Sound of silence

It's day two of infant school of rock, vinyl edition, and I briefly entertained moving on to John Lennon's solo career after catching the second half of that Lennon documentary from what was it, 1980-something? the other day on cable (is it hopelessly dating to even refer to cable as "cable?" Who doesn't have cable except for one cave-dwelling person I know who drives a dented Geo Prism?) Except that I determined, after sitting through all the bla bla bla about Lennon's slumber party for peace and the whole crap with the lost weekend, that -let's face facts, America- John Lennon took himself a tad too seriously. How would I explain Yoko Ono to a six week old? Can't be done.

And so Simon and Garfunkel it would be, although at times, I see eerie parallels between these sensitive newsboy-hatted troubadors and, well, Hall and Oates. Moving on.

When I was a sullen, big-haired high school student in the 1980's, I had a strange preoccupation with the 60's. This was before I figured out that the summer of love was basically an excuse for kids to delay fooling with the trappings of adulthood, sort of like graduate school works today. There was nothing really very peacemaking about sitting in a free clinic waiting to get tested for "the clap" (which STD is "the clap," exactly? Anyone from the 60's care to explain?) if we want to be honest with ourselves, and so my 60's fetish was admittedly misguided, although it's hard to blame someone who came of age in the era of Paula Abdul, Whitesnake, and the lowered mini-truck for seeking solace in another time.

At any rate, part of my personal, sullen religion at the time involved playing my dad's Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits LP in my room, while burning incense and ignoring my mother's call to come and eat dinner. The whole record was unbearably earnest and angst-ridden, like I was myself (and still remain-- I can't listen to "Kathy's Song" without getting a little misted up). And yet, S&G have no trace of that Lennon hostility-- they had nothing to prove. They were just all about kickin' the cobblestones and feelin' groovy, and I don't know about you but that seems like a good place for an infant to start out. So I busted out that record, the same faded, frayed one I used to play in high school.

Before the end of track one, that AM radio staple "Mrs. Robinson," the infant was asleep.