To entertain Jonah (and one another), Andy and I sometimes change around existing songs, Weird Al style, to suit our very own weird little family. And because we are often putting Jonah in a soapy bathtub right after changing a poop, one of our “top 10 hits” revolves around this activity – it’s sung to the tune of “Another One Bites the Dust,” by Queen, and goes something like this:
Da-da dum. dum. dum. Put the soap… in your butt!
Da-da dum. dum. dum. Put the soap… in your butt!
Putt the soap in your butt, putt the soap in your butt, put the soap… in your butt!
Hey! I’m gonna clean you, too! Put the soap… in your butt!
We sing gems like this to Jonah, he memorizes them, and then he performs them. Loudly. In public.
I know, I know. We have no one to blame but ourselves. But how else to explain the necessity of a clean nether-region to a kid like Jonah? He loves music. He remembers songs. This little boy, who can’t string together more than 5 or 6 spoken words at a clip, can sing entire songs – verse and chorus, the whole shebang. Go figure.
Probably 65% of his repertoire is made up of Guster songs (Yes, I brainwashed him)…
…and maybe 10% kids’ songs (The Wheels on the Bus was an early favorite), 5% Beatles songs (he especially loves Michelle and Yellow Submarine), 5% old-fashioned standards (my dad taught him songs like “Daisy” and “Bye Bye Blackbird“), and the rest these silly made-up tunes that Andy and I sing to him.
Oh, wait – I almost forgot about “Happy Birthday” – one of Jonah’s all-time favorites, quite possibly because its performance at certain gatherings is rewarded, nearly immediately, by cake. There was a time not too long ago when lighting any candle anywhere in our home necessitated a sing-along of the tiresome tune you should really only have to hear once a year. Every so often I would deliberately indulge Jonah, lighting a candle so we could both sing the Happy Birthday song (to Jonah every time of course), pause for effect, blow out the candle, and clap wildly, shouting “yay!”
And then light the candle again and start all over.
And over. And over, and over, and over.
Light, sing, blow, clap, yay! “More? more?”
Light, sing, blow, clap, yay! “More? more?”
Light, sing, blow, clap, yay! “More? more?”
It makes sense to me, though, that Jonah learns well this way and can remember lyrics and tunes. I mean, I learned more math, grammar, science, and history from Schoolhouse Rock songs (sandwiched between The Superfriends and Bugs Bunny on Saturday morning TV) than I did from the entirety of my elementary school education. And I remember memorizing many a sedimentary rock for geology tests in college by putting their names to some then-popular tune.
No, I can’t say I’m surprised that Jonah sings along to life.
I have to wonder, though: was it right for us to mess with such an anthemic Queen song, bastardizing it shamelessly into a ditty about (of all things) putting soap in your butt?
Even Weird Al didn’t stoop that low.
The Never Normal 