Farting Trumpets

Drew came home yesterday carrying a young boy’s dream and a mother’s worst nightmare - his first musical instrument. He chose the trumpet, in large part because it looked cool but wasn’t too heavy to carry in the annual parade. Only stupid people choose the tuba. His words, not mine.

Personally I think he picked the trumpet because he could make noises with it that sound like...... Give me a moment while I phrase this in a loving motherly way..........................

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Okay, here it is. When Drew plays the trumpet, he sounds like a lactose intolerant elephant who just ate a gallon of ice cream. It’s bad. It’s really bad.

I made the mistake of using the farting elephant analogy on Drew. After all, he’s a boy. We’d spent the last ten years giggling over gas. I was expecting a laugh. What I got was a hurt look as he ran out of the room crying.

Apparently making fun of his trumpet playing is off limits. I apologized to him and sat through a rendition of some song (I wasn’t about to call it “old man digesting burrito” even though that’s what it sounded like).

“Was that good, Mom?” Drew asked with hopeful smile on his face.

There’s only so much lying I can do with a straight face. “You’re certainly improving,” I said because it was true. It sounded like the burrito had dropped from the stomach into the old man’s colon.

My encouraging words only spurred him on. He played the trumpet until dinner time. He played it before and after bath. He played it while watching television. He played it in bed. He played it until I felt like screaming and begging to be committed to a mental institute where I could finally get some peace and quiet.

Here’s a picture of him playing it at 6:45 a.m. as Chris tries hard not to cover his ears.

After listening to the sounds for a day, I finally got it. The years that little boys spend making fart sounds are meant to prepare their mothers for the sound of the trumpet. Now all I have to do is get a pair of earplugs and keep smiling.