Moms...Fond Memories Of A Young Son

The year was 1992. Wait. That sounds ominous. Our 10-year-old son was the opposite of ominous. Dang! How do real writers express themselves so well? Let me begin again. My first blog entry introduced you to our daughter, former Vaudevillian Kitty Barroe.

Our son, also a former , never chose a stage name. From now on I will refer to him as Art, short for Arthur (as in Arthur "Harpo" Marx) of my favorite comedy team The Marx Brothers. Art portrayed Harpo dozens of times in the 48 Vaudeville shows he performed, pulling various hilarious props out of his over-size trench coat's ample pockets.

Now...back to 1992, the year our son began to audition for legitimate acting work. Not because he needed a job at that tender age. No. He loved getting out of school early, being driven to downtown Chicago and auditioning for TV commercials, voice-overs, print work, plays, and occasionally a movie role.

The highlight for me during our son's approximately 3 years of this fun pursuit? That's easy. It was our time together traveling to and from his auditions and the jobs he landed. While his dad was at work and his younger sister was at Grandma's house, I had Art all to myself.

Most of our time together was spent in the car, laughing at the vocal antics of D.J. Kevin Matthews. Then I would wait with all of the other moms in the lobby of various talent agencies while Art auditioned.

Finally, before heading back to the suburbs, the two of us would do some fine dining at his favorite restaurant, Rock 'n Roll McDonald's, which used to be on Ontario Street, not too far from most of his audition sites.

During the drive home I was a happily captive audience as our son talked a mile a minute about the audition, what was going on at school, his friends. Kid stuff. I was happily trapped in the car on I-90, the worse the rush-hour traffic the better.

The year Art decided to give up show-biz, he'd grown several inches taller, and his voice had dropped a few octaves. He no longer looked or sounded like a kid. I asked if he'd like to take some acting classes and audition for teen roles. His answer was quick and simple: "No, thanks." He'd earned some cash from a few jobs, and was ready to move on to a new obsession: Collecting antiques. That's right. Antiques from the eras of World War I and World War II, with parental discretion, of course. No weapons, and nothing displaying a swastika were allowed.

It's a 5-hour drive to visit our son now. I wish it was only 5 minutes.