Lord of the Regatta de Blanc

When I was in high school, I was incredibly good looking.



PROOF!

This may not be the best representation of my self 25 years ago, but it's closest to my mental image of my teenaged self.

I got better.

Anyway. I had two real loves in my life back then - music and books. My boyfriend was Sting. He loved me just the way I was. He gave me mighty bass lines and piercing vocals whenever I wanted them.

He was a good boyfriend.

I LOVED The Police. LOVED them. My room was decked out in their posters, my cassette collection was riddled with their albums. I watched the Synchronicity HBO concert live. I wore strange clothes. I cried when they broke up in 1984.

I probably would have worn strange clothes anyway, but we'll just blame it on them, okay?

I also lived with my nose in a book pretty much all the time. Not a school book, necessarily, but fiction - constantly. One of my long-loved, re-read favorites is Lord of the Rings. And while I'm not much of a movie buff, when the movies came out, I fell in love with those as well.

This week, those two loves have combined into a wonderful blend of firsts for my boys. We've been reading The Lord of the Rings aloud together, and they had already started to fall in love with the characters, and while we intend to continue reading it together, Dr. SmartyPants and I decided the time was right for them to see the movies. We've never let them watch PG-13 movies before.

They were SO EXCITED! Because they AREN'T EVEN 13 YET!

Breakin' the law...breakin' the law...

Joshua is already petitioning to have his name changed to "Legolas." I just hope he doesn't decide to go so far as to do any body modifications to get elf ears.

I also played The Police for them this week. This was part of an educational experiment we were involved in with Melinda, who feels my one flaw (one and only...isn't she sweet) is my general disregard for Bruce Springsteen. I don't actively dislike him, I even find myself singing along occasionally, he's just kind of "meh" for me. She loves him, and sent the boys an email to ask them to give him a try - with a couple of recommendations for songs to start with.

I played those songs for them, with no commentary - I'm not one to bias anyone's musical opinion. Their overall impression was that the music was nice, the saxophone was awesome, but they couldn't understand anything The Boss said, and his voice was kind of weird. They rated it an overall "okay." (sorry Mo...)

I thought it was time to break out The Police.

I'm thrilled to say they loved them. Derek loved the baseline on "Demolition Man" and was singing it in the backseat while Joshua grooved to the drumbeat in the front. Joshua asked me if I could buy him the album for his iPhone. (YES! YES! ACTUALLY NO! Because we already have it, but I can LOAD it on your iPhone.) When we pulled into the garage, and we were in the middle of "Every Breath You Take," they made me sit there until the song was over.

I just can't tell you how stupidly happy it made me that they loved the music that shaped my teen years. I can't even tell you why it made me so happy. I just know it did and I'm so looking forward to driving around with my two awesome kids, singing at the top of our lungs...