this is how we put our pants on

Posted on by debrarian

Thirteen years ago Val and I lived for eleven months in a camper van, vagabonding around the country. I am not (to my own disappointment) a morning person, but Val is quite sprightly in the mornings and would leap early out of bed to make coffee and rattle around the chilly van, usually singing, while I pulled my knit hat over my ears and scooched deeper into the blankets. (I wrote a poem about Val once that included the line “The crazy songs you make up when you wake up so damn early…”)

Val plunges into her songs the way a skier plunges off a mountainside, boldly and without a map, snatching at any sudden rhymes that crop up as she careens by. Listening is like watching a juggler on a unicycle. One cold van morning Val popped out of bed to yank her pants on, and this is the song that sprang fully formed from her whimsical genius brain:

This is how we put our pants on, put our pants on, one-two-three!
This is how we put our pants on, put our pants on, just like me!
If… you have… to Go -To -The – Store!
You have… to have pants… to Get – In -The – Door!
Oh! This is how we put our pants on, put our pants on, one-two-three!
This is how we put our pants on, put our pants on, Just Like ME!

You can see how it perfectly captures the hoppity, grimacing verve required to leap out of a warm nest into a van so cold you can see your breath, and jump into your pants lickety-split before you freeze your tush off. And then pogo like a punk rock squirrel until you’re toasty warm and your coffee’s ready.

We’ve been singing it ever since. And by now, most of our friends and relatives sing it too. It’s quite catchy. But we never imagined just how far the put your pants on song could go until my sister Abby sent the following surprise video for Val’s birthday this week: This is How We Put Our Pants On.

Holy pants. What a tribute. Abby, you rock, and so do all your friends. This is how you put your pants on, everybody! Put your pants on, one-two-THREE!

Love,

Deborah

 

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2 thoughts on “this is how we put our pants on”

  1. I watched the link about the pants song. As each vignette played I chuckled more loudly, until the opera singer gave her rendition and then I laughed heartily, out loud! I think this is the perfect example of how some small little desperate act of survival can make ripples that turn out to be joyous, raucous, unexpected. What a fitting frame for Val herself. From the cold van to her present struggles there is so much she could have simply stayed silent or even complained about — but she has made everything — her whole life — a song. XO

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