music for the masses

Music is important to me. Let me make it clear that I have no musical talent. I couldn’t even play a flutophone in grade school and when my wife and I took Ballroom Dancing lessons, I couldn’t find the beat. I guess saying that music appreciation is important to me is a better statement, but it’s not like I enjoy classical music. I just want my kids to be interested in music and I’m praying they like something other than bubble-gum pop or rap.

I realize that my daughter is more likely going to be interested in the Brittanys and Jessicas of her time than she is the Wilcos and the Jack Johnsons. But I’m doing what I can to keep that from happening.

I’m sure most parents go out and buy all sorts of Disney sing-a-longs and Wiggles CDs for their babies, and while we bought a few of these, we play them infrequently. The three discs we play the most for our daughter are compilations of songs by bands we like. Two of them are For the Kids and For the Kids II. Both are packed with artists my wife and I enjoy (Guster, Barenaked Ladies, Matthew Sweet) singing children’s songs. The third disc is actually a mix CD I created and burned myself. This disc includes songs by the Smashing Pumpkins, Phish, the Beatles, and the Sundays (there’s actually a fourth disc she listens to every night at bedtime. The songs are all-instrumental lullaby versions of Beatles songs).

Listening to “our” music does create a problem. Language is the problem. We probably should be censoring what our daughter hears, but it is also important to me that she grow up actually having some taste in music. I love Ben Folds Five, but the other day when “Kate” was playing, I cringed when Ben sang “Everyday she wears the same thing / I think she smokes pot”. And “Battle of Who Could Care Less”....I love the bit about the Franklin Mint in that song, but see yesterday’s post for information on that subject.

I know some people who get so upset if a CD they buy has words like “hell” or “suck” in them. I’m not that extreme. I realize my daughter shouldn’t be learning swear words or lyrics about pot, but I know she’s going to hear about these things sometime. I’m also not a fan of censorship, so clean versions of songs aren't going to replace the ones with explicit lyrics. I’ll just have to try to skip those songs when she’s around. No matter what, there’s no way I’m switching out my Whatever and Ever Amen CD for a copy of ...Baby One More Time.

monkey see, monkee do

Sometimes I fear that I may be inadvertently creating a monster. Or, at the very least, a toddler with a trash-mouth. I’m discovering that a 10-month-old is really a lot like a sponge. She picks up on things quite fast, and if I don’t change my vocabulary, I’m going to be one embarrassed dad on a future visit to the local Giant Eagle.

The speed with which she learns new things is astonishing. She did the “So Big” thing (arms raised above her head) after very little demonstration from Mom and me. She claps when someone says “Yea!”, and we’re working on getting her to show people she’s one by using her pointer finger. Her First Birthday is quickly approaching. Which brings me to the possibility of needing to hide behind the cookie display at the local grocery store.

See, I have a potty-mouth. Actually, what I have is far beyond a potty-mouth. I think I would make truck drivers blush. I drop the F-Bomb like it is an ordinary word in ordinary conversation. And I don’t stop there, oh no. I use a lot of words that any child should have her mouth washed out with soap for using. Our daughter hasn’t really started to talk, but if I don’t learn to watch it, her first word isn’t going to be something cute like “kitty” or “ma-ma”. It’s going to be “sh*t” or worse.

What I really need to do is find a replacement word. I know, I know, that’s only a temporary fix and if I’m not careful, she’ll go around saying that instead. But it’s a start. Besides, it’s an understatement to say that going cold turkey is going would be difficult. I know I have to stop using my gutter mouth or die freaking trying.

blocked

So for the past 2 weeks or so I haven’t made a post. Sure, I have been busy. I had the taxes to do, which I had put off. Again. I’ve been posting for my daughter on her blog, so I haven’t done much on mine. I’ve also been doing some minor things around the house and yard. None of those things have kept me away though. It’s been writer’s block. I’ve been searching for the perfect situation to come up for me to write about how it relates to raising a daughter, but nothing seems to spur creativity. Instead, I have had a last post of April 8th staring me in the face.

Our daughter hasn’t had any major milestones either. Sure, she’s walking around if you hold her hands or if she’s pushing her cart-toy, but she hasn’t taken any steps. She’s still only got two teeth, which keeps us from feeding her much table food. Her vocabulary isn’t expanding, much to Mom’s disappointment (no “Ma-ma’s yet, and Mother’s Day is getting near).

I just can’t find any good material. There’s a new Pope, the Pirates are horrible, and last Friday was Earth Day, but none of this can be used for material. One of our cats has been peeing in our basement, our bathroom still needs to be updated and it snowed this weekend, but these subjects also don’t relate well to the theme of my writings.

There should be some good material on the horizon. At 10+ months, her first true steps have to be close. Her first true word can’t be far behind. June 2nd is quickly approaching and her Birthday Bash is just after that. I just didn’t want it to seem that I’ve been neglecting this blog or that I had given up completely. I just need to get past my writer’s block.

I'm the older sibling

Our daughter has three Uncles, and, for the foreseeable future, no Aunts. Two of the three are my wife’s brothers and until June, both are still teenagers. The third Uncle is my brother Mark who is 3-¾ years my junior. I don’t want to apply any undo pressure on him, but he is our daughter’s best chance at an Aunt out of the three by the end of this decade.

My daughter will grow up in a similar situation as mine. She will be the oldest sibling. She will be the one responsible for looking after the littler ones. She will be looked up to by them. They will be following in her footsteps for most of their childhood.

My brother and I got along as well as two brothers with nearly four years between them could. I would stick up for him when my friends started to pick on him, then beat the crap out of him if he ate the last Soft Batch chocolate chip cookie. He once chucked a Hot Wheels car at my mouth and chipped my tooth, and I once smacked him upside the head with a King Kong Wiffle bat. Still, we played around-the-world on our backyard hoop together and we played Name That Tune by humming songs to each other at night until Mom or Dad heard us carrying on and told us, for the last time, that it was time for bed.

During my High School years, we did less and less together. It’s an inevitable part of growing up as siblings. We still did things together: we played street hockey with the neighborhood kids or snuck onto the local golf course; but we didn’t do all the same things we used to either. It wasn’t until my last semester of college that we really spent a lot of time together as young men.

Mark got accepted our university’s main campus as a freshman by trading his summer vacation for a summer semester. That was my last semester at school. I lived off campus in an apartment and the school required him to live on campus. Still, we hung out quite a bit that summer, biking and playing tennis a lot. I haven’t really played tennis much since then, and I miss playing with him.

While he was still going to school, my girlfriend (and future wife) and I would visit him from time to time. Unfortunately when he had an internship in Philadelphia, we never got a chance to visit him and he has never let us forget that. Since graduating, Mark has transplanted himself in Washington D.C. We try to visit him there each summer, but with the pregnancy and then our daughter’s birth last year, we didn’t get down there.

When our daughter was born, we asked him to be her Godfather. Mark graciously accepted, although he’s still trying to get used to the duties of an Uncle/Godfather. He hasn’t seen her all that many times since she was born, but it surprises me how good he is with her. Mark wasn’t around babies much, but he seems quite at ease with her. He’s even asked to change her diaper!

My brother is a complex guy sometimes. He can be a little overly-sensitive and he can be downright obnoxious too. But, he is my brother. I wouldn’t trade him for anything (although, if you’d have asked me that at age 12, I’d probably have traded him for an Atari 2600). I hope my daughter will be able to say the same when she’s the big sister.