Party pieces
When I was little and we visited my gran's we used to have little parties. No reason, except that we were visiting I guess. I've fond memories of these parties. And a particular part I've been thinking about is our party pieces. Everyone had to do a little performance. That's something I would like for the niblings.
Of course in the thenadays everyone was expected to put on the entertainment. A song, a piano piece, a poem, reading. A contribution.
So I should have a party piece. It's going to have to be a recitation. Because I can't sing, or do magic, or play an instrument, and it takes me over two minutes to solve a Rubiks cube. As an adult though it just makes me think of Anne of Green Gables and the ultra-dramatic "the highwayman came riding, riding..."
The only poem I know even one verse even slightly by heart is Ode on a Grecian Urn. Not really one for the kids. Fragments of some other equally unsuitable Beat poetry, I don't know how that got in the brain.
Before you say, it's just like knowing the words to a song - I can't do that either. I'm comically bad at lyrics.
Also, I don't like that 'reciting poetry voice' everyone gets. It freaks me out. What would we call that? Cadence?
Might as well try memorising pi. The kings and queens of England. A deck of cards.
Actually, I wrote 'the kings and queens of England' as a joke, not just because of my inability, but because it's such a reductive, weird bit of history to focus on. But maybe I could do weird history facts.
A little searching turns up stuff like "twelve poems everyone should learn by heart." Twelve poems? Not going to happen. I'd be lucky to get twelve words together.
All of which is to say: love the idea, fully support the idea, absolutely cannot do the idea.