I read childrens’ books to a roomful of kids. It was part of a local Christmas program.
All the kids were sitting criss-cross on the floor in a big hotel lobby, some sipping from paper cups of hot chocolate, most wearing pajamas.
There were Pokémon pajamas, Atlanta Braves pajamas, Disney pajamas. There was a little girl elaborately dressed in a blue silken evening gown with a sash, like Cinderella.
“Nice pajamas,” I said to one little girl in a pink sweatshirt and sweatpants.
“These aren’t my pajamas,” she answered. “Not unless I go to bed in them, and then they would become actual pajamas, but right now I have never slept in these clothes, so they are just real clothes and not real pajamas, and if I don’t go to sleep in them, they will not be real pajamas at all, just regular, ordinary clothes that I wear all the time, just like any other normal pair of clothes, and not special clothes at all, and…”
“Okay, sweetie,” answered her mom, using a tone that suggested this woman might be very tired. “We get it.”
I opened up the book and started to read. But the girl had not finished.
“…You can make any kind of clothes pajamas if you wear them before bed,” she went on. “Doesn’t matter what kind of clothes they are, it can be any kind you want, there are no rules for what a pajama really is, anything can be pajamas if you want them to be, I have an elephant T-shirt that was a regular shirt for all my life until I started wearing it to sleep in and now it’s pajamas, except once I wore it to help my Grandma work in the yard, and she said…”
After the child’s recitation of the “American Pajama Theorem,” I stood before the children, sort of like a victim about to die by firing squad.
I read aloud in a clear voice.
The first story of the evening was “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” The Grinch is a fascinating story, loaded with literary nuance and strong anti-commercialist motifs. But by page two I might as well have been reading a Chilton’s automotive repair manual because I was pretty sure I had lost my audience.
I looked out at the sea of kids. There was a lot of squirming and wiggling going on. One kid was picking his nose with his thumb. Another girl was eating her paper cup.
The more I read, the more they lost interest. One kid was rolling on the floor like he was making a carpet angel. Another little girl was playing tag in the lobby with an imaginary being.
By page 10, three children had already been escorted to the restrooms for urgent urinary events, one child had undergone an episode of mild public corporal punishment, and someone’s dad was snoring.
“…Pajamas are kind of a funny thing, when you think about it, you can actually make what you’re wearing right now pajamas if you just SAY they’re pajamas, but I don’t know why anyone would want to sleep in those clothes you’re wearing, it looks…”
By the end of the book, the seating arrangement had changed completely. Kids who had been sitting up front were now lying on their backs, playing drums on their bare tummies and making startlingly realistic flatulent noises with their mouths.
One boy was hanging from a nearby sofa, trying to look at the room from an upside-down angle, playing yo-yo with his own spit.
I was dying up there.
That’s when the little girl in the pink sweatshirt paused her dissertation on the juxtapositional definition of pajamas and suggested in a small voice that we all sing a song.
“You want to sing a song?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, nodding her head, indicating that I could trust her. “Let’s all sing a Christmas song,” she whispered.
So, we sang. I led the room in a rendition of “Frosty the Snowman.”
The mood of the room completely changed. The kids all sat up straight. And surprisingly, everyone joined in.
We nailed verse one. By verse two, even the parents were all singing. By verse three, hotel guests in the lobby had joined in. Unbelievable.
By the middle of verse three, members of the hotel staff were now singing. One custodian, one maintenance guy, and clerks had joined out cluster in the lobby. Singing.
When we got to the “thumpity-thump” part of the song, the whole lobby was ablaze with voices. I believe everyone in the hotel was singing.
When the song finished people cheered.
Most of the kids quickly ran off, onward to their next juvenile adventure. But the little girl in the pink sweatshirt remained behind and hugged me.
“See?” said the little girl. “Everyone loves to sing.”
“You were right,” I said. “You’re very smart. How did you know that?”
“I’m a girl, silly.”
Questions: SeanDietrich@gmail.com
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Originally published on Sean’s website. Republished here with permission.
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