This week marked an interesting new chapter in the Little Dude’s life: he started preschool. Day 1 went off without a hitch and he has been very excited about going back. So this week’s Rockin’ Friday tune is inspired by the return to classes and teachers.
Though the Little Dude’s preschool probably isn’t quite like the school mentioned in the song, this week’s tune is Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall (part II). Taken from Floyd’s epic album The Wall, the song is about a rebellion of students versus their demanding teachers.
Rocking a killer disco rhythm atypical of most Floyd music, Another Brick is one of Pink Floyd’s most successful singles and well-known songs. The schoolchildren singing “We don’t need no education” is both ironic and powerful. And the teachers telling the students that they “can’t have any pudding if they don’t eat their meat” is a sign of their oppression. Dessert should always be first.
For the Little Dude’s 2nd birthday party, we hired a guy in an Elmo costume to entertain the kids for an hour. As part of his shtick Elmo made balloon animals for the kids. Since it was his birthday, the Little Dude got first choice and was very excited when he saw the rainbow of options laid out before him in cheap latex. There were myriad options: blue, red, yellow, orange, green, pink, purple, and pretty much every other color on George Clinton's head. If it were me, my first choice would always be blue. My son picked pink. My heart sank.
George "Crayola" Clinton
The following week, at one of his friend’s birthday party, one of the goodie bag items was a bottle of Mr. Bubble pink foamy bubble bath. Seems harmless enough, right? After we introduced it to his bath routine a few days later, every night he was clamoring for “Mas Pinky!” (Side note: he uses “Mas”, which means “more” in Spanish, more than the actual English word “more” for some reason.) When that bottle ran out, we replaced it with a bottle of blue Mister Bubble foam which he now refers to as “Blue Pinky!”
There have been a few more instances like this over the last few months, which made me start drilling down on this. What’s the problem, you ask? I guess the manly man section of my psyche yearns for my son to be a manly man, too, and choose blue instead of pink. Is it my “fault” that he likes pink? Did I do something wrong? Should I have covered him in fresh animal pelts as an infant instead of a soft silky blanket?
I did some research to find out why we associate blue with boys and pink with girls. I figured the tradition dated back hundreds of years and had a purpose-driven origin. I was quite surprised to learn it’s only been since WWII and that pink was originally associated with baby boys, because it was recognized as a stronger color. Light blue was seen as better for baby girls because it was “softer”. Whatever that means.
As a Dude who grew up in the 1980s, you might think I would like pink. Most of the movies I grew up watching featured either a very cool or very wicked male character (usually Andrew McCarthy or Rob Lowe) who was invariably dressed in a Preppy pink polo shirt. But the Preppy style died down when the ‘80s ended and Grunge styling took over. I don’t remember Nirvana wearing much pink flannel during the early ‘90s.
Do you think John Locke isn't a Dude?
So should I be bothered that my son would pick a “girlie” color, if given the option? At first, I was frustrated. I want him to like the things that I like. A big part of parenthood is teaching our offspring. That’s why I play him the music I like and why he has Ohio State memorabilia all over his room. It’s not that I don’t like pink. It’s just that it’s not blue, which is my favorite color*.
The Little Dude’s affinity for pink is merely that: something that is pleasing to his senses. Does it make him any less of a Dude? Not at all. I don’t understand why he would ever choose to eat 3 plain rice cakes instead of pizza, but I don’t think that makes him any less of a Dude either.
After thinking about all of these factors, I think it really just means he’s more creative for looking outside of the box. He is very artistic in many ways so this is probably just an extension of how his unique mind works. I don’t want him to be a conformist anyway, so I give him credit for blazing a Dudely new trail. Even if it leaves pink dust behind it.
I tried to think of things that I like that are pink and came up with a short list:
Pink Ribbons: Enough said.
Pink Floyd: If you don’t eat your meat, how can you have any pudding?
Pink Panther: Not the crappy Steve Martin version, though.
Pink Lemonade: Though I have yet to encounter a pink lemon... Pink’s Hot Dogs: Though their lines are always atrocious, the dogs are top notch. Pink Houses: Ain’t that America?
What pink things do you like? Leave a comment below with your favorites.
*=Is it strange for a grown man to have a favorite color? Or just to admit it?
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When my wife was pregnant, one thing that several people told us we *had* to get was kid friendly music to play for our little one. Personally, I figured diapers and a car seat were more essential, but what did I know. Turns out I was right, but there is something to be said for good music too.
I’ve been big-time into music as long as I can remember. As the result of having a much older brother, I started listening to The Doors, Pink Floyd, Van Halen (the original/good version) and more when you could still count my age on one hand. I never had much use for pop music and still don’t. The same can now be said about so-called “kids’ music”.
I recently asked my Twitter and Facebook friends what music they play for their kids and the response was pretty surprising. More than half listed artists like Laurie Berkner, The Wiggles & Dan Zanes. Those are all pretty innocuous artists. And by innocuous I mean boring. It’s nothing personal. I’m sure they are nice people and obviously they are very successful, but after listening to their music a few times I wanted to rip my
ears off and freeze them so they wouldn’t be permanently scarred from the aural atrocities of those songs.
When the Little Dude was born I borrowed some kids’ CDs from the library as a test run before buying. For some reason, he couldn’t get into them either. And I was glad. I’ve heard a lot of parents complain about listening to their kids' favorite songs a million times. My sister has three daughters and even though they live across the country and I only see them a few times a year, I still know the words to Baby Beluga from listening to it dozens of times over the last decade.
My wife takes the Little Dude to a weekly Music Together class. I recently had the chance to attend one of the classes and while it was fine for an hour, I wouldn’t be able to enjoy it week after week. At least not without a good set of industrial-grade earplugs.
Why not just play the Beatles real music?
Many people rave about the Rockabye Baby CDs. If you aren’t familiar, they make CDs utilizing music by classic artists like the Beatles and Rolling Stones, but played as lullabies. They also transform, in an intentionally ironic manner, artists like Metallica and Guns N Roses from headbanging thrashers into gentle nursery divas. We have a couple of these CDs and I find them excruciating to listen to. Again, they must be very popular because they keep making more, but I can’t handle an hour of harpsichords and glockenspiels even if they are playing “Bohemian Rhapsody”.
I’m not saying all kids’ music is bad, but if I’m going to listen to something repeatedly why wouldn’t I want it to be something more palatable? About a third of the people who responded to my survey said that they play The Beatles, Beach Boys or Bob Marley for their little Buffalo Soldiers. A few people surprised me by saying that they played bands like Foo Fighters or Death Cab for Cutie. I can’t stand those bands when my wife listens to them, so there’s no way I’m playing them for my kid.
A tiny number of respondents said that they don’t alter their musical choices for their kids. That’s the group I fit into. After experimenting with the previously mentioned CDs, I made the Little Dude his own playlist on my iPod. I whittled down my 12,000+ songs into about 800 that I thought he might like. Obviously he’s never told me he’s a big U2 or Police fan so I’ve used my judgment to select songs with bouncy rhythm, catchy lyrics and easily memorable choruses. Those are many of the same criteria as the typical kids’ music, but my music is something everyone in the car can enjoy. As long as “everyone” is just me and my Little Dude.
I’m starting a new feature called “Rockin’ Friday” here on the blog and today is the first day, so sit down and buckle your seatbelts. Every Friday I’m going to post a song that the Little Dude likes and a little info about it.
Today’s song is Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves of London”. I started working on this post around Halloween, shortly after this song came up in my iPod’s shuffle one day. I knew the Little Dude would like it because of the catchy piano rhythm and also the infamous chorus. When Warren sings “A-hoooooooooo, Werewolves of London…”, my Little Dude joins in and howls like Michael J. Fox in Teen Wolf when he's surfing on top of Stiles' van. Sure the song mentions mutilating old ladies and drinking at Trader Vic’s, but I gloss over those lyrics while the Little Dude wails passionately in the back seat.
What songs or bands do you play for your kids? What do they like or dislike?
"His hair was perfect..."
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