The Primary Program

Yesterday was our church Primary program. This is the once-per-year event where all the children sit on the stand to sing songs and take turns speaking a few assigned lines into the microphone. I look forward to Primary program Sunday because it is the one week of the year when someone else has to make my kids behave themselves.

We arrived at church and Link proudly took his assigned place on the stand with his class. Gleek and Patches are both part of the younger group whose classes were asked to sit with their parents for the first part of the meeting. Kiki settled in on the bench, secure in the knowledge that she had grown too hold to be in Primary anymore. Gleek did not settle. She sat perched on the edge of the bench, waiting for time to go up on the stand. The moment they asked the younger kids to come up, she was gone.

Patches was not quite so ready to leave the safety of our bench for the stand. He frequently has trouble letting go of me on Sundays. We’ve been solving the problem by filling his shirt pocket with fruit snacks to ease the transition. When I filled his pocket yesterday I did not realize that Patches’ assigned place was in the center of the front row, right behind the railing. He sat down and immediately began to chomp his way through the fruit snacks. He dutifully stood for the songs, but continued to chomp rather than sing. The chewing kept his mouth busy, but his hands could not be idle. He marched his fingers back and forth along the railing. Fairly quickly these little finger men proved themselves to be ninjas as they jumped and attacked each other in full view of the entire congregation. Nothing like songs about Jesus with the visual accompaniment of open-mouthed chewing and hand ninjas. I probably should have been mortified, but Howard and I were too busy trying to keep our own laughter below the radar.

Patches’ failure to sing did not negatively impact the performance because Gleek sang loud enough for three kids. This added to our amusement, but also to our amazement because Gleek was completely on tune. I didn’t know it was possible for a six-year-old to belt like that. In between songs Gleek did a pretty good job of being reverent. Or at least I hope she did because she was on the opposite end of the stand and I couldn’t really see what she was up to. There was that one loud THUMP because she fell off her chair, but over all she did well. This was much better than last year when I had to walk up front and remove a misbehaving Gleek from the stand.

The program continued and I calculated whether Patches would finish his fruit snacks before it came time for his class to recite a scripture. He did run out, but the empty mouth did not result in more program participation. He did not sing or recite on cue. Instead he started making exploding sound effects for his hand ninjas. Periodically he would stop and wave to Howard and I. Then he would wink and give us a thumbs-up. He was obviously very pleased at how well he was doing. We would smile and wave back and attempt to indicate through pantomime that he should fold his arms and sing. Our pantomimes had minimal effect. The ninjas continued to make appearances throughout the 40 minute program.

In truth Patches really did do well for his age. He was not the only four-year-old in that front row who played with his fingers or studied the ceiling or turned around completely to watch the kids behind him. I watched Patches’ antics and knew that half a dozen other parents were watching him, grateful that this time it was not their child who was the spectacle. I love that our congregation understands what can reasonably be expected from children in the reverence department. I’m glad the congregation is tolerant because I really was doing all I could to quell the ninjas without marching up to the front, which would have been a much bigger disruption than a child quietly amusing himself by playing finger games.

On the way home from church, I praised all of my kids for their efforts. They really did try their best and all felt really good about how they did. But next year I think we may have a little pre-program discussion about appropriate behavior while sitting on the stand. It would be nice to be the amused/sympathetic parent who is watching someone else’s child’s antics.