Sylvia's Mother

So I'm up on deck, scrubbing the accumulated grime off.  Getting ready to leave Nawi for the familiar 'ol stompin' grounds of Savusavu Marina, taking advantage of the free fresh water while I'm here.  And one of those earworms gets in my head:  'Cover of Rolling Stone'.  Remember it?  Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show?  1973?  Yeah, I was there.  I think I even saw them in concert once.  Anyway, it's an earworm.  Tough to dislodge.  So I began to consciously try and remember their other hit songs.  And I remembered 'Sylvia's Mother.'

Why is this worth mentioning?  Because of the incredibly archaic lyrics:

Sylvia's mother da da da 

Sylvia's busy da da da

Sylvia's trying to make a new life da da da...

AND THE OPERATOR SAYS 'FORTY CENTS MORE FOR THE NEXT TWO MINUTES PLEASE'

And it hit me that Gen Beta (or Alpha, or Z or whatever) will have the following questions:

What's an operator?

Why did you have to pay to talk on the phone?

Which reminds me of a true story from my teaching days.  I was lecturing about asbestos and made the comment that Steve McQueen died of asbestosis.  Hands go up:  'Who's Steve McQueen?'  You never saw 'Bulleit'?  You never saw 'The Great Escape'?  Heads shake.  Ok, Steve Mcqueen was an actor famous for action movies, kind of like Harrison Ford.  Hands go up:  'Who's Harrison Ford?'  I should have flunked the entire class then and there.  And of course I couldn't think of any contemporary actor that was their like.

Please, Mrs. Avery, I just got to talk to her...I'll only keep her awhile. 

 


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