It was 11:00 AM. The golden hour. The tiny chairs were scraped into position, and my palate was fully prepared for lunch. Then, it happened.
One of the teachers gasped and pointed at my leg like I had just sprouted a second head. There were whispers. Panic. “James has…The Spot,” they murmured. Before I could even defend the structural integrity of my own skin, I was deemed a medical liability.
Ten minutes later, my mother appeared. I know my mother. I know the exact frequency of her smile when her mouth says, “Oh, absolutely, better safe than sorry!” but her eyes are screaming, “I HAVE A CALENDAR FULL OF MEETINGS AND I TOLD YOU IT WAS JUST ECZEMA.”
She scooped me up. I didn’t ask questions. I just accepted my VIP extraction from the premises. We executed what Mom calls The Pivot.
Back at base camp, I laid out my demands: a highly specific lunch. She delivered it flawlessly, constructing a magnificent fortress of lovies on the couch and summoning the glowing, hypnotic babysitter of Kids YouTube. I assumed my throne. Mom sprinted into the other room to aggressively type on her computer. She seemed tense, but I was having a fantastic Tuesday.
Then, she announced it was time to see the doctor. Now, one does not simply walk into a medical facility unprepared. I bypassed the stuffed animals. I ignored the action figures. I needed something cold. Something reliable. I reached out and grasped… the steel C-clamp.
Mom looked at me. I looked at her. We both knew that if the doctor’s examination table required emergency structural reinforcement, I was the only man for the job. She didn’t argue. She just sighed.
At the clinic, I held my clamp with the solemn dignity of a tradesman. The doctor took one look at my leg. “It’s eczema,” she declared.
Mom looked like she had just won the Super Bowl. She demanded a scroll of truth—a “doctor’s note”—to present to the daycare authorities to prove my leg was completely innocent of all charges.
We retrieved my brother, Jack. By this point, the sheer chaos of my disrupted royal schedule had caught up to me, and I passed out hard in the backseat. When I awoke, we were on a final quest for the magic cream that would appease the daycare gods, and more importantly, we were instituting the Popsicle Tax. Jack and I each got to pick our own box. Because we survived.
I went to sleep victorious. My leg was cleared. The C-clamp had performed flawlessly.
This morning, I was perfectly cozy in my bed when I heard the distinct sound of Mom discovering Pookie’s fresh puddle of throw-up on the floor, followed by the beep of the coffee maker. I smiled, closed my eyes, and gave her thirty more minutes of peace. She’s gonna need it.
