Sometimes, you just need to be regaled with tales of the asinine and the absurd. After all, what are the building blocks of the human experience but for these two things?
Today is one of those days, and now is one of those times.
Act I
Last year, when my elder daughter had just started kindergarten at her new, small school, I was asking her if she knew the names of her classmates. In a daily update email sent earlier by her teacher, I had noted that there was at the very least a “Luke” in her class, so I mentioned that.
She confirmed this intel, and then continued to inform me that there were actually 2 “Lukes”. I found that pretty cool because there were only like 6 kids in her class. What are the odds, right?
A few days later, I’m at parent orientation for the kindergarten class when we’re asked to go around the room, introduce ourselves, and share something about our kid that we find special.
Well, one of the mom’s found that question to be particular interesting, because her boys were identical twins. She kept talking, and when she mentioned their names, I realized that this was one of the Luke’s mom.
And then it dawned on me…holy shit , there are literally “2 Lukes”. Only one is called Ethan.1Not his real name. Consider yourself Shyamalan’d.2Or, as I have called it elsewhere, “M. Night’d”
I had found this so profound, yet so absurd, I couldn’t help to tweet about it to an audience-of-none on my secret Twitter account. In fact, what I wrote above was merely a light adaptation/expansion of those two tweets.
In my mind, I was all patronizing,4This almost also functions as a pun. You know, because I’m her father and all. Speaking of patron, you can always patronize me! thinking, “Oh, that rascal! Isn’t that cute? She thinks identical twins have the same name as well. Ahh, youths…”
Act II:
Well, one thing that I should have learned well before then was to always bet on the kid. Any time when she would say something that would warrant the typical parental response “Well, I don’t think that’s really the case” etc., us adults would always end up eating our words. Always. She was pretty much never wrong, with the exception of ghost/monsters in her closet. And honestly, I’m not even sure she was wrong about that (I listen to too many paranormal podcasts).5You can check some of them out on the Brain Ticklers page.
Shortly after the original incident, I was telling this story to B.S. Slappy, who’s son is in the same class (our kids are basically best friends). He was like, “Uh, actually…there ARE 2 Lukes. Luke B. & Luke W. And yes, one of them has a twin.”
Well, whatd’yaknow? The kid wasn’t full of it after all.
At this point I’m just basking in the copious amounts of the absurd flowing from this situation. I’m loving it.
The best part was that there was a twist after all–I had M. Night’d myself. A Self-Shyamalan, if you will.
Act III:
The school the Elder went to last year only went up to kindergarten, so this year we found a different school that we could afford even less–“but [this one] go[es] to 6.”6https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOO5S4vxi0o In this particular educational model–which will remain unnamed for now–grades are integrated together 3 at a time. But this school was so small, that all grades 1-6 are in the same classroom, with a grand total of 13 students.
After the first week of school, I naturally found myself asking her the same questions as the year before. She rattled off a few of the girls’ names, so I followed that up by asking if she knew any of the boys’ names.
The Elder: “Oh, yeah. There’s Dylan, he has a twin…and, let’s see…who else? Oh, there’s another Dylan. There’s 2 Dylans!”
Me [under my breath]: “I’m not falling for this one again. Fool me once…”
…
Me: “So…there are three boys involved in this scenario, correct?”
The Elder: “Yes.”
Me: “1) The first Dylan. 2) His twin who is NOT named Dylan. And 3) the second Dylan–and you promise he looks nothing like the other two?”
The Elder: “Yes, Daddy.”
Me: “Cool, cool…I just had to double-check. So, it’s like last year with the 2 Lukes, huh?”
The Elder: “Actually, Daddy…there’s 3 Dylans! [Teacher from previous school]’s son is Dylan, too.”
Me: “Don’t you bring him into this…“
[End Scene]
Content created on: 27 September 2019 (Friday)
Footnotes & References:
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