chorus, unless, of course, you do what The Kid does. With unmatched gusto, he and his lungs are front and center:

“ooooooOOOOOOHHHHhhhhh, deeeeEEEEEAAAAaaaarrrr LooooOOOOORRRdddd, THREE THINGS I prrraaaAAAAAyy!!!

He wails, he moans, he positively yowls, all in brilliant, ear-splitting bedlam.

My Co-Director approached me about The Kid the other day.

“Should we tell The Kid to tone it down?”

“Absolutely not,” I replied. “He’s the only one keeping that thing afloat.”

“He’s terrible,” she said.

“I know. That’s the beauty of it. It’s wildly entertaining.”

She squinched her brow at me. Maybe I seemed inconsistent, not my usual stickler for standards. But, look, The Kid is not going to sing that song any better any time soon. Clearly, he is crazy for it in a way that no one else is. And if a child is howling, crying out to his Lord, who am I to try to quench the Holy Spirit? I don’t need that trouble. Besides, without The Kid and his beautiful braying, a dreary song gets only drearier, becoming the ultimate, awful sugar crash.

So maybe there’s a time for standards and a time for relaxing those standards for something silly and grand:

The happy little accident of The Kid being a kid. The sheer comic whimsy of it all.

So when that song comes and he does his thing, I’m sure I’ll smile and secretly say, “Good for you, Kid.”

I might even take the bag off my head.