IV. The Trolley
I exhaled when the trolley arrived and it was less than half-full. The teachers took care of the fare while the chaperones herded all the children and me into the back car. Chooch desperately wanted to sit with the kid whom he’s always getting in trouble with, but I pushed him into a seat with Luna, and then used my big ass as a bookend to keep the kids plugged into the seat.
In front of us sat two boys and the one boy’s mom; she is one of the least offensive moms in the class. I was thankful to sit behind her because she talked to the children the way all real moms do while I tweeted, texted and took pictures with my phone. However, I did stop and pay attention when some of the parents began pointing out things to the children and considering I don’t know shit about my hometown, I rested my chin on my hands and looked out the window, listening along with all the other kids.
Don’t worry, I already forgot everything we learned.
Surprisingly, the kids were extremely well-behaved for the entire ride downtown. I guess it takes about 25 minutes or so, I never really paid attention on the occasions where I ride it to work considering I’m usually being distracted by grown adults pissing their pants, inner-city kids flicking switchblades, and my deep-rooted panic about getting off at the wrong stop.
The Law Firm is located directly across the trolley station downtown and Chooch made a big to-do about telling all of his friends that’s where I work. They all looked up and said, “Whoa.” I was like, “Yeah, that wide-eyed wonderment gets old real quick, friends.” But at least now the other parents don’t think I’m a stripper.
V. Erin’s Umbrella Quandary: A Tangent
When we emerged from underneath the city, it was raining pretty heavily. I actually was somewhat of a responsible mom and tucked an umbrella in my purse before leaving the house that day. Luna had a nice, raindrop-retardant hood on her coat and said she didn’t need additional protection, so I gave the umbrella to Chooch who then impaled half of downtown Pittsburgh with it. This left me unprotected from Mother Nature and looking like a goddamn drowned hood rat. The only upside to this is that it washed away my “OMG I’M IN CHARGE OF CHILDREN DOWN IN THE CITY” perspiration.
Since the umbrella was now eye level with me, I was able to notice that not only was 3/4 of it stained, but the top was not very securely fastened to the stick. A cigarette butt being flicked several yards away could have caused enough change in atmospheric pressure to make it wobble and sway precariously above Chooch’s head like a toy top.
All around me were crisp, clean and unbroken umbrellas. It made me so sad. Also, it made me feel like a hobo.
I have kind of a poor track record with umbrellas. Mostly I just never have one with me, and if I do, there’s usually something broken about it. Sometimes I have two umbrellas and they are both broken and I don’t find this out until I have a crowd of parents watching me. This is a true story from last year’s pumpkin patch field trip.
Since then, Henry has fixed one of those umbrellas (or so I thought) and I had been given a pretty black and white damask one from my Grandma Kelly, but asshole Henry broke off the handle, probably on purpose. My house is where umbrellas go to die. It’s a goddamn shame.
That night after the field trip, it got me thinking: I have never bought an umbrella. They have always been gifted to me by various grandmas who don’t want me to get sick from the rain and then expect them to make me some goddamn soup. So while I was sitting on the couch with Henry, I started shopping on my phone for umbrellas. I found a real majestic “Goth picnicking in the graveyard” one and showed it to Henry who got all irritated and said, “That’s a parasol, idiot. Good luck using that in the rain.” And then we had this big discussion about the time I was 5 or 6 and got a My Little Pony named Parasol for Christmas and my mom, with the video camera running, asked, “What’d you get, Erin?” and I excitedly speech-impedimented, “Pawasowl!” Henry made me repeat it over and over because since I am so near-perfect, he doesn’t often get a chance to ridicule me. Now he’s on the hunt for this video.
I hit a low point in life when I allowed myself to Google “Jonny Craig umbrella,” which apparently doesn’t exist, although it did bring up some pretty images of that ginger douchebag wearing Umbrella clothing.
I’m not buying an umbrella until I find one that really speaks to me. And then I’m going to buy an impenetrable bubble to keep it in on sunny days so no one will make it look like it belongs to a poor person even though it belongs to a poor person.
If anyone wants to make me an umbrella emblazoned with Jonny Craig’s mug(shot) for Christmas, I would not re-gift it.
VI. The Fucking Symphony
Thank god our class was dumped off into one of the small side balconies. We were the only school occupying that space which made me feel relief. I had been having nightmares of being downstairs, surrounded by hundreds of screaming and thrashing children. Luckily, the only screaming and thrashing children I was surrounded by were two boys from Chooch’s class who were sitting behind me and whined about wanting to leave the entire time, which only made my own kid want to turn around in his seat to see what they were doing, at which point I would have to physically force him to face the front because GOOD GODDAMN STOP WORRYING ABOUT OTHER KIDS.
There was a row with only three seats in it, and that’s where I ushered Chooch and Luna. It was cozy and the entire row in front of us was empty, so I was able to get my body temperature to chill out a little.
My sopping wet hair also accommodated that goal.
It took a good 25 minutes for the symphony to start, which is good because there were bathroom trips to be made. All you men out there love to rag on women for going to the bathroom in groups, but what the fuck is up with little boys, good god? One has to go and then seven others are like, “ME TOO” whether they have to pee or not. Of course Chooch waited until the dad I hated took a horde of boys to the restroom to say that he too had to pee as well, so I had to take him myself, that fucker.
One of the boys behind us waited until .003 seconds before the show started to tell his mom that he too had to pee, so then after those two left, the other boy she was responsible for (who was actually paired up with me at the last field trip was really good on that one but decidedly not so fucking wonderful on this one) suddenly had to pee and I was reluctantly going to take him but then it occurred to me that he was on the same potty parade as Chooch just minutes before this and what the fuck, kid. None of the girls were pulling this shit! Momesis, who was sitting behind me with her daughter and the girl she was in charge of, said very diplomatically, “Neither of us can take him because we have our own kids that we’re responsible for, so he’s going to have to tell a teacher.”
I like her more and more as this school year progresses. She is so good at this shit.
So we sent Pee Boy a few rows down to snag a teacher, who then took him to the bathroom while I kicked back and took in the goddamn symphony.
So this is a concert series that Heinz Hall does for kids; it’s 30 minutes long and full of uber-popular songs that you’re likely to hear on Little Einsteins. An older broad in a bright red dress sat on a stool at the front of the stage and introduced each song in overly-excited, pre-pubescent layman’s terms. There was some stuff from the Nutcracker and Beauty and the Beast (Chooch raised his hand when the broad asked how many of the kids have seen that movie and I can assure you he has not but now I’m going to make him watch it and he’s going to wish he never raised his hand when he realizes there are no zombies or boobs) and most of the kids automatically raised their arms and pretended to conduct. I even caught Chooch doing it every now and again, but then the jerk-boys behind him would start being dicks (the one kept yelling, and I do mean yelling, “BOO YOU STINK” every time a song ended and the other kid kept loudly complaining about being bored and wanting to leave) and this would provoke Chooch to turn and kneel on his seat to check out what they were doing and I would have to physically right him.
I’d reel his attention back to the symphony by asking him questions like, “Can you find the harp? How about the asshole playing the triangle? I bet I can play that shit better.” That seemed to keep him engaged.
Meanwhile, all the chicks were enrapt.
“Are you crying?” Chooch said to me at one point.
“What? No!” I lied, wiping my face with my sleeve. LIVE MUSIC MAKES ME EMOTIONAL, ALRIGHT? I will pretty much to sob to anything, even Katy Perry, but that’s only because she’s such an abomination.
The boys behind us never really shut the fuck up and at one point the usher said to the mom, “If you can’t get them to be quiet, you’re going to have to leave” and I was like, “Why the warning? Just do it.” I wanted to enjoy me some fucking orchestra, and they were really fucking that up for me.
VII. The Return Trip
I was really impressed with how smoothly our departure went. There was no mass exodus of city school children; rather, it was organized and relatively uneventful. It was still raining outside so that was stressful for me, trying to hold the umbrella atop my son’s dome while dragging Luna with my other hand. When we passed my work, I actually looked up at it longingly and wished I was there, warm and dry at my desk.
Then one of those bastards jumped into a puddle when I was directly behind him. I saw it all go down in slow motion but I had no motivation at this point to even attempt to move. WHAT’S A LITTLE MORE WATER, RIGHT.
We made it to the trolley station just in time to catch one heading back to Dormont and the kids were mostly quiet on the way back, except for the two I was in charge of, who never stopped talking the entire time and the poor Asian couple in front of us kept turning around and smiling wearily.
After the T dropped us off, we still had to walk back to the school. My pant legs were soaked all the way up to the back of my knees and I kept murmuring, “We’re almost there, we’re almost there.” It was the longest walk of my life. I so desperately wanted to not be holding hands with children any longer.
Back in the classroom, the teachers handed out donuts to the kids. Seriously? Where the fuck is my donut? The chaperones got nothing, not even a Valium. I made eye contact with two of the moms, and they started laughing.
“What? Do I look that bad?” I asked all self-consciously.
“It was a long day,” one of them said sympathically.
Then some kid asked me to carry his donut down to the cafeteria for him and in my head I replied with a hearty, “Fuck you” and went home, where I peeled off my clothes, put on my PJs, turned on Dance Gavin Dance real loud and curled up in bed. I wanted to start crying but I was too emotionally vacant at that point.
At least I got to see the fucking symphony.
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