It was a regular battle between me and my mother. I was dubbed the "car dj" when my dad wasn't around when I was in 6th grade and since my Mom worked at my high school, my duty followed me. On days when we had to go in an hour early (Alice had jazz band practice) and days when we barely made it on time (8:25! No time for a locker run), I would be scrolling up and down on my ipod's screen. In seventh grade, I quit playing Beatles' songs when my mom exclaimed "All their songs sound the same!"
For a long time, I tried to play things that would make her happy. She used to ask me to play Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1 everyday. That was before she went into therapy. By the time I was in my Junior year of high school, I started trying to play songs that I liked, that she didn't like. My playlists consisted of The Mountain Goats most off-key songs, the Teeth and Joe Jackson. I was waiting for, wanting, her to turn the music down so that I could turn it back up, louder. The gesture, the reason to snap at her and scowl; I was praying for it every time I put on Hast Thou Considered the Tetrapod. Joni Mitchell wasn't played anymore, I used to play Cake's Nugget every week:
"heads of state who ride and wrangle,
who look at your face from more than one angle,
can cut you from their bloated budgets
like sharpened knives through chicken mcNuggets.
shut the fuck up.
shut the fuck up..."
Sometimes she would turn the music down. Sometimes she wouldn't. This was the closest to rebellion I ever got.
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