Every parent has a story of how their children have embarrassed them and here is mine.
Back at the end of the summer in 1996 I lived in a small village in Essex, England. That summer had seen the Olympics in Atlanta, an explosion over the Atlantic of a Paris-bound TWA plane and England were beaten by arch rivals Germany in the Euro 96 semi-finals. Oasis and Blur dominated the UK airwaves. By September 1996 my family consisted of my wife, a two year old boy referred to as Moochy and a six month old who become to be known as Spud. Oh, and a nameless Goldfish too. Moochy was as cute as any two year old ever was. He had a shock of white hair and big blue eyes. Overall he was a pretty happy kid. The only concern we had was that he was having some problems with talking, most of the things he was saying were pretty unintelligible but at least he was trying.
The story takes place one Sunday afternoon. Spud and his mother were both taking an afternoon nap and I decided Moochy and I should do the weekly shopping together. So I strapped the blond two year old into his car seat and we set off for the supermarket which was about 8 miles away from our village. Along the way we listened to some of the latest songs including the Oasis track “Champagne Supernova”. Up front in the driving seat I sang along lustily. “Slowly walking down the hall, faster than a Canon Ball, where were you while we were getting high?” etc. (full lyrics here).
In fact I enjoyed the song so much I played it – and sang along with it – several times.
Unusually for a Sunday afternoon the supermarket was very busy. I placed Moochy in the seat of a shopping cart and we spent a happy half hour wandering the aisles selecting our groceries. Normally Moochy enjoyed the supermarket experience but this particular afternoon he seemed preoccupied. Eventually, we joined the line for the check out with it’s beeping barcode scanning machines and the quiet buzz of conversation from the surrounding queuing shoppers.
Amid this idyllic rural/suburban scene is when Moochy tugged my sleeve to get my attention. He looked up at me from his supermarket trolley seat and asked in the clearest and loudest voice that he had ever used:
“Daddy, where was I while you were getting high?”
Every eye in the store turned on me,
“It’s just the words of a song” I said but the faces of the other shoppers showed no-one believed me. We hurriedly paid and left before the Police arrived ….
Back at the end of the summer in 1996 I lived in a small village in Essex, England. That summer had seen the Olympics in Atlanta, an explosion over the Atlantic of a Paris-bound TWA plane and England were beaten by arch rivals Germany in the Euro 96 semi-finals. Oasis and Blur dominated the UK airwaves. By September 1996 my family consisted of my wife, a two year old boy referred to as Moochy and a six month old who become to be known as Spud. Oh, and a nameless Goldfish too. Moochy was as cute as any two year old ever was. He had a shock of white hair and big blue eyes. Overall he was a pretty happy kid. The only concern we had was that he was having some problems with talking, most of the things he was saying were pretty unintelligible but at least he was trying.
The story takes place one Sunday afternoon. Spud and his mother were both taking an afternoon nap and I decided Moochy and I should do the weekly shopping together. So I strapped the blond two year old into his car seat and we set off for the supermarket which was about 8 miles away from our village. Along the way we listened to some of the latest songs including the Oasis track “Champagne Supernova”. Up front in the driving seat I sang along lustily. “Slowly walking down the hall, faster than a Canon Ball, where were you while we were getting high?” etc. (full lyrics here).
In fact I enjoyed the song so much I played it – and sang along with it – several times.
Unusually for a Sunday afternoon the supermarket was very busy. I placed Moochy in the seat of a shopping cart and we spent a happy half hour wandering the aisles selecting our groceries. Normally Moochy enjoyed the supermarket experience but this particular afternoon he seemed preoccupied. Eventually, we joined the line for the check out with it’s beeping barcode scanning machines and the quiet buzz of conversation from the surrounding queuing shoppers.
Amid this idyllic rural/suburban scene is when Moochy tugged my sleeve to get my attention. He looked up at me from his supermarket trolley seat and asked in the clearest and loudest voice that he had ever used:
“Daddy, where was I while you were getting high?”
Every eye in the store turned on me,
“It’s just the words of a song” I said but the faces of the other shoppers showed no-one believed me. We hurriedly paid and left before the Police arrived ….
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Bazza
Picture courtesy of BBC.co.uk who seem to have gotten from Associated Press
You write very well.
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