Read Online Spinning by Michael Baron - Free Book Online Page A

Whenever I go out,
the people always shout,
“There goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt.”
Daa daa daa daa daa daa daa…
    With Spring tooting along, I remembered the daa daa daa part and we repeated the tune more confidently in the second and third go-around. Spring giggled through every refrain, then called for another song, as her routine required two. Diane looked at me and I raised my eyebrows to suggest that I wasn’t about to venture forth on my own here.
    “How about The Itsy-Bitsy Spider ?”Diane said.
    “The Band of Horses version or…”
    She chuckled. “Just sing along. ”
    As Diane began to sing, the song came back like I was in preschool again. When I remembered some of the hand motions, I abandoned my compress. At the end, my
spider did a little break-dancing thing. Before the end of third time through, all of our spiders were showing their stuff. Spring delighted in the songs. At first, I thought it was because we were entertaining her and keeping her up late. Every kid wants to stay up past bedtime that, I remembered. But with each verse of the song and every spider dance move, I could tell that she was pleased with my participation.
    “Water, please,” she said, sticking her hand out.
    After drinking a few sips there was probably enough water in there to last until her fourth birthday she adjusted her pillow for the next part of the show.
    “There’s more?” I said, looking at Diane. It seemed to me that this routine was designed to last until the morning.
    “This is the really fun part,” Diane said, winking. “We do animal impressions. I’m guessing you’ll be really good at this.”
    “Is there a video camera somewhere? Did my friend Hank put you up to this?”
    “Oh, come on, Dylan. You were made for his role.”
    I shook my head to deny the fact that I was actually enjoying this. You don’t get too many inner child opportunities when you’re out conquering the world.
    “Let me get ready,” I said. I turned around and did some flexes to loosen up and draw out the suspense. Spring giggled. I liked hearing her laugh. Besides, she was young and everything was new, so she was a great audience. I could steal every joke, every impression good or bad and it would work for her because she hadn’t seen it before. “Ready?”
    “Yeah!”

    I winked at Diane, and then turned around. In my best English accent, which sounds just like my worst English accent, I began.
    “Velcome. I am ze famous English actor Georgio Von Heffen-hoof…”
    “You don’t sound English.” Diane interrupted. “That’s more like German, right, Spring?”
    “German.”
    “Before I vaz so rrrudely interrupted… Zis is da famous German actor Hans Van Heffen hoff-er-stein. I vill now do my eem-prrression of the very rare, and almost extinct, Manhattan apartment lee-zard.”
    I turned my head to the side and stuck out my tongue, then to the other side. Although it was new to Spring, she looked like she had seen better. She gave me a courtesy laugh anyway.
    “Okay, smarty,” I said to her, “your turn.”
    I expected a duck waddle. Instead, Spring fell back into her pillow, arms extended to the ceiling, with her tongue hanging out. Staring at the quiet child, I whispered for her to hear, “Let’s leave while her eyes are closed…”
    Even with her tongue hanging out, she could holler. “Don’t!”
    “Guess what she is?” Diane said.
    “I don’t know.”
    “Guess.”
    “Sleeping polar bear.”
    “Nooooooooo,” Spring said.
    I gave it another shot. “A hypnotized Komodo Dragon.”
    She opened her eyes long enough to look at her mother.
    “No, honey, you aren’t that, either.”

    “I give up.”
    “A possum!”
    Diane smiled as I thumped my forehead. “Silly me. What was I thinking? Of course, a possum. You do very good animals, Spring.”
    “Thank you.” She fell back into her pillow.
    It was getting late for a little girl and I felt it best to save my impression of a herd of cows