Karaoke Dreaming: Getting Mouse Crazy on the Disney Wonder Mike

I’m the shy one.

Oh, stop it with the teeth sucking and the side-eyes—it’s true, doggonit.

Now, my family and friends will readily dime me out—tell you that I’ve given countless speeches/book readings, yucked it up on-camera with everyone from Sinbad (way back in the day when he had his own late night show) to anchors on The Today Show, The Early Show and CNN, and even sang with my sister-in-law/BFF Angelou and my nieces, Maia and Imani, in front of a packed albeit friendly church audience on Mother’s Day.

But talking into a camera is a cakewalk for me. Being forced into the spotlight is something wholly different. When we’re in African dance class and our instructor, Sauda, gets us into a circle and asks us to bust a move, I want to melt into the floor. When my father-in-law gets on the piano and asks for vocal accompaniment, my mother-in-law is the only one who can twist my arm enough—er, persuade me—to sing along. Don’t even get me started with what happens when our pole dance instructor is standing there waiting for me to show off my skills on the… long story.

Anywhoo, I get clammy—sweaty. My heart pounds in my chest. I get the shakes—uncontrollable shakes. You can’t see ‘em. But I got ‘em. And all the while, my eyes are darting here to there, wondering which one of the people watching is going to be the one who points a finger, clutches her stomach and leads the crowd in side-splitting guffaws while I’m scrambling for cover.

Yeah, no spotlight and wind machines for me—I’m much more content to play the rear, and leave the heavy duty lifting to, shall I say, more extroverted folks in my crew. Which explains these pictures right here, taken in Diversions, an adult sports bar on The Disney Wonder. My fellow Disney Mommy Blogger cruise mates tipped in there Saturday night looking for some music to dance to and a few adult beverages to cap off a fantastic dinner in the ship’s Parrot Cay restaurant when the host of the spacious sports bar clued us in: Turns out it was karaoke night—an introvert’s ultimate nightmare.

My bloggy buddies, Amy of Selfish Mom, Melanie of Don’t Try This At Home, Katja of Skimbaco Lifestyle, Kim of Traveling Mom, Arianne of To Think Is To Create, and Maria of My Teen, The Alien, along with our gracious Disney hosts Jonathan and Laura, didn’t waste any time pouring through the karaoke song menu, searching for the perfect tunes to take to the mike. The songs were standards karaoke fare—no surprises: lots of Elvis, Barry Manilow, Beatles, Jimmy Buffett and the like rounded out the list. Quite honestly, I was hoping there’d be more Stevie Wonder, a little more of the elements (Earth, Wind & Fire), some Chaka Khan or Angie Stone or India.Arie or Jill Scott up in that piece. Alas, the only song that even remotely made me consider making a fool of myself in front of a ship full of strangers was The Temptations’ “My Girl.” Alas, I quickly reminded myself that it is only in my dreams/shower/kitchen when I’m home alone that I can actually sing without morphing into a huge pile of sweaty, quivering jello, and nixed the idea of jotting down my name and song choice on one of those little white slips of paper the dee-jay had sent around to our table.

Of course, my bloggie buddies didn’t have any reservations about taking it to the stage. After we finished a full-blown side-splitting fall-out over two guys from Long Island embarrassing my hometown with an off-key/dead-wrong rendition of Bon Jovi’s “Dead Or Alive” (as a finale, one of those fools actually tore off his rip-away pants as he jumped off the stage, revealing black bedazzled drawers—no lie!), the girls ran onto the stage to play The Ikettes while a woman from Chitown belted out Tina Turner’s “Rolling On A River.”



Then, as if they just didn’t have enough, they rushed back up there to sing Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want To Have Fun”—well, Laura, suffering from a terrible head cold (she's in the pink dress), mostly croaked her notes while Amy, in the jean jacket, did the heavy lifting; everyone else danced and looked really cute.



Before the group could get back into their seats good, Amy shocked us all when the dee-jay called her name and she headed back to the mic again, this time for a solo deal. Her poison? Olivia Newton John’s “Hopelessly Devoted.” And get this: The girl can sing!



After our wild applause for Amy and some suffering through a few more “performances,” we all headed back to our spacious staterooms; waiting for me was a platter of chocolate-covered strawberries and a warm robe, both promising the perfect nightcap to a perfect evening. I sang the first verse of “My Girl” like I was David Ruffin up in that piece—“I got sunshiiiiiiiine, on a clooooudy daaaaay!”

I popped another chocolate-covered strawberry into my mouth and giggled.

One of these days… One. Of. These. Days.



(Note: This post is the third in the MyBrownBaby series on the 2009 Mommy Bloggers Disney Cruise. For more information on a Disney Cruise vacation, click here.)