One of the coolest things about having kids is that, at least for a time, you are their window to the world. You show them how to do things. You expose them to music and food. It’s like they are your own little miniature. They’ll reject some of it because they have no class their taste is yet to be refined, but sometimes they’ll surprise you with how fun and cool they are.
Sometimes that music, those games, and those jokes just stick.
And then you’ll be sitting there with them while they’re eating lunch, and “Hey, Jude” will come on. This is how they will respond without ever having heard the song before, and you will be kind of amazed:
Just as you suspected, they are your kid, and they have inherited your sense of cool, man. You are raising them right.
PS: I hope you enjoyed my singing. Don’t worry, I won’t be appearing anywhere near you anytime soon.
Before you start reading this, put on a song you love. If you want some suggestions, there are a few selections from my soundtrack I listened to when I wrote this here, here, and here.
I am not a dancer. Me not being a dancer goes hand-in-hand with me being self conscious. I feel like an idiot when I move my body to the music, and I have since my first seventh grade dance. Please please please don’t look at me. I’m that hippo in the corner doing yoga while wearing an Alexander McQueen-inspired getup.
I have felt like an idiot at countless weddings and parties when I started to sway. I’m not going to try to convince you that I look totally stupid because in all likelihood I don’t. It’s all in my head, I know that. But growing up means getting over yourself and just being a human who does things for the sake of doing them and not constantly checking yourself in the mirror.
So today when Wee Cee was in her high chair finishing lunch and The Reeling by Passion Pit came on and I naturally started doing Zumba moves to it because that’s what you do when that song comes on and I don’t trust anyone who suppresses the urge and says that it’s lame to move, well, she lost it and busted a move just as easily as I did. She threw her little fist in the air raise-the-roof style and swayed in her little baby way. We danced and swayed and laughed and moved together.
And then the song ended and I realized I had just danced without even knowing it. The above recounting of my moves are only corroborated by B who is home because the semester is over. How long have I been dancing without even knowing it? Probably since the moment this girl was born and I started getting over myself and started being a more human human. Being a parent means letting go of your lame self you developed the instant you hit puberty and forgot about being a baby. It means having fun because not only does it feel good but it makes your baby smile and it teaches her to embrace this glorious time in her life.
I love Michael. He was an entertainment god and his videos have a mythic quality about them. I mean, Thriller, seriously? It is justly considered the best video of all time. However, watching his videos requires a certain suspension of disbelief because they are often about as believable as a cartoon.
As evidence, I submit the 1987 video for “The Way You Make Me Feel.” Have a look:
So the video* begins with Michael screaming “HEEEY” at a girl as she walks the streets alone one evening. The timbre of his voice definitely reads “playful flirtatious encounter”, not “prepare to be stalked, beaten, and brutalized on top of a bunch of old boxes smelling of lo mein.”
*That is, the abbreviated video above. The full version 36 hours long.
Michael is dressed to the nines in an outfit that would be sure to receive a disapproving cluck from Michael Kors and Nina Garcia. Nothing says streetwise like a floofy white scarf holding your jeggings up. Also, am I the only person who feels like the more surgery MJ got on his face, the worse he smelled? I have always felt this way. Maybe it’s because he was a child trapped in a man-ish body, and kids don’t like baths. Or maybe it’s because he was lulu and lulus are prone to forget to practice basic hygiene. Or maybe it’s because this video was filmed in the Land the Sanitation Department Forgot.
So here in the LSDF, a young lady got all dressed in a diced up wet suit that night for her beau, MJ. Right. I guess she’s pretty good in the video, but for reals, she looks a bit too much like an emaciated Janet Jackson for me to be 100% comfortable with her role as Michael’s love interest. And could someone please feed her a pizza? For sers, guys, I think Miss C weighs more than her.
Michael usually has a posse in his videos, probably because he was always an outsider in real life. In this video, his posse is a group of middle-aged hobos. I think I even spotted the Hamburgler in there. His girlfriend has a posse, too, which is good because between the four of them, one of them is bound to have a rape whistle. Most likely the one who appears to be a man in drag. According to Wikipedia, one of the girl’s friends is played by LaToya Jackson, which I guess makes sense. Wouldn’t YOU want to be in a music video where your brother does pelvic thrusts towards the girl playing your friend?
Frolicking through the streets strewn with used syringes, the girl makes like Laura Winslow and brushes off the geeky advances of Michael, who is about as smooth an operator as the electronic jug band at Chuck E. Cheese’s. But by the end of the video, someone has popped open a fire hydrant and she is embracing MJ like her life depends on it.
And yet I love this video. Go figure.
Special thanks to Angie at Childhood Relived for allowing me to completely plagiarize her What the…Friday? idea for this post, where she resurrects an old YouTube clip and then points out that the drugs of the 80s were indeed potent. She’s pretty rad.
*****
And then there were four! Congrats to my friend Jells from I’ll Sleep When They’re Grown for the birth of A2! I am now officially not following any pregnancy blogs. I have a little hole in my heart.
Pet Sounds, the Beach Boy’s eleventh album, was released in 1966 as a response to Brian Wilson’s enthusiasm for the Beatles’ Rubber Soul and his inability to tour sans drug-induced panic attacks. He focused his attention towards creating an album devoid of “filler” such as cover songs and comedy tracks, and perfecting arrangement and production. Even though it wasn’t a runaway hit when it was released, it is now regarded as one of the best rock albums in history.
For good reason, too. This is the stuff that dreams are made of. It’s sometimes called a “concept album”, as if each track needs the others in order to make any sort of artistic, cohesive sense. This isn’t the case, though. The album opens up with “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” which is critically regarded as the track most akin to the Beach Boys’ pre-psychedelic work. From there, the album (namely, Brian Wilson) meanders into more pensive climes. This is a working album, because it’s work to figure out who you are, especially if you’re Brian Wilson.
The album makes little to no mention of cars, girls, or surfing. It’s just not that kind of machine. Is Caroline a California Girl like Rhonda presumably is? Maybe, but that’s not the trait that she is known for. You listen to the music and you know it’s the Beach Boys because of the unmistakable harmonies, but there is just very little tying it to their work from the early 60s. Tracks like “That’s Not Me” and “Put Your Head on My Shoulder” have an element of adolescence to them, but it’s the flip side of earlier tunes like “Be True to Your School” and “Little Deuce Coupe.”
I started out obsessing about this album a few weeks ago because of those stark differences between Pet Sounds and all the music of the Beach Boys that precedes it. I’m more a fan of the later music than of their early stuff. My thought was, if they had started with Pet Sounds and then shifted to their more bubble gummy surfer music, we would say that they had regressed or jumped the shark (an anachronistic way to describe it since the Fonz wouldn’t pull that feat until the mid-70s.) I wanted to write all about how I can’t waste my time listening to their older stuff when such goodness is there to be had in Pet Sounds. The idealism of Surf City is such a stark contrast to the reality that is Sloop John B.
I had these thoughts, but the more I dwell on them, it becomes clearer to me that the Beach Boys can be both because they were both. Their depth and versatility was what makes them worth listening to. It’s what allows people to toss around the word “genius” when describing their music, but in this case the word has merit.
Genius. What is it anyway? Is it the order of what you do? Is it anticipating the trajectory of your life or career and optimizing it, so Surfin’ Safari comes before Pet Sounds? Is it your versatility to make both? Is it the process of creating something palatable and fun that has timeless depth and resonance?
I’m not even going to attempt to answer that one. I think there are so many interpretations of what genius is, that it does a disservice to limit them. But I have no problem passing the question on to you. Thoughts?
Thirty-two weeks. Eight weeks (give or take) to go. It seems like only last week we went to Walgreens to purchase the EPT That Changed Everything so I’m really beginning to comprehend how relative time is to this whole baby-making undertaking. Bebe’s going to be here very soon, and after that, everything will change. As if everything hasn’t changed already. In baby time, she may as well come this afternoon. We’d be ready. Kind of.
Maybe "the nursery is coming together" is a bit too generous a statement.
The third trimester has been full of all those hallmarks that come to mind when you think of the Institution of Pregnancy. I’ve got the look: I’m a whale, having gained thirty pounds since the beginning.* The nursery is coming together. Enrollment in a childbirth class is in the works, and I’m beginning to iron out the details of my birth plan. B is giddy and talks to my belly several times a day.
*The doc said I’m right on track with my weight gain. I don’t believe this is possible, but what-evs.
So I’d say that Bebe and I are doing a pretty good job of fulfilling all the mandatory requirements of being a Mother With Child. We’re slogging through and playing the parts I suppose we should be playing. Face it, that’s what you do when you’re pregnant for the first time: you take cues from others and the media about what you should be doing because you have no clue yourself. At least I don’t. But I’m used to being pregnant now and here’s the thing that I love the most:
I’m mellowing out.
I think back a few months ago and I shake my head at how I could get myself in a tizzy over the minutiae of what I assumed parenthood would entail. Luckily for me, I have a blog where all my naivete has been chronicled. Today I was reading topiclessbar’s post Odd Thoughts on Having a Kid and I was reminded of a post I wrote way back called Baby Mix where I freaked out over Kiddie Culture and my soon-to-be induction into the world of The Wiggles. With all due respect to my October self, I now have to tell her to calm the frick down. No one is going to force this stuff on you and your Bebe. Pregnant Me pantomimes parenthood and assumes that what I see other people doing is what I’ll be doing too once Bebe arrives, but there’s not a lot of truth to that.
No one ever said I HAVE TO listen to The Wiggles. And here’s the thing: no one ever said that I’m not “cool” anymore if I do. Our family will work itself out and we’ll develop our own little culture. A good mixtape always includes a bunch of weirdness that somehow meshes with itself, so B and I can play our stuff right alongside The Wiggles if we so choose. Our family is changing and so is its soundtrack.
Granted, Little Alex shouldn't watch The Wiggles. But I've gotten over it.
In the meantime, though, I am still going to think about all the music I want to fill our home with. It’s a lot more fun to do this than it is to interview pediatricians, yet another amusing duty of the third trimester.
Arcade Fire – Tunnels
Just because. I may be in the minority on this one, but I think very little explanation is needed on why children – nay, EVERYONE – should be exposed to Arcade Fire.
The Go-Gos – Our Lips Are Sealed
This song has always made me think of Bebe. I mean, way, waaaaay before I became pregnant with her or even met B, I would hear this song and think of the girl who I might have someday.
The Smiths – Panic
A playlist should have something for everyone. This one is for B whose fascination with Morrissey knows no bounds and would possibly concern me if I weren’t completely convinced of B’s well-established manliness.
The Rolling Stones – Jumping Jack Flash
We have made a decision, B and I have. It’s weighty and contentious and not for everyone. Given the choice between the Rolling Stones and the Beatles, we’d have to take the Stones. Don’t be a hater.
….And a lullaby….
The Smashing Pumpkins – Luna
The Smashing Pumpkins get me emotional like no other band does, and this song is just so sweet I can’t handle it! The theme variations from Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness are also extremely soothing and lovely and will be a mainstay in the nursery; we’ll wait a few years to expose her to the shredding. One day I will tell the lengthy tale of my affair with The Smashing Pumpkins.
In compiling my (as always) *thorough* inventory of the human race, I have been able to discern two categories of parent.
First is the parent whose identity seems to be completely encapsulated in their baby/child. EVERYTHING is geared towards their young. Weekend outings are limited to going exclusively to kids’ museums, Chuck E. Cheese’s, and baby birthday parties featuring clowns whose humor is likely lost on both adult and youth spectators. Mac and cheese, chicken fingers, and crustless peanut butter sandwiches are not only featured on the wee one’s plate but also on mom’s (what kind of wine would you pair with Goldfish crackers?). Facebook status updates that once chronicled one’s witty comments on the suckiness of their jobs or the awesomeness of their trip to Estonia now concern the baby’s barfing or getting together with other spawners to take the kids to the latest community-organized spend-a-thon Craft Fest.
Then there are parents who seem to retain some of their adulthood upon introducing a baby into the fold. This is the kind of parent I want to be because I can’t handle the prospect that Barney time slots could possibly become pertinent to mine and Bebe’s daily routines. In our home, there will be no separately prepared meals for the elders and the youth because monochromatic children’s food is downright depressing and insulting to all who feel the need to consume it.
Believe it or not, I really don’t have any aggression towards kids’ culture. When I worked at a fairly hoity-toity restaurant a few years back, I used to watch Caillou before I went in for my shift because I found that its slow pace relaxed me and made me realize that the whiners and snobs who I would be dealing with that evening were, like Caillou, probably miserable from their youth and deserving of the same patience that anyone would give freely to a cranky four-year-old.
The stimulus that I will provide Bebe will (hopefully) be fun, cool, and not insulting to my baby’s intelligence. In her recent post Shiny Happy People, Jessica from booshy got me thinking about what babies hear (both in utero and, err, out utero) and how what the parents dish out trumps almost all other stimuli that the baby will receive from now until the kid learns of the existence of Tiger Beat. So in providing the soundtrack for our baby’s life, I think we can do better than The Waffles, or Wuggles, or Wiggles, or whatever the name of that musical group is.
At the same time, even though “Jeremy” is technically about a child, I don’t think I’ll be piping that into the nursery just yet.
So what’s the happy medium?
I have a few suggestions:
Every time the baby hears this song, I will remind him that his ultra-cool mom and dad have even been to Iceland. It will doubtlessly be annoying for the baby but it will hopefully remind him that his parents were cool way back when.
“Mommy, what’s ‘November Rain’”? I can field that question.
Me neither.
The ultimate shiny, happy medium. It kind of makes me sad that, despite the fact that REM hasn’t been too awesome since I was in 7th grade, Bebe will be born into a world where they don’t really exist anymore.
Now, the burning question: what would you put on your baby’s playlist? What should the kiddies be hearing?
