Has it really been 20 years since I rocked out in my ’86 Nova to ‘Zombie?’

The answer to that question is ‘yes.’  After impatiently waiting their new album to be available in the US, I finally have it downloaded onto every device I own that plays music.  It’s as if no time has passed…in so many ways…and anyone that witnessed my drive home from the grocery store yesterday can attest to that.

Music, at least, for me, has always been the soundtrack to my life.  (I had six different ‘Hyper Tape’ mix tapes back in the day…which were eventually replaced by burned CD mixes, etc., etc…)  Certain albums have the ability to snap me right back to the time when I replayed…or rewound…those songs to listen to them over an over…until I knew every note.  Bare Naked Ladies and Third Eye Blind take me right back to my college dorm-room.  Backstreet Boys…the Alpha Phi suite.  Garth Brooks…The Boot.  Jimmy Buffett…the boat.

The Cranberries takes me right back to the halls of BBHHS.   In a huge rush to get high school over with, I didn’t realize until I began to look back just how much of my personality was fostered there through friends, teachers, coaches, guidance counselors…it really did all make a huge difference. When I look back, I am reminiscent of many…many laughs.

I can’t help but wonder what the kids at Chardon High School will look back and remember 20 years from now.  What will be their soundtrack be?  How will it foster their growing personalities?  And, will they look back and still remember laughter…or will their high school memories be forever saddened?

Getting ready to sign my daughter up for her first season of tee-ball, I know the days and hours I have left to shelter her are slipping by fast.  Huron is a small town, and Brianne has already begun friendships with many of the kids she’ll be classmates with all the way up through high school.  As a parent, I don’t know how to pray hard enough that she does not have to travel through the saddening loss of friends at such a young age…especially in such a traumatic and devastating way as the kids in Chardon did this past week.

Thank God, literally, that the only frustration I had to deal with in high school revolved around which boy I had a crush on…I mean…getting good grades…getting into college…running varsity…only important things, Mom and Dad, I promise.  Often times, I’m focused on the excitement of sitting back and watching my daughters experience childhood and high school.  The thought of that innocence being ripped away by shootings in their schools never enters my mind.  And it shouldn’t.

As I watch all the money being wasted on political slander that election season brings…I as a parent wish there were a way to funnel that use of funding into metal detectors in schools.  Seems like a no brain-er to me.

I don’t know about you, but I want my kids to look back and remember the songs they jammed to on the radio, while aimlessly driving around town…just to drive.  Or, while hanging out at the park, on the beach, or around the homecoming bonfire…or through the Walkman headphones they ever-so-stealthily snuck into study hall to listen to the music their parents have a problem with…(Ok, so that was me…and it was Nirvana and Pearl Jam…also on the high school sound track.)   That’s the experience they deserve.  An innocent one.

Happy Rocking Out in the Mini-van (you know you do it…)

Megs

“Zombie”

Another head hangs lowly,
Child is slowly taken.
And the violence caused such silence,
Who are we mistaken?

But you see, it’s not me, it’s not my family.
In your head, in your head they are fighting,
With their tanks and their bombs,
And their bombs and their guns.
In your head, in your head, they are crying…

In your head, in your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie,
Hey, hey, hey. What’s in your head,
In your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie?
Hey, hey, hey, hey, oh, dou, dou, dou, dou, dou…

Another mother’s breakin’,
Heart is taking over.
When the vi’lence causes silence,
We must be mistaken.

It’s the same old theme since nineteen-sixteen.
In your head, in your head they’re still fighting,
With their tanks and their bombs,
And their bombs and their guns.
In your head, in your head, they are dying…

In your head, in your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie,
Hey, hey, hey. What’s in your head,
In your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie?
Hey, hey, hey, hey, oh, oh, oh,
Oh, oh, oh, oh, hey, oh, ya, ya-a…