Teens and Music...could I make that Teens and Books?

Since my last post about movies and kids, I  found this blog post about the style rookie's obsession with Hole. Hole is (was?) Courtney Love's band. I'm not a huge fan, but the style rookie is,  and that is what is important. Style Rookie is a blog written by Tavi, a 14 year old girl obsessed by fashion and in possession of unique talent and aptitude for fashion-and self analysis. I read it for fun--and it is fun, ranging from complaints directed at Seventeen's addiction to appearance, to explaining her love of certain music, to her favorite shoes (miu mius at present), etc. Tavi's videos and photos show real talent.  But this post is about the power that music wields over all of us, all our lives. It starts before we realize it, but I became aware of its influence at about Tavi's age. We all laid on our beds for days listening to whatever touched our hearts, unconcerned that our parents could hear it too. It never occurred to me that my mom might learn something about me that I did not want her to know. I don't think she did, because she was mostly upset at how loud it was. She did protest "Dead Babies" by Alice Cooper, so I played it louder. I would have tortured her with "Cop Killer" if I was a little younger.

So...knowing all that, I felt tears rise in my throat reading her recent post about Hole and getting through 8th grade. For me,  it was a mixture of Alice Cooper, Led Zeppelin, and Simon & Garfunkel. OK, that was embarrassing, but true. I swore that I would have "Bridge Over Troubled Water" played at my wedding because it was so romantic. Even my best friend asked, really (little dark)?  By the time I did get married, I was much more likely to play Bowie, Talking Heads or the Tubes, but that is another story. "I'm 18, and I don't know what I want...I've got a baby's brain and an old man's heart" explained exactly how I felt then, and for Tavi it is Hole:
At some point during the second half of 8th grade, I became sadder and angrier; to this I do not credit teenagerdom, or angst or any hormonal whatever, just learning, and not the kind that I was supposed to be getting from school. This is when it became necessary for me to talk my way into the computer room during art class to listen to “Northern Star” instead of researching whatever I said I would research and to bring my cassette player to gym class so I could silently confide in Live Through This...

So I want to remember Tavi's post when the school year begins, and they walk in with a song in their head, sure that what I have to show them could never deserve their time or attention. It does, but it will be competing with some important "teenagerdom" muses........