Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Talk Radio


I was driving with Daughter and her best friend this weekend when the request I've come to dread came from the backseat: "Mom, can you turn on the radio?"

Okay, I really have just got to put a stop to this already. The answer from now on has to be, "No. Really I can't turn on the radio." First of all, I'm so old now that I have almost all the channels preset to NPR. And the ones that aren't on NPR were hijacked by Husband and set to classic rock or rhythm and blues stations. Either way, it's not exactly what two ten-year-olds had in mind.

They persist, telling me that they want a certain specific station, then watch as I try to use my limited brain cells to drive the car and figure out how to find a radio station. After all, I've only owned my car three years, not long enough to have mastered the scan button on the stereo. I'm lucky I know how to turn it on.

I find the station and it turns out it's Rap. This is when you know your daughter's not a little girl anymore. What, no Radio Disney? What about those nice High School Musical CDs we got a few years ago? How about Selena Gomez? Stony silence. I feel myself aging.

In that exact moment I turn into my grandfather. I say, "Is this music?" I even get a little Old Country accent. My voice gets a lilt. My hand waves in the air dismissively. How did I turn into my grandfather?

Here's what I remember. It was the late 1960s. Neither he nor my grandmother knew how to drive but my mother would careen over to their West Rogers Park apartment in Chicago in her tiny red Chevy Nova to get them each Saturday. Then my grandfather, with his diabetic legs that were all walked out, would sit in our house all day and into the night watching the kaleidescope of his granddaughters as we flew in and out of one door or another, running in and out of rooms, and as we played music on our HiFi system.

My grandfather would shake his head wonderingly at the noise coming out of the stereo. He'd say, "This is music?" And I'd say, "Yes, Zayda. It's the Beatles and the Monkees!" And he'd say, "Is it music or animals?" And I'd have to think.

The girls don't know that I just turned into my own grandfather in the front seat of my car. They're singing along - or talking along - with the rapper. Then Daughter's friend says, "You know, I'm not sure if this is music because he's just talking." And right then, with just the tiniest bit of wavering in the backseat, I click the radio off.

Is it startling when music you loved is suddenly referred to as classics? Do you remember relatives questioning whether the music you liked was music at all? Have you had a "generation gap" with your kids yet with music?

33 comments:

  1. I think my favorite moment was about five years ago....my husband was flipping through some radio stations and happened upon some music by Rush...he is singing and bopping along and then we hear "This is your classic rock station 98.1 fm"...
    The look on his face....priceless.
    I laughed, and laughed and laughed...
    just the other day I heard madonna and bruce springsteen on 98.1.
    Time catches up with us all.

    As for my daughter's music...I homeschooled, so she has come out of that experience with a kind of eclectic mix of pink floyd, simon and garfunkel and new stuff like down with the sickness...which I have yet to really listen to...it's starts that cookie monster crap and I tune out.

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  2. Chris, my husband's such a 60s rocker that he's raised our kids on it too. And I think that day in the car my daughter was just trying to get along with her friend because she is SHELTERED! (Yea for sheltered!)

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  3. Not only have I had a generation gap with my kids, who by the way are 35 and almost 38 and now like my 70's favorites, but I have a huge generation gap with my grandchildren. When they are in the car I NEVER put on the radio. I wouldn't have a clue as to what they'd like and when I tell them to find something they'd like to listen to, the sweethearts politely decline knowing I wouldn't care for their hip-hop, rap or whatever.

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  4. "Classic," or here in Dallas "I K-Luv My Oldies!"
    What the...?

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  5. ahaha! YES...I totally get it! First of all, I don't think I know how to work the radio in our car either. I never use the regular radio, we have satellite radio and I only sometimes use that. I usually plug my Ipod into the car and listen to my own music. Secondly, when I do happen to hear something that the kids are listening to these days, I am appalled that they are remakes. And transported back to the time when I would listen to a great new song, only to have my mom tell me that it was a remake and I would have to watch, horrified, as she sang along with my "cool new song". That's me, now. **SIGH** I hate being so uncool.

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  6. This is me! First of all, I'm radio-impaired, too. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out the car radio.

    Second--rap SUCKS. I hate it. It gives me a headache and the lyrics are jacked. If either daughter ever likes it, I'm screwed.

    Thank goodness we haven't hit that bump yet. You're right, maybe High School Musical isn't that bad!

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  7. You cannot hide pop culture from your children. My father hated Led Zeppelin, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and The Who. He thought is drug crazed long hairs screaming. He was right. I expose my 8 year old son to a wide range of music. And yes, even allow him to listen to a christmas carol or two. You can't hide from this stuff. He loves Klezmer too and can dance the horah. Teach them well, let them listen, they will go down the right path. As the Boss said, "Have a little faith..."

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  8. Oh man do I understand this! And then wait to the volume starts to bother you. Do you have to play the music so loud? Wait did I just say that?

    And I try and stay current. I listen to Kanye and Eminem. But it's so hard.

    My other issue is that I'm so old I can't see the right buttons to push in the car or on my ipod or any other small device.

    The generation gap...when did we find ourselves on the other side of the devide?

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  9. Ellen, so funny. How did this happen? I remember when I was a kid how we were the Now Generation. We were always going to be totally cutting edge, right? It proves that nothing stays still in the world, there's always a generation coming up behind us (or another behind them) and one of the things all these piling up generations accomplishes is that our stuff starts looking very out of date!

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  10. Anne H, Can you believe our music is now "oldies?" When I was a teenager the oldies station used to play wolfman jack and the stuff from the 50s, like beach music. How can Beatles be oldies, tell me? And I'm forty-nine too, for exactly 4 more days...

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  11. Jennifer, the stereos seem to be more complex nowadays. There are whole sets of buttons I don't dare push. Of course, I don't pull out the owner's manual either! And the bigger question, how did we become our mothers?!

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  12. TKW, You should have seen me when my battery had to be replaced. Turns out the radio has to be completely reprogrammed when that happens! So all I did was program NPR in. Also, don't they know that I secretly psychoanalyze them after school, that's why there's no music?

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  13. Neil, with my husband there's no chance of the kids not knowing music. They've been exposed to everything from Jimi Hendrix to the Who and the Grateful Dead. I'm the dork in the family though I like Timbaland and Fergie and, I hate to admit it, am a big Amy Winehouse fan. But I do draw the line at things like Britney Spears new song "Three," where she sings about menage a trois. That's one thing my ten-year-old doesn't need to hear about. Thanks for visiting.

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  14. Terry, Can you believe the volume thing? That doubly proves I've become my elders. I can just feel my kids seething when I turn the volume down. What is more geeky than low volume?

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  15. Um. Fact is - I introduced my kids to Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Queen, Eric Clapton - when they were fairly young. They loved it. And now, with two teens, the CDs in the car are pretty wild - some French techno (something), Metal (something), Alternative (something).

    Clearly, I don't retain the names of the groups. (Duh.) But the fact is, I love the music. It's definitely wild, and definitely music. And definitely pumps up the heart rate.

    Not quite my grandfather yet, or maybe I am, just a wee bit. He was a musician and party animal - his whole life. Not so bad...

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  16. BLW, you are such a hard rocker! And Queen? Oy.
    I'm not just dancing the hora, here, though my kids don't seem to count my Jazzercising as proof of my staying current. I wonder why? :)

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  17. In response to this blog: I never could understand how my parents could prefer the sound of silence (actual silence and not the song) to music when they got in the car when I was a teenager. When I started driving I liked my music on and I liked it loud. I wanted everyone to enjoy it...lol. Sometime in my 30s I turned it off. I was a sales rep and driving a lot for work and discovered that all of that noise actually bothered me. I preferred to listen to my own thoughts. After several weeks with the radio off I realized that I had become my parents and it wasn't painful at all!

    As for how I got here... I read your comment on Chris's blog. I believe strongly in visualization and meditation. I have chronic fatigue and migraines and right now it's all bad news. I have been dialing up everything and it's still problematic. I read your post and I know that I am missing something. So, any insights you've got... I'm open to anything you have to say!

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  18. I'm so stuck in the 80's, it's sad. I've tried to train my daughter to listen along and, for a teenager, she's pretty literate in my music taste. But every now and then she'll say "listen to this new song, Mom" and it will be a remake from my past - making me feel oh so old!

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  19. I am at once dreading and eagerly anticipating these moments with my girls. The angst-ridden and affectionate exchanges that remind me that I am not a kid anymore. Yay. Wah.

    Love this.

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  20. Robin, thanks for coming on over here. I like your blog as well! I'll be happy to tell you more about the whole headache thing - it was amazing, really, that I got rid of them. Email me at barmitzvahzilla@hotmail.com and I'll give you all the sordid details!

    And funny about liking the sound of our own thoughts instead of radio! What a quick road that does seem to have been, going from a teenager blasting music to driving quietly along, thinking!

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  21. Lisa, I thought he remakes of Beatles songs into musak were bad but it is disconcerting when songs that were GOOD ENOUGH are now redone and the kids think that's the only version. Weird.

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  22. Aidan, at least you have the darling years ahead -all the Disney stars, the girly music. I just don't understand how we instantly become uncool. Like even if I was a young mom, I'd be uncool.

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  23. I used to (and occasionally still do) listen to rap. I definitely do not put it in the category of music. I consider it dance beats.

    I haven't listened to the radio in ages. Something about the commercials drives me bonkers. Of course, with the children in the back, I don't need music! They serenade me with their whines the whole drive!

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  24. Love this post, Linda! I am grateful to my parents for introducing me to the "classic" rock hits of the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Listening to their music gave me an appreciation for the songs that are now considered classics. I actually still prefer the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Neil Young, and Tom Petty to a lot of the music that was on the radio when I was growing up. And Husband and I still play it for our boys now. (I can't deal with most of the kids' CDs I've heard.) Husband likes rap and I like some of it, but, with Big Boy in a repeat-everything-he-hears stage, I draw the line for him at any music with words I wouldn't want him repeating at library storytime!

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  25. Amber, I'm trying to piece together Rap + Utah... Interesting! And I remember how stressfull it was having the kids erupt in the backseat, unreachable most of the time, while I was driving. A kind of music, but not soothing!

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  26. Kristen, I'm with you on the lyric thing, though who would've thought I'd turn into Tipper Gore? My kids wake up to "classic rock" everyday! You should see what my house is like since my husband discovered YouTube. Oh my.

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  27. I have never been a big music listener. My kids try to sneak it off my talk radio stations to radio before I notice.

    Thanks to my husband's influence, though, they are getting introduced to music. My daughter and husband listen to the same things. (I think?)

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  28. i.LOVE.this!!

    I'm quite sure loud, aggressive music will complete the messy pitholes of my boys' rooms as they reach adolescence. oh joy!!

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  29. Charlotte, I really enjoy NPR but the kids are absolutely mystified by it when they get in the car with me and it's still on. Like they can't imagine WHY anyone would ever turn on the radio to hear TALK!

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  30. Sarah, You should see how I have to fight with my son not to stand around with those stupid white ear phones in his ears and to be a part of our family. I only got him his gadgetry to be a part of the social groups at school, not to phase us out! Imagine THREE boys sitting in the car with ear plugs in. (Though it would be quiet!)

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  31. Hi Linda -
    I try to be open minded about my daughter, Kate, playing "teeny bopper" music while we're driving back and forth to school or track practice. The thing that most annoys me is rev'ed up DJs that sound like they're shooting crystal meth on the side. When I can't stand the inanity anymore, I switch the station back to NPR.

    I used to be an audiophile during my 20s; so, I know what the buttons and dials are supposed to do. The problem is changing the settings without loosing traffic awareness.

    Our family insurance rates have doubled since my oldest daughter, Sarah, started driving a few years ago. She's the responsible one. Kate is the wild child. It's only going to go downhill from here.

    BTW, at the conclusion of Revolutionary Road - the only movie I've seen in the last two years - Kathy Bates is sitting in the living room with her elderly husband yakking about the neighborhood and real estate prices. Her husband eases back in his rocker and slowly fades out the volume on his hearing aid with a sly smile on his face. If I were hearing impaired, I'd try this while driving with children.

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  32. David, I am a huge NPR fan too. Funny how when you're a kid it just sounds like people talking - what could be more boring than that? Now I long for the fascinating discussions! I try to explain them to my kids but it's a serious NO GO. Radio to them = music.

    And about Revolutionary Road - I can see I need to rent it. Just Kathy Bates alone is reason enough!

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