This past Christmas I picked up my niece and nephews for a day of shopping. In years past I was the master of entertainment. We’d laugh and joke. We’d eat french fries and skip through the parking lots of department stores.
Now the younger of my two nephews asks me to be “normal.” The older one just glares at me when I yell “Santa!” at the suffering mall Santa. It’s hard to remain relevant to growing boys who think my brand of cool is embarrassing.
So after the Santa faux pas I more or less lost them on the way to lunch so I did what any desperate aunt would do: I taught them the diarrhea song. This little ditty was a classic song sung among elementary school kids in the ’70s and ’80s and it contains all the little things that boys (and girls) find funny. Suddenly, I was back. My nephews and niece were laughing and singing the beloved diarrhea song. They were even more impressed that ncle Zach knew the song.
As we were traversing through the Christmas traffic on our way to lunch the kids suggested I look for the song on Spotify. I was sure that there was no way that song could be on a streaming service but I was wrong. A man with an acoustic guitar sang 15 verses of the elementary school classic. (Sing along if you know the words) “When you are driving in your Chevy and you feel something heavy…” We sat in the Burger King parking lot listening to the entire song laughing, and sometimes crying, our bellies aching from the most crude and hilarious subject: diarrhea.
This is where it all took a turn. We finished the song, dried our tears and went into the Burger King. Since it was just a few days until Christmas the restaurant was packedhile we waited in line my darling niece and nephews, wearing their Burger King crowns, began to sing, loudly, the diarrhea song.
I gently told them to stop. Zach begged them to stop. I told them that it wasn’t nice to sing songs about diarrhea in a restaurant but they just laughed.
Suddenly I was wishing that these kids would just act normal. My four-year-old niece with the dimples and the golden ringlets standing in the lobby of a Burger King singing “Diarrhea, cha-cha-cha” was the result of my bad judgment. I made Zach take the kids to a table while I ordered. I could hear him and the kids singing and laughing. I shot him a “shut up “ look and all they did was slide off their seats and continue to sing that dreaded song under the table.
Thankfully the food shut them up and we made it out of the restaurant and on to another store. The song went on until my niece, of all people, asked us to sing a “normal song.” The spell had been lifted.
I learned a lesson that day. I wanted so bad to remain relevant that I unleashed something that I could not control. No amount of Imodium or begging could stop it.
The infamous day of shopping and the Aunt Cassina faux pas was but a memory by the time we got to Christmas morning. We opened presents and were just about to eat Christmas dinner when from the kitchen we all heard my niece belt out, “Diarrhea, cha-cha-cha.” I looked at Zach and smiled. My legacy.
Cassina Farley can be contacted at cassinaandzachfarley@msn.com