In his young life, Connery has been exposed to many different kinds of music and other verbal stimulation. However, I don't think he's ever reacted quite so favorably as he did the other day when he got his first taste of Ozzy Osbourne.
Yes, I'm frightened too.
The story begins without me, when Chip and Connery were heading back from the ski hill after their first-ever father-son skiing day. Since we have been without our Sirius radio since the whole deer-stravaganza, they were stuck listening to commercial radio. Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train" came on, and Connery was rapt with attention. Chip told me about it later, and so when "Crazy Train" came on the radio a few days later when I was alone in the car with Connery, I turned it up so he could hear it. He was very excited to hear Ozzy again. And then he asked me, in his sweet four-year-old voice, "Can you hear that driving beat?"
After I nearly drove off the road trying not to laugh, I began to think about the advisability of hooking my son on metal bands from the 1970s and 80s. Surely, I thought, it can't be good that his musical tastes are running toward hair bands.
But then, in subsequent days, I started to remember my own checkered past. I'm pretty sure that I spent the entire summer of my 15th year listening to "Appetite for Destruction" by Guns N' Roses and delighting in the fact that it was so, so naughty--at least for a nerdy child of liberals like me. I actually owned more than one Billy Idol record. (I may be the only person who can say that--or at least will admit to it.) I once stopped talking to a friend for several days because she voted for Journey over Def Leppard on Friday Night Video Fights. Yes, I am that old.
And I can't even blame the flush of youth. While my musical tastes did change considerably as I grew older (thank you, Jon Thomas, for introducing me at a young and impressionable age to The Smiths), I still carried a flickering lighter of love for those bands. I'm not ashamed to admit that when U2 and Guns N' Roses came to Vienna on two consecutive nights when I was studying abroad there that I actually had to ponder for some time which concert to attend, since I couldn't afford both. (You may be relieved to know that I chose U2, although perhaps the most thrilling moment of the whole concert for me was when Axl Rose made a surprise guest appearance and duetted with Bono. Oh yeah.) Even now, NPR member and music minor that I am, I can't resist singing along with "Welcome to the Jungle."
So is it my fault? Did I pass down some kind of genetic trait that makes my child extra vulnerable to power chords? When he starts asking for pleather pants, I guess I'll get worried.