I've got a confession to make

Since going through rehab for my Def Leppard addiction, I've been hooked into XM channel 48, The Squizz. I guess you could define the music selection as hard alternative rock. Joey, on the other hand, loves channel 41, The Boneyard which is basically old hair bands. The odd thing is that they are mostly hair bands that I don't remember, and I was the freaking queen of the hair bands in my day. You know, back in the day when we rode in covered wagons to school and had to do math on our abacus? Yeah, back then.

I've always liked a huge variety of music. My parents, who were growing up in the 1940's filled our home with Big Band music and show tunes. To this day, I can belt out most of the soundtrack to Porgy and Bess and Oklahoma.

Stop laughing. I really can.

My brother Paul had a rock band when I was like 2 years old, and I used to hang out in our basement with the band while they practiced. They played stuff like the Doobie Brothers and Steppenwolf and your classic 70's stuff. Not to mention that my brother, who is as white as a piece of Wonder Bread but was cursed with the curliest and kinkiest hair ever, was rocking a major afro and would also wear these red, white and blue vinyl bellbottoms.

I listened to your typical Top 40 music through high school. Nothing wierd for me, no sir. Probably the farthest out in left field that I ever got was listening to some old Genesis with my boyfriend Rob, who also introduced me to Steely Dan (an obsession that still seems to wax and wane with me). Not to mention that I was also in the marching band (our specialty was Yes' "Owner of a Lonely Heart" which is particularly lame to play the flute to), the orchestra (second chair violin, thank you very much!), string quartet, church choir, and of course the drama club. I was dipping into pretty much every musical genre that you could imagine.

Except one. And that wouldn't come until I moved South when I was 18 and discovered country music. Yeah, I'd heard country music before. But somehow listening to it on The Lawrence Welk Show on Sunday night with your parents isn't the same as listening to Randy Travis sing "On the Other Hand". Angry Rocker Ex-Boyfriend Ron introduced me to old school country music as well as southern rock. Before moving down here, I'd never heard of Lynryd Skyryd or maybe I figured they were some sort of disease or something.

And I liked it. And then it went away. I went off to college and submersed myself in God knows what music-wise. You know, I can barely remember my first two years of college (ahem) so I am not even sure what the hell I listened to. Funny how lots of alcohol can do that to you.

When I finally transferred to the school that ended up being my alma mater, I met this girl from my hometown who happened to have landed a teaching job in the same city and we decided to be roommates. (Hi Kim!!!) Soon, I discovered her deep love for country music. We would hang out at home and watch CMT in it's infancy and listen to Garth Brooks (this was like the first year he was popular) and go to this place in town where they had line dancing and these tall handsome Marines from the local base would come down hoping to find a cute college girl to dance with. We had the requisite acid-wash jeans, boot shoes, black belts with silver buckles, and just enough attitude that we would get out there and dance our asses off.

And it was during this time that I became a member of the Reba McEntire fan club. Looking back now, I can't believe that I actually joined it. We did get to go backstage for a meet & greet which was basically like 50 fan club members herded into a back room where she came and posed for photos and such, so that was really cool.

But the best part of it all was that even though country music wasn't (and still isn't) one of my favorite genres, it gave me a common bond with Kim and I'd like to think it was a great part in making us friends.

So anyhow, I hadn't thought about any of this in years until GMan and I were emailing each other about music recently - I offered to burn a CD for him with some of my lovely angry music and the subject of me belonging to the Reba fan club came up. Not to mention that a few weeks ago when we were in Las Vegas, I heard that song of hers "Whoever's In New England" and I was belting it out just like it was 1992 and I was in our living room.

While it might be a mild embarrassment now (not only for me, but for poor Reba - who wants someone that likes Sevendust claiming to be a member of their fan club?), I'm thankful for it. Not to mention it totally freaks Joey out when we're riding down the road and I start singing along with the radio. He thinks I'm a closet listener - and that's not the case, but typically when we're listening it's stuff that was popular back in 1992. Hardly fair, but the freakout factor is significant.