It started like any other Karate Boys training day—shouts of “Kiai!” ricocheted off the walls while Bryce, self-appointed sensei and general chaos enthusiast, demonstrated a spinning backfist that looked suspiciously like an accidental windmill. It was all smooth sailing until we heard it. Faint at first, like a distant storm rolling in. And then it hit—full-force, unignorable. Mitchell.
Mitchell doesn’t know the meaning of subtlety. If fanfare was a person, it’d be him. We paused mid-kick as the unmistakable sound of a stroller wheel thunking against every doorframe announced his reluctant departure. “Nooo! Nooooooo!” echoed down the hallway, followed by the soundtrack of his unmistakable defiance—heavy stomps, nonsensical toddler babble, and the occasional panicked, muffled hiccup. It was majestic. It was tragic. It was Toddler Beethoven’s Fifth, and the theme was resistance.
“Where’s Mitchell going?” someone asked, like the answer wasn’t crystal clear. Mitchell was heading straight for his destiny—or, more accurately, a 60-hour-per-week after-school program in Reseda. Rumor had it, the facility had all the toddler essentials: naps, plastic trains, and a vague promise that someone would handle the diaper apocalypse waiting under Mitchell’s impractically large shirt. (Not us. Definitely not us.)
But Mitchell wasn’t sold on this grand new adventure. “NO SCHOOL!” came his war cry, punctuated by the awkward thump of him being shuffled toward the great outdoors like a dog refusing bath time. Bryce froze mid-karate pose, peering toward the door as if sensing a loss in the toddler force. “He’s fighting it,” he said solemnly, like a monk observing the decline of the enlightened.
And boy, was Mitchell fighting. Trapped in the clutches of some poor, unnamed chaperone, he flailed with the dedication of someone who knew his fate was sealed but was determined to make a spectacle out of it anyway. “Mitchell!” we heard again—although whether it was a plea, an exasperation, or a full-on surrender is anyone’s guess. By the time the noise faded, Mitchell and his pamper (ominously unaddressed) had been loaded into the van of destiny, bound for Reseda as we resumed our kicks, half-hearted at best.
Was he victorious? Probably not. But if chaos is an art, Mitchell’s the Picasso. Long live the chaos king.