(I’m listening to the “Stuck In The Middle With You” by Stealers Wheel)

We’re taking the girls on their first road trip.  It’s a rite of passage into being kids.  Littles is almost 4 and Tiny turns 1 soon, so we felt it was time.  We’re headed to Pagosa Springs, CO to relax and get away.  It’s about a 5 hour drive and no road trip would be complete without a playlist, so I’ve made two.  One is for the 90’s and 2000’s (because the kids need to know about good music and I feel it’s my responsibility to teach them) and the other is full of oldies (because you have to respect the classics).  I’ve been on a lot of road trips in my life.  Some have been with family, some have been with friends, and a lot have been by myself; but there have always been a few constants: good times, great memories, and excellent music.  It’s time to pass on that gift of music to my kids.

Great memories have a way of attaching themselves to music.  Those songs serve as a time capsule and once you open it and listen to them, a flood of great memories come roaring back.  When I was kid, we went on a few memorable road trips and I remember dad having the oldies station on.  It was a different time, before Walkmans, CD players, iPods, and smartphones.  I had to listen to what the two people in the front seats, my parents, wanted to listen to.  Oh, I could give some input, but we listened to music as a family.  Music was a way to bond; now, people listen to isolate.

Those early trips as a kid were great.  I received my musical knowledge from groups like, The Lovin’ Spoonful, The Spencer Davis Group, Simon and Garfunkel, The Beach Boys, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, and many others.  That’s what was on the radio, so that’s what we listened to.

I’ll never forget the trip when I got my first portable CD player.  The trip was a massive 6,000 miles that took us through California, east to Texas, north to Iowa, and then back home to Washington.  I only had a few CD’s to my name but I remember them vividly: B-52’s “Cosmic Thing,” Bryan Adams’ “Waking Up The Neighbours,” and The Cars Greatest Hits.  I thank BMG to this day for those CD’s and I’ll always remember cruising in the back of my parent’s Nissan Quest.

As childhood gave way to semi-adulthood, it was time for me to go to college.  More road trips, music, and memories ensued.  I made the trip from my home in Washington to my school in Iowa so many times during those 4 years.  CD players were common in cars by then, and I had made a small investment to put one in mine.  Those trips were filled with everything from Pearl Jam, to Elton John, to 2Pac, to Tom Petty.  You name it, I probably listened to it.

The beginning of one of the many trips in “The Road Van.”

One particular story comes to mind about a one hit wonder named Donna Lewis.  On the maiden voyage to school, my best friend, who was my college roommate, made me listen to it.  It was his and his girlfriend’s “song.”  I, being a 17-year-old boy, ribbed him mercilessly for it, but to this day, I love that song.  Whenever I hear that beat of, “bum bum bum, bum bum ba dum dum, I love you, always forever, near and far, closer together”…I think of that trip.  We were young, we had our whole lives ahead of us, we had no idea what was in store, and we were excited.

On one trip home from school, much to the chagrin of my mom, I drove straight through.  I covered 1,700 miles in just over 24 hours without so much as a nap.  Mom was pretty ticked when I showed up at our house just before dawn. I didn’t tell her I was going to do it.  I didn’t really know I was going to do it.  I had even told her I was going to stop for the night, but when I hit the Washington border at 9pm with Pearl Jam’s “Even Flow” blaring out of the speakers, I thought, “Well, I’m almost home now, might as well push on through.”  She wasn’t impressed, but I was.  There was nothing better than putting the AAA time estimation to shame.

The last trip from Iowa to Washington led me to discover one of my favorite songs.  I had checked into this cheap motel in Montana; the kind with no name and that looked like it hadn’t been remodeled since the 70’s.  I keyed into the room, locked the deadbolt, fastened the chain, and I turned on the TV.  There was this dude walking on a beach and singing, “look at the stars, looks how they shine fooooor you.”  The song?  Coldplay’s “Yellow.”  I will never forget hearing that song and how I wanted to listen to it so badly for the rest of the road trip. The problem was, the CD wouldn’t be released for another week.  I know, because I tried to buy it at a Best Buy the next day and they told me.  Keep in mind, this was before I could just go to iTunes, download it, and listen to it 6,000 times on repeat.  I would have to wait for the CD.  So there I was, sitting in silence, driving, and I had those opening guitars stuck in my head.  None of the other music I had with me sounded as good.  I just wanted to hear that one song over and over and over, and I couldn’t.

When the wife and I were dating, we moved her from Minnesota to Colorado.  We stuffed her whole life into a Volkswagen Rabbit.  She even had some of her bedding in those vacuum sealed bags, and they broke inside the car.  The bedding just filled in the gaps of where stuff wasn’t.  She literally rode with a backpack on their lap for 15 hours because there was nowhere else to put it.  I have a whole playlist dedicated to that event, but one song comes to mind:  Wyclef Jean’s “Sweetest Girl (Dollar Bill).”  Whenever I hear it, I’ll always remember starting our life together.

The point is, music is full of memories and now it’s my turn to make some memories for my kids.  Making these playlists has been a blast from the past.  It seems like every song I choose for the list has some sort of memory attached to it.  It’s like jumping into a time machine and listening to the soundtrack of my life.  I can’t wait to hit the open road, make some memories, and listen to some great music.  I just hope the kids think it’s as great as I do.  Regardless, one day, they’ll listen, look back, and remember.