Humorous Duet

Life with our first born—before we had our second child—was like having front row seats to a monologue. A very dramatic, and very long, monologue.

But when our second daughter London was born, we found ourselves directing a very entertaining duet.

Our younger daughter differs from her older sister in a number of ways, but they are not total opposites. They are both confident, expressive and curious little people who find joy in the world and each other. But one of the key differences in their personalities is the way in which they need attention. Our oldest, Lowery, must—at all times—be seen and heard. And London—to nearly the same degree—must be held and felt. This is a subtle difference. But it is often the cause, and the solution, to the problems that can arise between them.

Especially when Lowery has been sitting opposite of her sister on the floor, talking to her for an extended period of time. London wants her to stop talking and to hold her hand while they sit quietly and think. When Lowery realizes she can sit close to London and keep talking, harmony exists.

But it doesn’t always stay harmonious. Like any good duet, there is as much tension as there is ease. And sometimes we have to intervene.

Jim, an only child, approaches the girls as if he’s talking to two individuals. Customizing how he speaks to each. Letting the suggestion, or firm command, flow only between himself and each child.

I, the youngest of three, approach them as a unit. Often concerning myself only with what happens between the two of them. Above all things, I want the relationship between them to be as healthy and strong as possible, often prioritizing it over their individual relationships with me.

And it plays out like this:

Lowery is playing with a doll and London takes it from her. Lowery immediately runs to find me and tell on her sister. Feeling a panic rise up in me that this fight about the doll will turn into a rift between the girls in which they will never speak again, I tell Lowery not to be a tattle-tale and I sit them both down and explain how their love for each other is more important than anything and they needed to work it out. I make them voice their feelings to each other, validate them, and demand they hug. I’m not done until I witness them come to a resolution, which sometimes leaves them angry at me.

The same situation, if Jim is at the helm, plays out a little differently. For starters, Jim speaks to Lowery immediately. He explains that London is still learning different social skills and he reminds Lowery that London won’t want to play with the doll forever and then she can have it back. Lowery skips off to do something else, thrilled that her father listened to her long-winded explanation and validated her feelings. Then Jim will go to London, scoop her up and remind her how fairness works. He will hug her, like she needs, and suggest that she give the doll back to Lowery. London, feeling comforted and validated by his warm embrace, skips off to do something else. While both children feel great about that exchange, it’s unclear if they reached a resolution.

It’s a subtle difference. Both options seem effective. And both approaches take so much damn time it’s no wonder the laundry never gets done. But it does make me wonder exactly what our role is as a parent of siblings.

I think we may have thought ourselves the directors of the show. But we may be nothing more than their audience. And that’s a role I’ve spent precious little time in.

I did not participate in high school sports.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I was the statistician for the basketball team and was responsible for tabulating every single move each player made every game. A few games into the season, the coach pulled me aside to tell me our star player, Jermaine, wasn’t getting enough rebounds. I strongly suggested that perhaps he needed to talk to Jermaine about that one. So, after that, I did not participate in high school sports.

But I was heavily involved in Speech and Debate. I was the second person in a humorous duet team that was a state finalist. One of my closest friends in high school was a boy named Cheyene. He was, and still is, the funniest person I’ve ever known. He had been in Speech and Debate all through high school—he was the Jermaine of that club—and when I joined as a junior he asked me to perform a duet with him. Now, wanting to start a rookie caused a bit of a stir, but Cheyene convinced our director, the brilliant Mrs. Fracek, I could do it.

Mrs. Fracek had agreed, between cigarettes, so long as she could find good material for us. She selected a play called Jerry Finnegan’s Sister, by Jack Neary, which was about a boy who had pined his whole life for one girl he’d known since childhood, a girl completely unaware of his affections. Clearly Mrs. Fracek was a firm believer in Method Acting.

We all worked for weeks selecting the right lines of dialogue to condense the play down to the extremely strict eight minutes allowed by the persnickety National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA). Then, the three of us alone in her classroom would work on blocking, voice range and pacing. My time with Cheyene was a crash course in how much effort is needed to make comedy look effortless.

After months of preparation we went to a small regional tournament. I was giddy and scared, but mostly just fearful I would disappoint Cheyene. Two minutes and thirteen seconds into our first performance—in front of nearly seven other people—I completely lost my lines. Shocked and paralyzed, I looked over to Cheyene, who effortlessly ad-libbed until I came to. We clumsily finished the duet with an unprecedented three-and-a-half minutes to spare.

Back home we worked even harder. Longer hours. Sometimes at his house. Sometimes at mine. And like poor Jerry Finnegan’s sister, I assumed this was just because Cheyene wanted us to make progress. On our performance, that is.

After what seemed like months and months of two-a-days with Cheyene, going over and over the lines (I can still recite parts of it after a few beers), we got good.

Really good.

Cheyene and I knew this was because of the audience. Having done the production so many times, we knew what lines really worked. We knew when the biggest punches of laughter were coming, and how to twist our bodies, or alter our voices, to sell otherwise flat lines. We were constantly listening to our audience to determine our pace and delivery. Back on the bus, we would compare notes, realizing that if the audience skewed more female, I should play up my lines about puberty; if they were more male, the Nixon joke about Deep Throat was our ace in the hole.

We had perfected our duet by always listening to our audience.

After a few months on the tournament circuit Cheyene and I became legends. We could walk into any rural Oklahoma high school’s cafeteria and the crowd would fall silent, a few people whispering, “Is that them?!” We racked up more medals than our necks could support. Our success even transcended the cerebral world of Lincoln-Douglas; we were asked to preform our duet at a pep rally before homecoming.

Give the audience what they want, we’d always say.

Until we qualified to go to the State Competition. Buzz about our performance had spread throughout the state (at least among those in the 16-18 age bracket who had trouble getting a prom date), culminating in a crowd bigger than the NSDA had ever seen. The host of the annual competition didn’t account for accommodating such a crowd. And neither did we.

It was the largest crowd for which we’d ever played. And we didn’t anticipate how the size of the audience, or the smallness of the room, would impact our routine.

We couldn’t anticipate the laughter. The loudness of it. More octaves in the crowd. Different pitches around us. Too little space for the sound to bounce. But we did what we always did, we played to the crowd. We adjusted pace with the cacophony of cackles.

Give the audience what they want.

And as Cheyene delivered his final line of dialogue, ending the play on a sucker punch line that was both profound and hysterical, the stone-faced timer clicked her sanctioned stopwatch and looked up with a pained expression. We were one second over time.

And, therefore, disqualified.

Up until that day I didn’t realize the audience had as much potential to ruin a performance as it did to enhance it.

And if Jim and I are merely members of the audience for our children’s humorous duet, then it’s possible we have just as much chance of ruining their performance as we do of enhancing it.

But I hope our children already know what I had to learn the hard way:

The audience can only matter so much.

Because the show must go on.