Growing Up Crazy

Chapter 1

     “Hello! It’s July 14, 1998, and it’s the birthday of our newest little baby. Our baby boy, number five.”

The baby stirred slightly.

“Let me hold him!” whined Beth. “He’s not your baby.”

“Keep his head up.”

“Look at his little hands! They’re so tiny!”

“Get back in the light, the video camera can’t see him.”

“He just woke up; can we take him down stairs?”

“I guess so.”

Taylor, Beth, Anne and Becca clambered off the bed in Mom’s room and walked downstairs to the front room. Mom followed slowly behind, carrying the baby. She sat down in the rocking chair. That was the last thing I remember before I dozed off.

“Hello. This is July 21, and the baby, unnamed, is now a week old and he’s been very calm and peaceful.”

“Waaaaaaaa!”

“Well he WAS calm and peaceful a minute ago.”

The baby was lying on a blanket on the floor, his eyes slightly closed.

“You can turn off the camera now, Mom.”

“Oh, he’s so cute!”

“Oh brother!”

I look over and see my brother and sisters running around an upside down red bowl with the CD player playing “Catch a Saber-tooth Tiger.” What was disturbing is that both my sisters and my brother were wearing skirts. “He’s only four,” I remind myself, “but he still looks ridiculous.” Just then, Dad came in and picked me up.

“Smile!” Said Dad.

“He was smiling a minute ago,”

“I think he’s getting sleepy” said Mom. “Let’s put him to bed.”

        Mom scooped up the baby and started up the stairs.

        “My, you’re a big boy!” exclaimed Mom. She reached the top of the stairs, went into her room, and set the baby down in his crib.

“Good night,” Mom said, and crept out of the room.

As I lay in that crib, I started to wonder--about my future, mostly. What was I going to be like when I was older, if I was going to be popular, if I was going to like bouillabaisse or not. From what I’ve heard, bouillabaisse is really good.

Yes, that fat, frowning baby is me. And this is my life story.

                                

Chapter 2

        OK, Let’s pause for a second. Before I continue, there are a few things you should know. I’m only 13 years old as I sit at the computer typing this up, but I figured I should get started now writing my life story, because when I’m old and crazy, I won’t remember a thing about my childhood. And what good is that, writing about yourself when you’re all grown up and have your own apartment?

“Dear Diary,

Today I had happy tots fruit rings for breakfast. They were disgusting.”

        * Burp *

“Dear Diary…”

                                                THAT wouldn’t be cool. So why wait to write your life story?

My advice: don’t.

And also, just because you’re not rich and famous doesn’t mean your life isn’t interesting. My life is kind of interesting. And even if your life isn’t appealing, cool, or attention grabbing, it doesn’t mean you have to write a life story.  You can MAKE it cool. For example, since I can’t remember every detail exactly, I might have added a little colorful description here and there to the story to fill in the gaps.  So enough chit chat, let’s get on with the story…

Chapter 3

I was born on July 14, 1998, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I don’t remember much about that day, so I went and looked at some old family videos of that date, and the first few pages are approximately what happened. Except for the bouillabaisse part. I’ve never even so much as seen a picture of bouillabaisse. At any rate, I don’t remember anything about the first few years of my life, but I have old family VHS tapes that I can get info from. Let’s go back in time, back to September 1, 1999. Sometime that day, I’m not sure when, I was crawling up the stairs in a yellow Onesie. I wasn’t a regular talker yet, but Mom says I had my “own language”. Mainly higher and lower pitched raspberries and other tongue noises like “badalubbaderoduberabba”. I looked over my shoulder and saw Anne.

“Come on, Stuart! Walk to Anne!” 

Walking isn’t such a big deal. I was getting around just fine by crawling! But Anne insisted, so I stood up, and lifted a leg up to take a step. Only I forgot to put it back down before I tried to lift my other leg. Darn. Anne stood me up again, and this I time I got about five or six steps before I made the same mistake.

“Oh look, Mom,” said Anne. “Stuart walked a little!”  Mom and Beth came to examine this progress. “His record is 30 steps,” Beth exclaimed. “I saw it myself.”

“Actually his record is-“ But Taylor interrupted her hastily.

“Mom Mom Mom!”  He yelled. “Wanna hear my new song I just made up?”

“Not yet” she said. “I’m trying to videotape Stuart walking.”

Nevertheless, Taylor started singing anyway.

“Did you ever see a dinosaur in the United states?

In the United States?

In the United States?

Did you ever see a dinosaur in the United States?

Well I don’t think so, ‘cause dinosaurs are going on a date!”

He squealed joyfully, and ran off, probably to compose another song (if you could call it that).

That was probably the worst song I had ever heard in my entire life, even though I was only 14 months old. I started to say something witty about the song, (“Bordofferobedoarubba!” or something like that) when he ran back into the room yelling “MOM MOM MOM! Listen to my new song! ”

“One second, I’m helping Stuart.”

Again, Taylor took no notice and started singing:

“Did you ever see a dinosaur climbing up a tree?

Climbing up a tree?

Climbing up a tree…”

Ignoring Taylor, I decided to go play around with the sheer curtains instead. I attempted to walk towards the windows that had the curtains, but I stumbled over the vacuum cleaner. Dang it. Just then, Mom headed towards me with the video camera at the same time Taylor said,

“Well, I don’t think so ‘cause they eat beans!”

        Ignoring him again, I scrambled behind the curtains just as Mom hit the “record” button. After putting on a show of peek-a-boo with the curtains, Mom said something about hurricane Floyd coming. Deciding it would be best to stay away from the windows, I headed away from my place among the curtains, tripped over the vacuum, and said,

“Uh-oh!”

Right after I said that, I wished I didn’t. At once Anne said, “Oh, Stuart said uh-oh! Say it again, Stuart!”

Next thing I know, Mom, Beth and Anne were teeming around me.

 “Uh-oh! Say uh-oh!  Say it, Stuart! Say uh-oh! Can you say uh-oh?”

Me and my big mouth.

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http://www.lulu.com/product/ebook/growing-up-crazy/18665317

77 pages
Pictures
mini photo album in back