Thursday evening, I stopped by the library to pick up/drop off a few CD's, of the books-on-CD variety, and on my way home, as I drove past Ian's school, I noticed two signs on stakes, hand-written, literally planted in the ground on the grass outside the school, next to the road.  One said, "Concert Tonight" and the other said "7:00 - 8:30."  It was a bit after 7:00, so I turned around, went into Ian's much-loved elementary school, and found my way to the gym, which is also the auditorium, and discovered approximately eight young men, college-aged, on the stage, in identical blue t-shirts, singing something hip and modern, in that timeless collegiate a capella style.  These singers turned out to be a group called "Not Too Sharp," from the University of New Hampshire.

This genre is very familiar to me, and I couldn't help but suspect that Ian might find the performance more-than-a-little-bit interesting.  Moreover, because Ian is School Spirit Personified (it's really touching to see how much he loves his school, and it hokey "culture" and close-knit ethos), I thought just the phenomenon of going to his school in the evening, so close to the end of the academic year, for something that has nothing to do with academics, might be very exciting for him.  So I got on my cell phone, called Amy, told her what was going on, and encouraged her to poll the Youth and determine who, if anyone, would like to go to the concert with me, in the nine minutes it would take me to get back to the car and drive home.

It turned out that the "takers" were both Ian and Daniel.  Madeleine was heading off to bed - or so the vision was, at the time, and therefore wouldn't be joining us.  As we entered the school building, Ian was lecturing me, in painstaking detail, on some aspect of one or two particular Pokemon (yes, the plural of Pokemon is Pokemon).  As we approached the gymitorium, so to speak, I encouraged Ian to speak a bit more softly, since we were walking into the concert itself.  However, once we got into the middle of the gym, Ian didn't need any direction; the boy was completely captivated by the spectacle before him.  Big smiles, movement in time to the music... eyes aglow.

At the end of the concert, although many people in the gym gave the musical young men a standing ovation the first time around, only one person rose to his-or-her feet after the encore, to delivery a second standing ovation.  The applause was profuse and heartfelt.  And immediately, Ian wanted to know whether I had the wherewithal for him to gather autographs.  Because of my own eccentricities, I happened to have, in my pocket, a folded-up printed sheet of Internet-originating coupons for Bob's Stores along with a pretty decent good felt-tip pen.   And with that, Ian was off.

I respect Ian's selfhood and otherness, and I like to give him a bit of space to let his own personality play out into the world around him, so I kept my distance for awhile.  However, when I finally went over to the circle of blue shirts in the front of the hall, just in front of the left corner of the stage, I saw that they had a certain nucleus.  Young Ian had gone from singer to singer, collecting each one's autograph, and by the time I got there, they were almost finished.  By that point, they were simply passing the paper to each other, without any mediation on Ian's part, and I think they were somewhat tickled, both by the assignment and by the lively personality, about half their height, eager engaging them in conversation.

Ian needed help deciphering their writing - pretty impossible, in the case of most signatures, as is to be expected with such a personal trademark, but their inscriptions above each signature were quite legible, and read as follows:

Thank you!

Thanks!
Zac D [I could read Zac D's entire signature]

DEAR IAN,
Keep on being awesome!

Thanks a ton!

Glad you had fun!

[and the best:]

Keep on being the man!


I'm very glad I took them to the concert, and that I hadn't actually used the "25% OFF YOUR ENTIRE FOOTWEAR PURCHASE & 30% OFF YOUR ENTIRE APPAREL PURCHASE" coupon from Bob's Stores.

(June 14, 2012)