Simon and Garfunkel reminds me a lot of when I was about sixteen, and basking in music that my parents loved when they were teens and students, but that my friends and I really thought we had discovered entirely on our own. It’s odd how teenagers really think that they are the first to discover so many things, and they need only look back a generation to see a different group of people making the same discoveries. It’s going to be weird when my friends and I all start having children, and when those children grow up in entirely smart homes – I mean, we all remember getting a first home computer, and several years later, unrolling a long flex to the phone to plug in to access the internet.
It’s going to be really weird when there is a sudden resurgence of some archaic music format… like an mp3 player or iPod classic that is now retro and cool. When I was a teen, a friend and I swapped literal mix tapes, which definitely showed that we grew up in slightly untechy households. Making a mix tape was a proper art – finding the right number of songs per side and capturing them all in the right order (thankfully, for us, usually from another tape or a CD, rather than the radio).
What a weird song it is… with its various referential nods to other famous people from the era – coocoo cachoo, a reference to The Beatles, and the obsession with Joe Di Maggio – a nation’s understated hero. Joe Di Maggio also features in We Didn’t Start the Fire.
Other memories this song brings back is mooching around our various kitchens, making pancakes or (put it in your pantry with your) cupcakes… or various arts and crafts, like Easter egg painting… or mooching to the local mall. We felt so grown up when we did that…
At sixteen, we had art in Mr Cain’s art room – spread it out over all the desks, over the floor, in the loft. We spread out over the classroom, shoes off, paint or chalk or charcoal dust over everything. Looking back at it, Mr Cain must have been the pinnacle of human patience, dealing with umpteen angsty arty teens all living out their creative catharsis in his professional space for an hour per class per day, Monday to Friday.
Lightning blog 40! (wow!)
Writing song:
Everyday Adventures 