Yes, My Son’s a Cello Prodigy, But His Shit Still Stinks Like the Rest of Us

My son is an incredible cellist. He’s been getting full-ride scholarships from the likes of Julliard, the New England Conservatory, and the Yale School of Music since he was in 6th grade. He’s given private solo performances for 3 presidents, 2 crown princes, and a Duke. He was being showered with roses after playing Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 flawlessly to paying crowds before he learned to tie his shoes. But his shit still stinks like the rest of us and you can be damn sure I let him know it every chance I get.

Look, my son is really good at his very large violin. He thinks he’s hot shit because he can move a crowd to tears with his rendition of The Swan by Camille Saint-Saëns but I’d like to see him raise a world-renowned child prodigy cellist on the salary of an assistant manager of footwear of a Dick’s Sporting Goods. I don’t get a plaque commemorating my store-record for having sold more Asics before lunch than any other employee. He gets one for rubbing some strings on other strings.

He ain’t shit.

I always roll my eyes when he gets 18-minute standing ovations. Would they be applauding if they knew he still eats his boogers? Every time a conductor turns to him and bows as the stuffy classical music crowd roars with applause, I wonder, do they know all his underwear has a streak of shit running down the back? Because they all do. Tell me, legends of classical music, if my son is such a visionary how come he can’t see that his bedroom is a goddamn mess?

How much of a genius could he be if his original compositions have been featured in commercials for high-end luxury sedans and he hasn’t even asked for a free Audi?

Parents of lesser children say I should be more appreciative of my son’s talents. Look, I’ve rammed Sketchers onto thousands of disgusting feet to pay for flights around the world so he can get honored in Vienna and Leipzig and Prague. But then bring his ass back home and he fails P.E. How do you fail kickball class? I’ll tell you how: when you’re my cello prodigy son.

Every day, I have to let him know he comes from a long pathetic line of nobodies who’ve accomplished nothing other than somehow surviving this long with no discernible skills. At any second people can realize the world doesn’t need another guy who can play the shit out of Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations. He has to be prepared to have an unremarkable life suddenly thrust upon him.

But, every time I warn everyone this kid ain’t all he’s cracked up to be, fucking Yo-Yo Ma calls him the “future of classical music” in another interview. Listen, he pissed his bed last night, so we set him up with fresh jammies and sheets,  and he pissed in those too. The future’s bleak, Yo-Yo.