Always fancying himself a songster, Drew spent hours putting on performances in his childhood bedroom. Attendance records were met each time he got new stuffed animals to arrange as an audience. In fact, the crowd was so quiet, Drew often got noise complaints… about his singing.
You see, Drew would crank up the volume on his ghetto blaster (boombox, for the moderately young reader) and sing at the top of his lungs. It usually prompted banging on the other side of his bedroom wall or his brothers in the basement shouting through the air conditioning vent to shut up.
So, it was no surprise that Drew would take the spotlight any time he could – especially when a real, human audience was willing to watch.
Fast forward to Christmas dinner at his grandparent’s house when Drew was almost four years old. The long table set up in their basement and each family member having the same designated seat year after year. Oftentimes, Christmas carols would be sung after dinner as dessert was served. This time, however, Drew planned to headline the show.
His great-grandma was in town for the occasion. She, in her 90s at the time, had a cane to get around. It had four small legs on it to offer more stability. Coincidentally, it was tall enough that the bicycle-handle-type grip came right to the level of Drew’s mouth. A perfect makeshift microphone, he thought.
When his favorite Christmas song came on (Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree), Drew grabbed the cane, er, microphone and started singing along in an attempt to overpower the actual recording -- just like at home. During a musical interlude in the song, Drew continued to dance and use the cane as a microphone stand, rocking left and right with it, practically dancing with it.
With his dance break in full swing, he began pushing the cane from left to right, switching hands like he was singing to the crowd to one side and then the other. Problem is, he got so into the actions that he eagerly pushed the cane from his right side to left but missed catching it and it smashed into the record player, also at just a convenient height. The hard rubber grip of the cane hit the delicate vinyl record with such force that it popped up off the turntable and cracked.
In Drew’s later telling: “It wasn’t that I broke the record that was embarrassing. I was actually humiliated that I missed catching the cane and felt like I pissed off my great-grandmother. That’s what killed me the most.”