Back Seat Singers

One of the things that makes me not mind all of the errands, school drop offs and pick ups, and endless travels here and there, is singing in the car with my girls. It makes our trips more pleasant for all, seriously cuts down on the backseat fights between String Bean and Peanut, and reminds me of my own childhood. During road trips with my sister and mother, we would rock out in our ’71 Volvo wagon (yellow, with fake-wood interior and black vinyl seats), and whichever kid got to ride shotgun would hold a boom box on her lap, because the am-only radio wasn’t too reliable. We were singing Abba, the Grease soundtrack, The Bee Gees, John Denver. My girls are more partial to P!nk, Fergie, The Fray, with a little bluegrass thrown in to make their daddy and grandpa proud—primarily Crooked Still (I think their version of “Shady Grove” gets more backseat requests than any other song I’ve ever had in the car).

The girls are unaware, as they break songs down and try singing different parts, that they are learning about melody and harmony, or that they are carrying their mom down the happiest of memory lanes, or that they are building for themselves the exact same memory that I cherish. There’s a nice feeling of having come full circle, as I ferry them from place to place, with their sweet little voices singing song after song on the CD I’ve burned just for them. And it makes it just a little easier to get reluctant kids into those car seats to remind them whose turn it is to request a song. They’re always game for some back seat singing.

Chit-Chat

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this before, but my girls talk a lot. A whole lot. They keep themselves awake during naps and at night with their own talking, they have a hard time hearing each other over their talking, and they don’t stop talking long enough to hear the answer to a question they’ve asked, which just results in a lot of raised voices and repeated answers.

The other night I was putting Peanut to bed, singing her the bedtime song of her choice (“Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”) and had to start the song over three times because she kept prattling on about her grandma, cousin, and silly uncle, and couldn’t hear the song over her own chatter. Halfway through the song each time, she’d cover my mouth and say, “Start over, I didn’t hear the song!” By the third round, I told her I wasn’t starting over any more, and if she wanted to hear it, she needed to close her mouth and open her ears. She tried to stop talking, covering her own mouth with her hand, but even that brief song was too long for her to keep quiet through.

When they aren’t talking, the girls are singing. They know the whole Disney princess anthology of songs, and songs from all of their favorite shows, and after exhausting that repertoire, they resort to making up their own songs: long, complicated show-tune-style numbers with dance moves and emotive facial expressions, full of silly lines like “I like you and the sun! Let’s look out the window and then have apples!” (where apples would raise to an operatic soprano, and be drawn out to about five syllables).

It’s not that they aren’t entertaining to listen to, or that I don’t appreciate their communication skills or creativity, it’s just that, sometimes, I’d like a few moments of quiet, absolute quiet, to just hear my own thoughts.