Mornings - A Guest Post by Dad

As the 4^th grade school year comes to an end for Luke, one would be remiss to not document his signature antics in the mornings.  Now I’m not referring to Luke’s antics during the lovely 2-hour window from when he wakes up at 6 a.m to when we leave for school at 8 am.  Any documentation of happenings during that 2-hour window would unduly prejudice the reader of this post into thinking that Luke’s sole purpose in life is to annoy his sisters, drink lesbi-vegan smoothies and bug his mom about where his black sweatpants are.  I’m more interested in documenting the 35 minutes of time from 8 a.m. to 835 a.m., which is when I give Luke a ride to school and we sit and chill in the drop-off circle at French Road Elementary School.  This alone time with Luke is equal parts special and startling, along with a dose of Groundhog's Day.  Every single morning, before we pull out of the driveway, Luke tries to pack the car with as many lacrosse sticks as possible.  I normally end up yelling at him because his “d-pole” is bumping into my neck while I’m driving.  I can see the headline in the local paper "Man gets into accident due to son’s lacrosse stick knocking him out while driving."  Once into the car, next comes Luke’s routine request for me to put on Right Hand Man from the Hamilton Soundtrack.  Luke is wise beyond his years, as he knows that his Dad loves this soundtrack and that I won’t say no to this request.  I’ve gotten wiser and no longer hand Luke my phone when he requests this music.  I do all the DJ’ing from the front seat so that Luke doesn’t end up making any unauthorized “one-click” Amazon orders from the back seat (those fidget cubes are so hard to resist).   Back to the morning music, what Luke is REALLY interested in is the next song after Right Hand Man.  In his mind, getting me to listen to Right Hand Man will soften me up for his second request, which is almost always one of the following songs:  (1) Til’ I Collapse, by Eminem; or (2) I Spy, by Lil Yachty  (clean versions only).  Now, you may be wondering what’s so startling about this whole situation.  Well, the kid knows all the lyrics to these songs….every.single.one.  And we have no idea where he is able to listen to this kind of music because it doesn't happen on our watch.   I could go on and on about Luke’s ridiculousness in the morning but I'll spare you.  In all seriousness, as Luke gets older, I’ll miss taking him school and belting out Right Hand Man with him (oh, and I Spy too!).