Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Curly cords

I enjoy sharing music from my youth with Sydney. The pop music I listened to in high school isn't much different than the pop music she hears today. When I noticed she kept replaying "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" on our Wii "Just Dance" game, I knew it was my chance to enlighten my 7 year old by introducing her to the music video.

That's not all I had to introduce her to.

As I Googled the song title, I explained to Sydney that when I was in high school, when "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" was brand new, we used to watch it on music videos. I explained they were short videos of the band performing the song. Lots of them were very creative. I found the video and pushed play.

"Will you start it again and go full screen?" That meant that she likes Cindy Lauper and somehow, at age 7, understands the magnitude of this song to my generation. Maybe, we were bonding...all due to this song.

Okay,I take motherhood and my responsibility to teach and share too seriously. Truthfully, she just likes the song. That's fine with me.

Then the video gets to the point where all the girls are calling each other and bopping their heads back and forth.

"What are those things?" she asked.

"What things?"

"Go back. The things they have in their hands."

I was confused. Surely she was seeing something I wasn't.

"The telephone?" I asked.

"What's a telephone?"

Nuh-uh. My kid didn't just ask me what a telephone is. Oops. Yes she did. Then I realized, she's only seen cordless phones in her lifetime.

"When we say 'phone,' it's short for telephone," I explained.

"But what's that?" I paused the video again and looked where she was pointing.

The curly cord.

So we had a lesson in phones, tele and otherwise.

"When I was a kid, my dad bought me a longer curly cord so I could move all over my room to talk on the phone. When I got a longer line to plug into my wall, I could even take my phone into other rooms," I said.

"And you couldn't just use your cell phone?"

"We didn't have cell phones back then. As a matter of fact, I remember where there was only one kind of phone you got from the phone company and it was either black or beige."

"Wow. The old days were lame. Can we watch that song movie again?"

Made me start thinking about all the times I went with my mom to our phone office to pay our bill. It was nice to be able to walk in to a local phone office and pay the bill for your black or beige phone. People you knew waited on you. They told you to have a nice day. While it wasn't an exciting day, it did teach me the concept of paying bills...and it was a nice experience.

Most of our stuff today is auto withdrawal or paid online. Other than the water bill, Sydney doesn't see me pay anything. We can't pay our gas, electric, or phone bills locally any more.

If you ask me, that's what's really lame.

1 comment:

  1. Ha!! Thanks so much for reminding me of those phone cords! I remember seeing my mom talk to my aunt forEVER in the kitchen on one of those phones. We'd get tangled in the cord, have to duck under the cord...play limbo. Awww. You made me remember some happy times at home. Thank you! And thanks also for stopping by my silly blog! Come back anytime. :)

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