nostalgic nudge

Pause - rewind - replay
Inkslinger blogged this morning about trips to school with his dad and the music that played in the tape player.
I love that Led Zepelin II stayed in the tape player forever. I have a habit of leaving things in the CD player in my truck forever too. The kids are always asking, "dad, can we please change the CD?" But I think, you don't go around painting the walls of the living room every day do you? Or swapping out the pictures on the wall. Nothing stays in the home stereo for very long, but the truck, that's a different story. There, I need a solid, secure backdrop for the journey that is life. A familiar song for uncertainty of my going out and coming in.
Doesn't everyone need their musical wallpaper? When we were in high school, each of us could be known by the old standby in the tape player. In Dwayne's red, 1968 Mustang, we listened to Journey every single day to and from track practice. In Travis' Honda Civic, it was "Pyromania", and sometimes "Panorama". (I just want to be your...) and in my green pinto, "Permanent Waves" (you don't dare play "Pyromania" in a Ford Pinto).
From one day to the next, we may have a new zit, a new girlfriend, or even be an inch taller. Life changes overnight when you're 17, some things appear to be consistent, but you're really not sure yet what is trustworthy and what isn't. Enter the eternally looping 8-track. Or the auto-reverse cassette. There is a sure thing. "Photograph" blaring at ear-numbing volumes, interacting with end-of-the-schoolday restlessness, adrenalin, hormones, and smelly track shoes.
And thus, for good and bad, Steve Perry, Def Leppard, Ric Ocasek, and Neil Peart put their nearly indelible stamp on your memories and in some cases, formation.
On the way back from Austin, I was listening to "Moving Pictures", and was blown away by how much I've been influenced by Neil Peart over the years. It is not so much that I've been swayed by anything he had to say, but that I've been caused to think about things that I never would have thought of as a 17 year-old. Neil Peart caused me to observe and assess the behaviors, thought processes, and world views of those around me and to think for myself rather than unquestioningly, blindly follow the crowd.
So sorry kids, if you have to listen to the same old thing day after day in the Explorer. For me, there are layers of advantages. I picked it for you. It speaks to me. And some day, miles down the road, while that eternal CD is still is still is stil is still looping in your brain, the whole experience will be mixed up together; the dad, the music, the squeaky clutch pedal - an amalgam of memory that makes up a part of who you are.
Listen to my songs and know who I am. See where I've been and who I've become. Listen with me as I keep on becoming.
Years from now, something will occur to you from some song we shared, and you'll say, "hmmmm... I hadn't realized that about dad."