Honky Cat

One of my greatest successes as a father is that, in general, my kids do not listen to crap music. From an early age Andres learned to appreciate Springsteen's Darkness on the Edge of Town (and even frequently asked for "The Boss" on drives to daycare) and, to this day, has favorite tracks from that album. In between Zumba songs Natalia also introduced the kids to Carole King--so we went through a Chicken Soup with Rice phase for a month or so last winter. Then there was the Pete Seeger era, ushered in by Andres' fascination with Abiyoyo. Our current playlists here tend to include a lot of American folk, some dance music, and some Springsteen. It's a departure from the typical 2 and 4 year old fare.

This is all a way of beginning the story at hand.

About a month ago I started using the term "honky cat" (yes, from the Elton John song) as a friendly appellation for the kids--as in, "Hey honky cat, you need a diaper change!" or "Time to get off my shoulders honky cat, you are getting heavy." I'm not sure why I decided to start using this moniker but it seemed to fit and the kids didn't object, so there you have it.

Soon they were using it on me as well--Celia for example, would come up to me and call me a honky cat. Pretty awesome. And now, most recently, they have started ganging up on me. The game goes like this:

Andres: "Daddy say, 'You're a honky cat.'"
Me: "You're a honky cat."
Andres and Celia: "No, YOU'RE a honky cat!"
Me: "No, YOU'RE a honky cat."
Andres and Celia: [Laughing] "No, YOU'RE a HONKY CAT!"

We repeat this about 7 times before they tire of it. But then we're back at it about 2 minutes later.

So the other day I decided to provide them some context for this whole honky cat thing--actually show them a video of Elton John singing the song. Well, they were pretty enthralled, and guess what video is now #1 in the YouTube rotation here? That's right: Elton John singing Get Back Honky Cat, live at the Ephesus Theatre, 2004.



This morning Andres watched it twice on my phone on the way to school. In the afternoon, Celia cried in the car when I said she had to wait until we got home to see the video. (Oh and she knows it's Elton John singing too, as she says "It's Elton!" when she hears the music.) And earlier this week Andres, in all seriousness, turned to me and said "daddy I could watch this video all day."

I've tried to get them to branch out to other songs too...maybe some Crocodile Rock, maybe some Daniel, etc. (not Candle in the Wind though--that song sucks) but they are holding firm, for now, to their new favorite song. In fact, even other versions of the song are not permissible; this is the only one they will watch.

It's a fun obsession, though. Tonight they were both annoying the piss out of me because neither of them would eat their dinner, and there was an unholy amount of whining going on. So I put on Elton. And then we had a dance party right there in the kitchen, with Andres showing me breakdance-like moves and Celia bopping up and down like a pre-teen. A couple of honky cats getting down, all right.