The BEST High School Musical, Ever

Well, not in the way you're thinking. Yesterday, the Matron took in Performance that was Fine, indeed. Near-professional quality. She was impressed.

Friday, the Matron took her eldest and Scarlett to see Stryker's junior high school's production of Little Shop of Horrors. Stryker, kicking and screaming (do you think that's metaphoric? you don't have a 12 1/2 year old) because he hates theater, as General Protest over Scarlett's career and, well, at times, general existance.

To say this Junior High show had some, uh, General Deficit, would be an understatement. But of course, the endeavor was entirely adorable, even in the inaudible Song and Line. But there were millions of onstage smiles and enthusiasm!

So the audience is there, in spirit if not for the show -- for the children -- until the plant sings! The plant can sing! And not just like regular singing. The plant is as good as anything you hear on the radio or in concert or on professional stage. The plant's voice overpowers the entire play and the Matron was staggered along with everyone else.

Whisperings ensued!

Scarlett: "Mom! That is the BEST singing I have ever heard in my whole life!"

Stryker: "He's famous in school. He's a really good guitar player too."

Matron: "Wow. Do you know him?"

Stryker: "Yes -- he's in two of my classes. He's smart, too. He's probably the most popular kid in school"

The Matron could not wait until the curtain call to lay her increasingly cloudy and saggy eyes on this kid. When she did? She nearly wept.

Last fall at Junior High Orientation, the Matron spotted a boy. He was wearing skin tight jeans, a purple-beaded shirt and had half his hair dyed pink. His ear lobes sported dangling earrings. The Matron thought to herself that he pretty much had "I am so gay that I already know it" plastered all over his forehead. He wasn't white, either, in a state not yet the bastion of racial diversity. Her heart hurt a minute for that child, tossed into the psychological and social Cesspool that is Junior High.

That boy was the plant!

The most popular kid in school. There is hope for humanity, at least in one Junior High School. Friday will live forever as the best high school musical the Matron will ever see, regardless!