RW Phenom

Those of you with older kids have no idea the phenomena of Ralph's World. Self proclaimed Superhero of kids music, Ralph is a Grammy nominated children's music superstar. Mom, dad, and Charlotte alike are fans of his "not so kids music" kids music. So when we heard he was playing in our old stomping grounds of picturesque Williamstown MA, we jumped at the opportunity to get tickets and see the show live for ourselves.

The trip started out uneventful. We should have known something was not right when during the ride Charlotte asked to listen to Ralph's World. Where was the CD? At home on the counter where he left it. Not good. So to prevent Charlotte from crying any longer we listened to Annie. Over and over and over.

We arrived at Nanny's house which was boarded up for the long and cold winter. There was not much to eat and Charlotte was starving. Dad scoured the fridge to find a snack for Charlotte. The only thing he could find was a jar of pickled polish sausages. Clue number 2 something was not right. Charlotte loved the pickled sausage.





The morning of the concert we left super early to get good seats. On the way to the show Charlotte said, "No No Ralph's World". Huh? Was she kidding? We shrugged our shoulders and we played along. "No dear, no Ralph's World".

When we arrived at the venue everything seemed OK. Then she said it again. "No No Ralph's World". OK, now what? The choice was either leave and waste the money on the tickets, or try to trick our child into thinking we weren't really going to see Ralph. We chose the latter.

Waiting for the doors to open we could hear Ralph inside practicing with the band. Charlotte seemed OK. Not excited. Not miserable. When the doors opened for us to run down and get our front row seats Charlotte lost it. Screaming, crying, kicking, tears streaming. NO NO RALPH'S WORLD!!!

Luckily the doors opened 30 minutes before the show. It took her 30 minutes to stop crying. We walked around. Dad did everything possible to distract her. Charlotte saw all of these kids gathered around some guy outside the auditorium. It was Ralph. They were all getting pictures with him. Charlotte waived to him and even said "Hi Ralph". Using poor dad's judgement (which many dads do), he decided to get a picture with Charlotte and Ralph. Mom quickly snapped away. Charlotte's lip started quivering as Ralph asked her what her name was. Then she started wailing. Poor Ralph, just trying to be a nice rock star had his ego trampled by a two year old little girl.


We did what all bad parents would do. We went inside and sat in our seats. Charlotte calmed down. She even clapped. Then Ralph and the band appeared before us. Instead of singing along she cried. She would stop for a few minutes, look at Ralph, then cry. This was not a cry like teenagers viewing the Beatles for the first time, this was a cry of this Ralph guy is going to kill me. Needless to say we left the show early. Poor kid. As soon as we got in the car it was like a switch went off and she was fine. She even joked, replaying the whole scene. Charlotte cry. Charlotte afraid Ralph. Then we turned Annie back on and life returned to normal. Sorry Ralph.