Play some other music, white boy

WHAT’S SO FUNNY

We’re about to go on a 20-hour drive to visit our son Keaton -- 10

out and 10 back. Three of us in the vehicle. A crucial element of

such a trip is the music.

In California you drive the kids everywhere, so they grow up

trapped in the car, where you control the sound. They eventually get

their licenses and their own vehicles and go their own musical ways,

but in the meantime you have enormous impact for good or ill.

When they’re little you play the soundtrack from “Beauty and the

Beast” and the Marlo Thomas all-star compilation “Free to Be a

Family.” When they get older you squeeze in your own stuff. That’s

when you start to lose them.

When I drive alone I work on my singing in various genres; I also

like music that makes me think I’m the lead in a TV series.

Throughout the years I’ve played an edifying variety of material for

Keaton and Katie -- just about everything but rap and Japanese rock.

So now Keaton likes rap and Katie likes Japanese rock.

Keaton and I only got together on comedy and occasional rockers. I

remember one exception: I played Nelson Riddle’s “Route 66” theme and

he said, “That’s good driving music.”

When Katie was younger we sang our way through the Beach Boys and

Bobby Vee, all the way to Ben Folds. But lately she’s gotten restive.

She prefers her own people -- Evan and Jaron, Hayashi Nobutoshi --

and chafes at my song selection. She recently accused me of not

liking anyone I haven’t discovered myself -- a laughable charge I’d

like to see her prove in court.

She also says I’m bossy because I limit her selections in the car.

Finally, the other day, she called me a “CD Nazi.”

Yeah, I was hurt. I play a mixed selection to see what she likes,

and if she likes something, I play it again. Maybe that’s what the

Nazis were all about.

Later I went to her and I said to her, I told her, I said, “You

shouldn’t have called me that.”

“It was hyperbole,” she said. When I stared she added, “A literary

device, dad.”

I was so proud. Thurston is a Distinguished School because it has

distinguished scholars.

On the trip I’ve decided to defer to her preference at least half

the time I’m driving. When it’s my call I’ll search for a common

ground. James Taylor, John Mayer. The important thing is to get along

in the car. Harmony uber alles.