Say Cheesy!

So today is school picture day for all three kids. Of course this is also the day #1 has her heart set on wearing her tackiest Hannah Montana t-shirt, Little Man wakes up with the world's worst case of bedhead which resists even the most determined minstrations with water and a comb*, and #2 decides tights make her legs feel "too soft" forcing me to search for the only pair of leggings that match the dress she insists on wearing. So after finding appropriate and not-too-soft attire, bathing LM to tame his wayward locks, brushing, braiding and polishing my offspring, they were all ready for their close-ups.

This made me think of my own school picture days and, frankly, I don't remember such parental acrobatics. Being the child of a dual income family, many times photo day was forgotten entirely and I wound up being snapped in an unfortunately strawberry covered turtleneck in the third grade. I do remember trying desperately to show my recently lost lower front tooth in second grade, resulting in a rigor-mortis-like grimace. I remember how unfortunate it was to have pictures after recess, which produced a rather windswept appearance in photos, despite my best attempts at using the awesome free comb the photographers gave out with their names embossed on the side. I had so much hair, it would wind up stick in the back ala Freddie "Boom Boom" Washington.

So who remembers those backdrops? Of course there was the plain, sky blue one, but there was also the diagonal neon lights, the fake fall foliage (and equally fake rail fence to lean on), and my personal favorite, which I will call The Floating Dead Kid. This was the pose my mother chose nine times out of ten (not for my kindergarten picture, above, obviously). This photo was comprised of a smiling front shot of me standing before a black background, on which was superimposed a larger, translucent, non-smiling side shot of me, that seemed to float like my soul itself above my left shoulder. Dear GOD, do I wish I could find the one from second grade. It not only includes the Joker grin discussed above, but on the straight face, you can clearly see a huge scratch which was battle scar from the previous night's bedtime scratch fight with my sister.

And the class photo. Not until I was a teacher did I realize what a logistical nightmare these are. It is never as simple as putting the kids in line shortest to tallest, but which kid can't be next to the other kid because they start telling fart jokes. Try looking good as a teacher smiling through clenched teeth, hissing "Kevin, if you don't cut it out now you are inside for recess today!" And as the tallest kid in my class for the majority of the school year, standing in the back row, never getting to be front and center next to that little black sign with the class name and year was a total bummer.

So my children, living in the suburban Shangri La of New Town, had their pictures taken in the grove of oak trees in front of their school, hair perfectly in place and appropriately attired. My oldest, not yet tired of it, reveled in being the second tallest in her class and, word on the street has it, #2 even smiled (her preschool picture, which I can not find after the move, has a decidedly "fuck you" vibe, shocking). Don't ask me how they got Little Man to sit still though. I have a feeling his proofs will come back with nothing but a blur that seems to be wearing a blue oxford.

* I now regret my evil thoughts as teacher when my male students would come in each morning looking like Cameron Diaz in There's Something About Mary. I was all, "Jeez, people, ever heard of a comb and water?". Now I know, little boy hair, like little boy pee goes where it wants and can not be tamed.