classical gas

In another universe, I’m driving in the car with my mom. The windows are down, the thick scent of this year’s alfalfa crop blowing in. We have nowhere to be anytime soon, and there is no one here to yell at us. We are not stupid bitches right now, or careless or selfish.

We are (temporarily) free.

The Monkees are crooning about being a believer, we mimic the engine sounds which alert us that someone’s boyfriend is back, we cringe, imagining the scene depicted by J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers about the screamin’ tires, and bustin’ glass.

We sing along with every single word of every single song ever played on the radio by the Beach Boys.

And then a song comes on, and I am absolutely grooving in my seat. I feel like, I don’t know, Jimi Hendrix or something, and I am a MASTER guitar player (air guitar).

My mom says, “Your dad used to play this song.”

I know vaguely that my dad was in a band (two? three?). Maybe with his brother, maybe they practiced in the garage of his house. Maybe it was in high school, maybe a little after. Do I remember us having a guitar in our house? An amp?

I don’t remember knowing the name of the song. The names never really mattered to me. Regardless, I don’t ask for the name or what his band was called or who he played with. I don’t ask if he ever had any gigs.

I simply nod at my mom. Something I know. File it away.