It began like any other Saturday morning—birds chirping, toast burning, and my teenage daughter, Emily, howling what I can only assume was meant to be a Billie Eilish song in the upstairs bathroom.
The acoustics, designed by Satan himself, amplified every tone-deaf warble into something akin to a goat undergoing an exorcism.
Now, as a parent, I understand the sacred unwritten rule: never, ever crush the spirit of your teenage daughter, no matter how much your ears beg for sweet release. But on this day, my tolerance—much like my eardrums—snapped.
She emerged downstairs wearing her “Singing Is My Superpower” hoodie, looking smug and self-satisfied, like someone who had just single-handedly saved the music industry.
“Dad, did you hear me sing just now?” she asked with full confidence, as if expecting a Grammy nomination.
“Yes, sweetheart,” I said, taking a deep breath. “It was… flatter than the fattest pancake ever conceived. Like, if a pancake and a steamroller had a baby, that’s the note you were hitting.”
There was a silence so tense even the dog looked uncomfortable.
Her eyes widened, her jaw dropped, and for a moment I feared I’d just triggered the next great teenage meltdown—something psychologists might later refer to as “The Great Warble War of ’25.”
“You what?” she hissed, voice already warbling again with the tremble of teen betrayal.
“I mean, in a good way,” I added, scrambling. “It was impressively flat. Like, you reached a new dimension of flatness. Avant-garde! Very postmodern!”
She glared. “You just don’t understand my art.”
“You’re right,” I replied. “Much like a dog doesn’t understand algebra. But both of us still know something’s gone terribly wrong.”
Cue storming off, slamming doors, and a suspicious number of Instagram stories captioned, “When even your own parents can’t handle your shine”
I spent the rest of the afternoon watching YouTube videos titled “How to Rebuild a Teenager’s Confidence After Vocal Honesty.” That night, I offered an olive branch in the form of a family karaoke night where I butchered “Bohemian Rhapsody” so badly, Emily couldn’t stop laughing.
“Okay, maybe I wasn’t that bad,” she conceded, wiping away a tear. “But still… pancake flat? Rude.”
Since then, Emily has insisted on singing exclusively in the garage “to protect the family.” I said it was a great idea for acoustics. She said it was so she wouldn’t kill me with her high notes.
Either way, peace has returned. For now.
Until she tries rapping next week. Heaven help us all.
🐾 Featuring the Family
- Emily “Echo” Simmons – Our confident, tone-wrecking heroine
- Dad – Narrator and accidental dream-crusher
- Mum – Buffer and biscuit distributor
- Chew-Barker – Long-suffering canine, emotionally scarred by soprano attempts
Have you ever survived a teenage performance?
Drop Newsfangled a comment below—share your own pancake-flat parenting moments or your dog’s dramatic exit strategy.
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