Just dropped off Kaylee at the high school for the first speech meet of the season. I gotta tell you, I LOVE that she loves speech as much as I did back in the day. It was the one thing I was actually good at in those formative years at AlBrook High. Football? I got shoved, blocked, and tackled into the ground so much, I thought mud was a beverage. Basketball? My younger brother was a starter, but I was the "sixth man" (which, in high school-ese, means "you'll get in when we're ahead or behind by 72 points"). Choir and band? Yeaaaah, I was OK, but besides my patented Trombone Triple Tongue Technique, what did I have? (It didn't even pay off with any dates, for goodness sakes!) But speech...ah yes, speech. It was there, alone in front of a high school classroom filled with nervous sweating kids in clip-on ties and too-big sweaters early on a Saturday morning, that I found my high school extracurricular home.
I tried Drama at first...Edgar Allen Poe's "Tell Tale Heart". But I had a hard time recreating that atmospheric terror tale at 9am on a Saturday, (plus there's nothing really dramatic about a prepubescent 13-year-old frothing at the mouth and squeaking about tearing up planks to expose hideous beating hearts...mildly creepy and mostly sad, to be sure, but not dramatic) so I quickly shifted gears to Humorous. Woody Allen and Steve Martin were my muses, and it was here, using their writings, that I first discovered the power that comes from making people laugh. I could control an audience by simply raising an eyebrow, or by giving a certain word or phrase a silly vocal emphasis. And not only did I control them, they seemed to enjoy it. Heck, they wanted more! That's the kind of power that goes to a 13-year-old boy's head. In fact, it still makes my 48- year-old head swell up like an ancient bald balloon when I do it in sketch comedy revues.
Now I am able to pass info on to my child that is actually useful and instructive. I may not be able to help her with her flip turns in swimming (I would be honking up chlorine for a week), and I can't offer her fatherly advice with her club choice in golf ("I dunno.....hit it harder with the bigger one?"), but speech is a place where I CAN impart some knowledge. I am now experiencing first-hand the warm, fuzzy joy a baseball dad feels when his son comes to him and asks about the correct procedure to lay down a bunt! The same feeling washed over my soul when Kaylee asked for advice on what to cut out of her speech for time. I was even able to help her get a bigger laugh with a simple tweak of a vocal delivery. That, my friends, is advice you can't buy anywhere else, and it's making my face hurt from all the ear-to-ear smiling.
And why shouldn't I smile? I get to pass on some knowledge that she can use to become a better speaker, a better performer, and more importantly, a better person. Yes, those are all the benefits that come from a high school speech program. On top of that, she is making friends and memories that are gonna last her a lifetime. Oh sure, hockey might give you that, too, but you gotta sharpen an awful lot of skates and have your nose assaulted with sweat-drenched gear on a daily basis. All you need for speech is eye contact, poise, and a clip-on tie! OK, I can't get her to go for the tie, but she is really shining at all the rest. And it makes me a happy, proud dad.
Until I remember you have to get up at 3:30 to get to a Forest Lake speech meet....then I'm a bleary-eyed happy, proud dad.
I tried Drama at first...Edgar Allen Poe's "Tell Tale Heart". But I had a hard time recreating that atmospheric terror tale at 9am on a Saturday, (plus there's nothing really dramatic about a prepubescent 13-year-old frothing at the mouth and squeaking about tearing up planks to expose hideous beating hearts...mildly creepy and mostly sad, to be sure, but not dramatic) so I quickly shifted gears to Humorous. Woody Allen and Steve Martin were my muses, and it was here, using their writings, that I first discovered the power that comes from making people laugh. I could control an audience by simply raising an eyebrow, or by giving a certain word or phrase a silly vocal emphasis. And not only did I control them, they seemed to enjoy it. Heck, they wanted more! That's the kind of power that goes to a 13-year-old boy's head. In fact, it still makes my 48- year-old head swell up like an ancient bald balloon when I do it in sketch comedy revues.
Now I am able to pass info on to my child that is actually useful and instructive. I may not be able to help her with her flip turns in swimming (I would be honking up chlorine for a week), and I can't offer her fatherly advice with her club choice in golf ("I dunno.....hit it harder with the bigger one?"), but speech is a place where I CAN impart some knowledge. I am now experiencing first-hand the warm, fuzzy joy a baseball dad feels when his son comes to him and asks about the correct procedure to lay down a bunt! The same feeling washed over my soul when Kaylee asked for advice on what to cut out of her speech for time. I was even able to help her get a bigger laugh with a simple tweak of a vocal delivery. That, my friends, is advice you can't buy anywhere else, and it's making my face hurt from all the ear-to-ear smiling.
And why shouldn't I smile? I get to pass on some knowledge that she can use to become a better speaker, a better performer, and more importantly, a better person. Yes, those are all the benefits that come from a high school speech program. On top of that, she is making friends and memories that are gonna last her a lifetime. Oh sure, hockey might give you that, too, but you gotta sharpen an awful lot of skates and have your nose assaulted with sweat-drenched gear on a daily basis. All you need for speech is eye contact, poise, and a clip-on tie! OK, I can't get her to go for the tie, but she is really shining at all the rest. And it makes me a happy, proud dad.
Until I remember you have to get up at 3:30 to get to a Forest Lake speech meet....then I'm a bleary-eyed happy, proud dad.
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