Singing In The Shower

My son's in the shower. Around this house that carries quite a bit of entertainment value. You see, my son loves to sing, portray various character voices from movie scenes, and just be an all-around goofball. I, on the other hand, get to sit in the family room and enjoy whatever comes barreling from his mouth. I love every minute of it.

They recently finished reading "Romeo and Juliet" in his English class. His teacher loved his accent so much that she had him read the part of Romeo all week. Then the last few days she gave him a break and offered him three various minor roles. She never realized up to that point that he had her feeding right out of his hands. He took those three roles and did a different voice for each of the characters and really hammed it up. Had the entire class in stitches. That's when he's really in his element. Next year he's taking forensics (no, it isn't anything to do with dead bodies). I'm sure he'll practice his lines and skits on me. Oh goodie.

Every morning when I take him and his best bud to school, I get my day started off with "Hey, Abbot!" or some other rousing rendition of stupidity from a movie scene or clip they've seen in youth class. It never seems to get old for them, and I end up in a coughing fit from laughing so hard. Then they'll start some stupid song from a comment or word spoken and spend the next five minutes bouncing phrases off of each other trying to make each line rhyme. My abs are rippling from the daily workout (I wish!).

Sometimes it is almost too much, but in those moments I always stop and remind myself of when the laughter and songs were absent in our lives. Sometimes life gets messy, and even our kids forget how to laugh because there is nothing for us to laugh about. When our spirits shrivel up the music and joy in life dies.

As parents, we must remember how important laughter is to our children. They need to see us smile, note the sparkle in our eyes, see the laugh lines crinkle around our face (and in our house sing lustily). Our kids take their cues from us in so many ways, and we need to be careful that our adult cares and worries don't come home with us too often. I forgot that for awhile. But now the sun is shining once again.

And the shower is filled with song. I just wonder what HE'S laughing about in there.