Tuesday, July 08, 2008

Brace For This.

I am Full Swing into Summer Camp. As I am sure you can imagine, Summer and Summer Camp is a Very Busy Time for One Who Teaches Drama To Kids. My classes are Full, Full, Full and if I have to hear That Song From Wicked one more time, I may Shoot Myself. Fortunately, there are only three weeks left.

I like teaching in The Summer because The Kids are all really Relaxed and Happy. After all, they aren’t in School! They do lots of Fun Things and they like to tell me about Movies They Have Seen and Vacations They Are Going On. Some Kids Grow! Lots of kids get Braces. When I was A Kid, we didn’t get Braces until we were Full-Fledged Teenagers. But, nowadays, we like to torture tots with teeth tinsel at a much younger age. You know, before all of The Humiliation sets in.

Just the other day, in fact, one of My Eight Year Olds came up to me before class and announced, “I got Braces yesterday!” Being a well-meaning and responsible Grown Up, I asked The Student to Smile. And then I told her she looked Beeeeautiful. But, she just looked at the floor, disheartened.

“I HATE them,” she confessed.

A Slightly Older Student happened to be standing nearby and overheard our conversation.

“I think Your Braces look Great!” she told The Eight Year Old, grinning so as to expose her own set of Terrible Teeth Tracks. “They make you look A Lot Older, in fact!”

This piqued The Younger One’s interest. “They do?!” The Eight Year Old replied, encouraged.

“Oh, yeah!” replied The Older Student. “Now, you look at least Ten!”

3 comments:

Green said...

At least ten. So cute.

Sarah said...

That's awesome. I was one of the first in my class to get them at age 9. At that time, everyone thought they were pretty cool. Also I got mine off after 6th grade so they were gone by the time they had become "totally uncool."

julia said...

That is so sweet, I so love it when an older kid compliments or is especially nice to my 6 yo daughter.