In college I was sitting around with some friends in a smoky dorm room, and someone threw out the general question, “Were your parents into the Beatles or into the Rolling Stones?”
The responses were evenly divided, but those who said “The Stones!” had wilder temperament than those who said “The Beatles.” Which makes sense, for surely a childhood of Exile on Main Street is more corrupting than one of Yellow Submarine.
I kept silent as everyone else enthused about their parents’ devotion to Mick or John, but soon someone called on me to answer.
“I don’t think they were that into either,” I said, mentally flipping through the stack of old records kept in our living room. “Certainly not the Stones. Maybe they had a Beatles album. I think they were more into folk like Simon and Garfunkel, the Mamas and the Papas, the Turtles…”
“The Turtles?!?” everyone screeched. Someone tousled my green hair, flicked my nose ring, lit my cigarette. “And look how you turned out.”
