Tale #52: The Forgotten Child

VACT is a true family organization. A child will audition for their first show and before they know it, their mom is the head of costumes, dad is on the board, older siblings are techies, Grandma and Grandpa come to every single performance, etc. People want to be involved with VACT.

A part of that comes from the love of theatre as an art form. However, a greater part of it comes from the innate human desire to be part of a community. A community where you feel welcomed, you enjoy yourself, and you feel your children are well-looked after.

Some of our families got a little too comfortable with that last concept.

Every year, VACT hosts an annual meeting. It used to be a true members’ meeting as VACT used to be a membership organization. Now that VACT has grown and has much greater assets, the term meeting is used more symbolically and it is really just a season kick-off party.

At our old VACT Building (the pole-barn), when it was still a true members’ meeting, people would come and then stick around after for a potluck-style social gathering. Children were invited to attend even though they weren’t voting members. Often children would be featured in the performances to demonstrate the show titles up for vote for the upcoming season (but more on that next week).

By the annual meeting in 2016, our teen program was at max capacity, and teens across multiple school districts had become good friends. A group of teens performed a medley from Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka as part of that year’s meeting, therefore they all stayed after for the free food and hangout time. Some had come with parents who were members and others had driven themselves.

As the socializing was wrapping down, and the main volunteers were getting ready to head to the bar for the after-after-party, I was tasked with tidying up the food and making sure all of the teenagers were picked up/had left.

I quickly realized that a fifteen-year-old whose parents had been at the meeting was still there, yet her parents were not.

I asked her, “who is taking you home?” I wasn’t sure if she was allowed to ride with one of the other teenagers. She replied, “my dad.” I looked around at the few stragglers leftover and looked back at her and asked, “well where is he?”

She too realized that her parents had left her there.

I called the dad, who coincidentally had said goodbye to me twenty minutes earlier, and asked how she was supposed to get home. As I was asking, I could hear that he was walking into his house and all of a sudden he said to his wife, “She didn’t come home with you?”

What had happened was his wife took the younger daughter and left much earlier in the evening. He thought she had taken both kids as he couldn’t see his other daughter tucked away in the corner with the teenagers. So he just left on his own.

A classic case of “I thought you had the kid!”

This was just one of many times when we’d find ourselves with stray children who were victims of parent misunderstandings.

Part of working in children’s theater and community theater is understanding that you are more than just a creative artist.

You’re a babysitter.