Allow Me to Introduce Myself: I am the Jukebox
My kids call me ‘pop’. The grandkids call me ‘grandpa’. To my neighbors, I’m that strange, hermit-like creature who barely emerges from the house because he’s stuck slaving behind a hot computer all day just to pay the bills. But to my wife of three-plus decades, I am the jukebox.
It’s not all the time, mind you. Sometimes I’m the cook, the guy who cleans the kitchen, the computer repair guy, or even the guy who gets on her nerves because everything is a joke to me. But every once in a while, I am the jukebox. Why, you ask? Because I have a bejillion songs rattling around in such a limited cranial space that they tend to leak out with the slightest prompting.
She could mention that Ron Howard is directing a new film and, within seconds, I am either whistling the opening song from the Andy Griffith Show or singing a lyrically accurate rendition of the Happy Days theme, complete with instrumental sound effects. The other day, I was minding my own business when someone mentioned the possibility that Bill Gates wants to be a pot-bellied dictator ruling the world from his headquarters in Redmond, WA. Where did my mind immediately go? To ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’ by Tears for Fears.
Sometimes It’s Great, Other Times…
Don’t get me wrong. I love being musical. I love the fact that, despite not being able to remember to fully close drawers when I’m done digging around in them, to the dismay of my lovely wife by the way, an untold volume of lyrics and melodies have found permanent residence in my brain. Sometimes it’s great. But other times, not so much.
There are those songs that, quite frankly, I wish could be forever evicted from the cranial space they occupy. Exhibit A would be the Captain & Tennille’s rendition of ‘Muskrat Love’. Seriously? Was it really necessary for me to turn on the radio in 1976 only to hear of the amorous adventures of rodents I truly don’t care for — up to 10 times in a single day? And why can’t I just forget about it FORTY-SEVEN years later?
I would also like to forget ‘Happiest Girl in the Whole U.S.A.’, ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’, ‘The Way We Were’, and the venerable ‘It’s a Smal World’. Yet try as I might, all of those musical squatters have found a loophole in the law of my subconscious, a loophole that prevents the rightful occupants of the space from getting rid of them.
They Have an Accomplice
Further investigation reveals that the unwanted songs have an accomplice in their efforts to remain resolutely in my brain: my wife and children. I learned just a couple of years ago — and I swear I am not making this up — that they used to make a game of seeing which songs they could get me to sing by prompting me. Oh no, dear readers, I was not aware of this little game. On more than one occasion I thought I was engaging in a normal conversation when one of them threw something out in hopes of prompting the jukebox to start.
They would say and do things just to see which song would start playing in my head. Would it be a one-hit wonder, a golden oldie, or a platinum selling record? If they were feeling especially lacking in entertainment possibilities, they might try to see how many different songs they could prompt in a short 5 or 10 minutes.
Well, the kids are all grown and gone. It’s just me and my wife most of the time. The jukebox still plays in my head, dropping in new tunes on a regular basis. It’s okay. I would rather be introduced as the jukebox than the ex.
