Today I had my mind blown.
I was hanging out with my friend as he went to pick up his kids from school. Now since his kids are in preschool and elementary school, there’s really nothing on the radio for them to listen to. It sucks and I empathize with his plight.
I mean, this is my former roommate—my best friend, with whom I initially bonded over our admiration for The Lox. He’s from New York. He lives and breathes hip-hop, but he’s a parent, so he’s got to pay attention to what his kids are absorbing.
Anyway, I’ll toss together a random mix, burn it and throw it his way from time to time. (Incidentally, he shares his birthday with my coworker.) Sometimes I’ll make a mix of songs that I know he’s been dying to hear and other times I’ll make it a theme. Since it was has birthday, for instance, I created a Cake mix.
Get it? “Birthday.” “Cake.”
However, it turns out that when he’s in the car with the kids, he puts on a CD full of songs meant to inspire. If I recall correctly I dubbed it the “Optimix Prime”. It’s full of quirky songs and more than handful of TV theme songs. It’s a pretty light and fun mix.
We’re all in the car and he says, “Check this out,” at which point he puts the disc on. And I kid you not, the kids knew Peggy Lee’s “It’s a Good Day”, by heart. His eldest is seven years old and his youngest is going to be three. His eldest knew every word to the song and the youngest was vocalizing along to the instrumental solos.
I was bugging.
I mean, we’re talking about a song that’s six decades old and two kids who are only going to know about the 20th Century from history books. Not to mention the fact that he and I just happened to stumble across the song by accident (via the criminally underrated U-Turn.) I could barely wrap my head around it. It seemed like a juxtaposition that would ring false if you saw it in a movie or a TV show, yet it was happening right in front of me.
I did my best to keep my composure, because (a) I didn’t want the kids to realize that they were being observed, and (b) I didn’t want them to become self-conscious. But it was such a pure moment.
And then the cherry on top was that they were also fans of the theme to Greatest American Hero. That took me back because I can remember being around that age and totally slayed when I heard it on the radio.
This happened hours ago and I’m still buzzing about it. I don’t know what it did to me. I don’t know if I’m happy that they’re being exposed to music that doesn’t suck and are receptive to it, or if I’m extrapolating to be optimistic about their entire generation. All I know is that it completely made my day and probably my weekend too.
