Panache.

I've been trying to write my daughter's "Young Citizen" entry for my hometown's newspaper. The weekly paper features a said young citizen, and in a town as small as mine, it's the kid of people you know, or at the very least, you know the grandparents. It's usually a trite, insipid little piece of, "My mommy and daddy are the greatest, and I love spending time with them and playing with my dog!" along with name, location, and who the parents are, whom surely you know, because... well, it's a town of less than 3,000. Surely you know the parents and you probably know both parents' life stories -- whether the parents want you to know them or not.

So anyway. My mother's been nagging at me to get this done because god knows she needs to see her Grandbaby on the front page of the town newspaper, so the whole town can see just where I put out and got knocked up had a small detour in life plans. I just can't stand to write the usual form-letter style Young Citizen intro. I just can't. I moved out of that town to go out into the big world and become a writer, damnit, so I best deliver so everyone will be talking for months about that ol' rascal How2 -- remember her? -- and how her baby's Young Citizen was the most hilarious (or absolutely disgracefully inappropriate) thing they'd ever read.

I need SPARKLE. I need Liza Minelli PIZZAZZ. RAZMATAZZ, folks. JAZZ HANDS. I've just typed entirely too many Z's for one paragraph allowable by any English language rules.

So the question is, what to mention? The typical article goes like this:

Hi! My name is SUSIE ANN WHATSHERNAME, and on Saturday, I will be 2! My daddy is Jim Bob and he works as a machine operator for The Big Factory Here In Town. My mommy is Bobbi Jo and she stays really busy at home taking care of me, my big sister, TAMMY, 8 1/2 months I am really lucky to have grandparents who live in This Godforsaken Town and spoil me. They are Harry and Mary Whoknows and Joe and Peggy Whatshername. All of my aunts and uncles think I'm ornery, but really cute!

So yeah. You see what I've got to work with here.

I've thought of mentioning such things as:

• "My mommy and daddy are exhausted."
• "My mommy drinks a lot, and her happy juice makes my nose feel funny!"
• "Sometimes my mommy and daddy shake me and it makes me giggle."
• "I enjoy eating mandarin oranges whole, and then pooping them out in a mess so foul that people think I am possessed."
• "I enjoy self-mutilation with whatever I can get my hands on, nearly falling to my death off of chairs and couches, chewing on electrical cords, eating fistfulls of dog hair, and attempting to slam my hand in doors and drawers."
• "I am not your monkey."

As you can see, the options are limitless. Though maybe I should try to write this thing when I'm filled with more love and adoration for my daughter and less sheer and utter exhaustion and exasperation. Maybe I'll write it when she's like, 25.