Acceptance

This post is a few days late due to bad internet connection. But I'm doing this thing where I try to embrace music I wouldn't normally allow into my eardrums.

Now, Christmas music... I don't think I'll ever get to a point where any form of merry seasonal music will pass into my body without giving me violent urges and inducing mad eye rolling. I'm sorry, ok? I'M SORRY. I'M A GRINCH. A SCROOGE.

But that's really beside the point. What this post represents is a general curiosity with all things foreign to my interest. Today, for example. My little, "gangster-thug/Top 40/whiny-boy-band/diva" loving sister (that is how I dub her, and she will never be able to reject that label because she doesn't read my fantabulous indie-rific blog, ha! nor does my cousin know about this side of me. tonight, she told me that whenever she and her roommate saw hipsters on the Upper East Side (yes, folks, that's Gossip Girl NYC territory we're talking about) she chuckles 'why don't they just go back to Brooklyn?'. ahem. i am friends with brooklyn people. at least i'd like to be. especially langhorne slim. and eugene mirman.)

Anyway, my sister. She likes horrifyingly embarrassing music. T-Pain regularly makes it onto her playlist. She enjoys, I dunno, Kelly Clarkson. She listens to songs where hoarse men croak about the cocaine. It's, frankly, an embarrassment to the family. I mean, who wants a sister who self-admittedly embraces the life of a down-and-out bling-wearing rapper who brags about his magnificent life in the ghetto? (Note to all: We are spoiled white girls who grew up in a suburb where the racial make-up was 3/4 white (usually Italian and Russian) and 1/4 Asian. Perhaps I exaggerate about the Asians. I had/have a LOT of awesome Asian friends.)

Ok, back to my sister. We were cooking all afternoon with my mother on this lovely Thanksgiving. Nicole saw fit to blast some blatantly inappropriate music. Cooking with mom is a good time for some CSN. Maybe Fleet Foxes. Paul Simon if you're feeling extra dangerous. She gets utterly stressed out when the volume goes above 5. Seriously. She had a slight panic attack about the sweet potatoes, until I pointed out that she was only freaking out about the obscenely loud Lil' Wayne song my sister was blasting. She nodded and chuckled. I turned down the music, and the sweet potatoes lived to a good ripe age. Until we ate them all.

I do, however, try my best to learn about popular music when my sister is home. I say, 'Nicole, educate me.' Yet, the funny thing is (and I don't know if this applies to all young children with questionable taste in Top 40 music or just her) she never really knows artists' names. I did manage, however, to extract tiny particles of information today. We were listening to Beyonce's "Diva."

ADMITTEDLY, that is a great song. Nicole, I give it up to you.

The next several posts will be dedications to embracing music I would normally brush aside.