cruisining tunes…
Aug 8th, 2009 by Kate
(cross-posted to The Mamas!)
What music do you listen to when you’re in the car with your kids?
When my oldest was small, I listened to whatever - and I do mean whatever - I wanted. She wasn’t the type of kid who repeated inappropriate things at random times. We listened to a lot of David Bowie and The Cure but there was also the occasional spin of “The Chronic” or the Office Space soundtrack. I never once heard her baby-lisping, “One, two, three and to the fo’”.
Fast forward a few years. Toot is an infant and I start thinking that there is almost no chance I will be as lucky with this kid as I was with Kit. How many children are not “repeaters”? So out goes the Dr. Dre, Yeastie Girls, Tupac and Little Kim. I listened to the relatively sanitized Black Eyed Peas, Destiny’s Child and The Killers. And as always, a lot of NPR.
(I feel like I should note that I hold no “cool music” credentials what-so-ever. I LOVE pop, hip-hop and rap. While I do own a lot of Depeche Mode, Pet Shop Boys and even a little Death Cab for Cutie, I have been know to appreciate Carrie Underwood and Celine Dion.)
Now, Toot and The Boy are four and almost-three. Not a day goes by when I don’t hear Toot’s sweet little voice singing, with exceptionally clear enunciation, from the back seat. Sometimes it’s a song from The Little Mermaid or Once More, With Feeling (the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer).
Just as often, she’s singing (as she calls it) “The Chapstick Song” (I kissed a girl and I liked it, the taste of her cherry chapstick) or (and I cringe as I write this) “Let’s have some fun, this beat is sick, I want to take a ride on your disco stick”. She loves that stupid song.
“Toot”, I say, “What’s a disco-stick?”.
She looks at me like I’m a crazy person, exasperatedly replies, “You know! It’s like one of those sticks that you hold onto and bounce!”
“A fancy pogo stick?”, I ask.”YES, mom.”
I feel slightly better about her enthusiasm.
I struggle, in respect to music, with what I feel is expected of me as a mother and what I want to do. I DON’T want to listen to Kid’s Bop or The Wiggles. I don’t feel as though kids need to grow up never hearing a swear word. But I don’t want to coarsen or desensitize my kids. Finding the balance is hard. Again, what do you listen to in car with your kids? What would you never-ever play for them?
We’ve only had a car that can play anything but the radio and cassette tapes for two months, so unfortunately Aldus has already been exposed to far too much Phil Collins and Lionel Richie than anyone ought to be.
Charles has tried to balance it out with Beastie Boys but is now trying to teach Aldus the chorus of M.I.A.’s Paper Planes. Yup, that’ll be my two year-old singing, “All I wanna do, bang bang bang bang. Click ka-ching and take your money.”
Me, I’ve subjected him to Neko Case. I don’t worry too much about anyone overhearing him asking to hear “for Pauline” (”Margaret and Pauline”) or singing “Holy to the lord” (”John Saw That Number”). But I totally gush when I finish singing one of her songs and he shouts, “Good job, Uhma!”
If/when I get my act together, both of the boys will probably get a fair amount more of The Police, Smiths, Morrissey, INXS, Erasure, etc.