David Bowie

David Bowie was my first crush, I was 11 or 12 and Let's Dance was released. Modern Love, China Girl and the best of the album: Let's Dance. Look at how cute he is. The blond hair, the fake eye. I was enamored. I started listening to everything, Ziggy Stardust, Heroes, Scary Monsters. I was hooked. I think David Bowie actually turned me away from lollipop pop and down into the world of alternative music (yet another reason to adore the man). Listening to David Bowie made me look for the music on the radio and I found WFNX and all sorts of great eighties music. Music I cherish: Talking Heads, Smiths, R.E.M, the Violent Femmes, Siouxsee and the Banshees, Replacements, Kate Bush, Velvet Underground. The list goes on and on.

Let's fast forward to 2001, shall we?
Picture this:
A six month old beautiful little baby girl with a penchant to refuse eating everything. Her mother thinks back to what the books say about getting the baby to eat:

1. Make the food interesting - She's eating rice cereal. I am feeding my child gruel. How could that be interesting in any way shape or form?

2. Make eating interesting - I tried engaging her in conversation but she didn't speak until she was three. I tried dancing around the room and she pretty much looked at me in horror. As I put the bib on the child I tried to think of a great song and all I thought up was: Let's dance.
I re-wrote the song in my head and came up with these lyrics:

Let's Eat

Put on your big bib and eat your food

Let's Eat

Eat while your gruel is still so good

Let's Play

While smiles light up your face

Let's play

Play after we eat our food

And if you say hide, I will seek with you

and if you say nap, we'll sleep

Because my love for you will break my heart in two

If you should fall

Into my arms

And tremble like a flower


I never got past there, she was willing to eat after I danced around the room singing.
Let me remind you all, I am tone deaf (worse than Cameron Diaz in My Best Friend's Wedding). I believe her ability to eat is the proof that babies will love whomever feed and snuggle them, because my singing sucks.
Let's fast forward again, to tonight. She wasn't eating. Again. She's now 6.5 years old. I started singing her old favorite and then asked her if she wanted to hear the original. Her answer was. of course, 'Yes yes yes!' So I told her she had to eat a few more more bites and we went up to the illustrious iTunes to download 'Let's Dance.' I added an extra caveat that she had to be in the tub and getting clean before the song would play.
She cleaned, we danced.
Then I played some of my other fav DB songs. She was hooked.
Then I told her there was song called 'David Bowie' that wasn't by David Bowie.
She was hooked. My kid is a Phishhead. One of the perks of traveling is that you can get free downloads from iTunes from here. I take full advantage of that but sometimes iTunes fucks with you and makes you buy an album for one song and DB is one of those songs. So I have all of Junta on iTunes now.
Fuckers.

I still love that my daughter loves music.



PS - After that she wanted to hear 'It's Hard Knock Life" from Annie. I still have some work to do...