Note To Future Self

Throughout our various pre-natal meetings and check-ups, my favorite bit of old wives’ hokum was the idea that the we should play music for the bean sprout, conditioning her to associate, presumably, soothing ye olde worlde folke lullabies with the snuggly warmth of the womb. I was always too happy to take the bait, nodding enthusiastically.

Oh, what music have you been playing?

Led Zeppelin.

I should interrupt this anecdote to mention two things:

1. Far from being an ardent fan, my familiarity with Led Zeppelin’s canon reaches, perhaps, the level of a furtive classic rock AM station listener. They play some of those songs we listen to on long drives, don’t they?
2. I actually subscribe to the fetus-learns-to-hear-in-the-womb theory for parent’s voices. I’d like to think the grizzly bear learned to tolerate our atonal warbling before birth. In the first few weeks after birth, nothing soothed her like the sound of our voices. But I doubt a steady diet of Beethoven could really convert your darling blasocyst into a NASCAR prodigy, or whatever parents want these days.

All that said, I borrowed some Zeppelin from the library, and did in fact dance the bean sprout to sleep while listening to D’yer Mak’er. Fancy that.

Addendum: On re-reading, I should probably mention that we didn’t actually play any Led Zeppelin to Sprouticus in utero. We didn’t really play any music explicitly for her enjoyment. Well, other than the Ozzy Osbourne/Madonna mix tapes we crank while doing the house cleaning.