The Mixed Tape
This morning, while deeply involved in my current read, The Namesake, I came across a familiar term that brought both a flood of memories to mind and a sweetly funny realization.
The book’s female author, Jhumpa Lahiri, weaves this tale with precise accuracy and realism from the viewpoint of the story’s male main character. The Namesake is a book my friend Rebecca recommended with such fervor, that I had to pick it up and buy it. It has taken me a while to get around to reading it, but now that I am in the midst of it, I simply cannot put it down.
Aside from feeling oddly connected to the hero of the book, Gogol Ganguli, and his account of his life as a first generation American, I also am learning what the immigrant experience must have been like for my parents when they first arrived to America. What is interesting is that Gogol and his family are of Indian origin. His parents came over from Calcutta shortly after their arranged marriage. My family is of Colombian origins and yet, both families have undeniable similarities in their experiences both in America and when they visit their homelands.
From Gogol’s mother, Ashima, I am experiencing what it might have been like for my mother here where language, food, customs and culture are so drastically different. All that she left behind is painfully missed for anyone with close ties to family and friends. More so, the fears and troubles encountered when the man is off to work and you are left to your own devices in a foreign country for which you have not yet found any love. Following Ashima is like shadowing my mother through an American city in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Moreover, for Gogol’s father, Ashoke, whom I suspect is a lot like my own father was when he arrived, struggling to overcome the stigma of his immigrant status and wishing to realize with his idealized American dream. The man’s feelings of responsibility to provide for his family on foreign soil can be overwhelming at times.
Despite the detail of the immigrant experience in the book, those stories remain on the sidelines of the real body of the tale. What this book truly seeks to illustrate is the comical, painfully trite and lovingly sweet coming-of-age of an average American boy. Watching Gogol stumble through the silliness of his name in an American classroom, enter puberty with parents whose culture chooses to flatline any assumptions their children may have about adolescence, and tackle the issues of education and life is truly a gift. As the reader follows Gogol through the awkwardness of first love and of experimenting with drugs and alcohol, we suffer with him as he simultaneously pretends to be the proud and perfect Indian son at home. Living parallel lives for Gogol become even more complicated when his first love is an American-born girl with hippie and divorced American parents.
I am still a long way from the book’s end, but so far, it has not disappointed. I have had several quiet times of knowing acceptance, vivid recollections, awesome realizations and quite a few enjoyable a-ha moments. These are all signs of a truly great read!
One moment that stands out in the book, thus far, is the time when Gogol makes a mixed tape for his girlfriend. Ruth is Gogol's first love. She is cool, hip and the child of American hippies. Ruth is all Gogol imagines a girl should be, yet he knows his parents will never accept her. Nonetheless, he pours his heart out in a mix of songs he loves and thinks she will, too.
Aside from the mentions of the Magic 8 Ball, the Rubik’s Cube, the music of the times and the commercials on television, that I can recall with precise detail, it is the mixed tape that I am most endeared to in this book right now.
When Joe and I were first dating, he made me a series of three mixed tapes. On these tapes were many songs I had never heard of from bands whose names I vaguely recognized. When I listened to these tapes, with little interest at first (I did not think I was a fan of any of the music), I slowly understood their significance. I would play them over and over and find little treasures in each line or lyric, in the strength of the voice and the angst with which it was sung. It must have taken Joe hours to choose, compile and record these for me. I imagine that before, and while, he was making them, there were moments of contemplation. Does that line sound too forward? Is there too much sexual connotation in that one? Is she going to think I am ridiculous?
The answer was, No, she did not find it at all ridiculous.
On the contrary, I was extremely flattered and touched that Joe felt I was worth the time and effort to make the tapes. It meant that for a good period of time when we were not together, he was still thinking of me. It meant he cared deeply for me. It meant that love was growing and he knew somehow that making these tapes would pay off in the end.
Recently, the Mixed Tape made another appearance in my life. I was watching an episode of Family Guy, a crude, but hilarious animated show for grown-ups. I am certain that the show’s creator, Seth MacFarlane, grew up in the 80s along with me. He experienced all it had to offer, as is clearly seen in the all the references he makes to common every-day things and places of the 80s on his show.
In the Mixed Tape episode, the character of Stewie – a harmlessly demonic, slightly effeminate, off kilter baby with an adult voice and almost unidentifiable accent is smitten with his hot, blonde bombshell babysitter named Liddane. In conversations mostly with himself, Stewie is convinced that he and the babysitter have a thing going and will end up together.
To show her his undying love, Stewie makes her a Mixed Tape of love songs. However, Stewie finds out that Liddane has a boyfriend. He is so enraged that he plots to kill the boyfriend and frame Liddane as a drunk, so his mother, Lois, will fire the girl.
Stewie is unforgiving, as Lois tears into the girl after finding Liddane asleep surrounding by empty beer bottles Stewie painstakingly placed around her. Lois fires her on the spot. Then, as a confused and teary Liddane leaves the house, she tells Stewie “I’m gonna miss you, little man,” and hands him a mixed tape that she made for him.
The significance of the mixed tape is not lost on Stewie who, suddenly remorseful, cries to get back his babysitter, to no avail. Out the door and at the top of his lungs he yells after her: “Liddane!!!!!!!” sounding eerily like a young Marlon Brando as Stan Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire as Stan yells up to his wife, "Stella!! Sttteeelllaaaa!".
The mixed tape from Liddane, as the one Stewie made for her, represents a love and understanding between two people. In this case, it was romantic love for Stewie and motherly love for Liddane. Either way, what came across in Family Guy, like in the book The Namesake, is that when someone takes the time to make someone else a mixed tape there is a deep love brewing and it is well worth taking the time to cultivate it.
I remain continuously impressed with how observant of the human psyche Seth MacFarlane’s writing is. What we see as coincidence, he sees as worth documenting. I believe Family Guy is so wildly successful because of his ability to touch upon things we can relate to and understand and, mostly, because of how nostalgic a nation we really are.
Sadly, the Mixed Tape is a rapidly dying art. Today few (if any) new stereo systems even come with a tape deck. The tape has become a kind of relic and its player something you must request to be included, at an additional cost to you. Soon you will no longer be able to choose all the songs that remind you of that cute boy or girl and put them all together in a unique compilation made especially for that person. Somehow, “downloading” the songs and emailing them to your sweetheart does not have the same appeal.
I feel sorry for the young lovers of today who will never exchange a mixed tape. I think it is a small piece of yesterday and it is a shame we are going to lose it. I recall fondly how happy my tapes from Joe made me. He was the only boy ever to take the time to do such a thing for me and its sweetness remains alive all these years later. What I am is nostalgic for that kind of sweet love that was so keenly representative of the times and will soon be no more. What I feel is lucky to have been around for it.
The book’s female author, Jhumpa Lahiri, weaves this tale with precise accuracy and realism from the viewpoint of the story’s male main character. The Namesake is a book my friend Rebecca recommended with such fervor, that I had to pick it up and buy it. It has taken me a while to get around to reading it, but now that I am in the midst of it, I simply cannot put it down.
Aside from feeling oddly connected to the hero of the book, Gogol Ganguli, and his account of his life as a first generation American, I also am learning what the immigrant experience must have been like for my parents when they first arrived to America. What is interesting is that Gogol and his family are of Indian origin. His parents came over from Calcutta shortly after their arranged marriage. My family is of Colombian origins and yet, both families have undeniable similarities in their experiences both in America and when they visit their homelands.
From Gogol’s mother, Ashima, I am experiencing what it might have been like for my mother here where language, food, customs and culture are so drastically different. All that she left behind is painfully missed for anyone with close ties to family and friends. More so, the fears and troubles encountered when the man is off to work and you are left to your own devices in a foreign country for which you have not yet found any love. Following Ashima is like shadowing my mother through an American city in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Moreover, for Gogol’s father, Ashoke, whom I suspect is a lot like my own father was when he arrived, struggling to overcome the stigma of his immigrant status and wishing to realize with his idealized American dream. The man’s feelings of responsibility to provide for his family on foreign soil can be overwhelming at times.
Despite the detail of the immigrant experience in the book, those stories remain on the sidelines of the real body of the tale. What this book truly seeks to illustrate is the comical, painfully trite and lovingly sweet coming-of-age of an average American boy. Watching Gogol stumble through the silliness of his name in an American classroom, enter puberty with parents whose culture chooses to flatline any assumptions their children may have about adolescence, and tackle the issues of education and life is truly a gift. As the reader follows Gogol through the awkwardness of first love and of experimenting with drugs and alcohol, we suffer with him as he simultaneously pretends to be the proud and perfect Indian son at home. Living parallel lives for Gogol become even more complicated when his first love is an American-born girl with hippie and divorced American parents.
I am still a long way from the book’s end, but so far, it has not disappointed. I have had several quiet times of knowing acceptance, vivid recollections, awesome realizations and quite a few enjoyable a-ha moments. These are all signs of a truly great read!
One moment that stands out in the book, thus far, is the time when Gogol makes a mixed tape for his girlfriend. Ruth is Gogol's first love. She is cool, hip and the child of American hippies. Ruth is all Gogol imagines a girl should be, yet he knows his parents will never accept her. Nonetheless, he pours his heart out in a mix of songs he loves and thinks she will, too.
Aside from the mentions of the Magic 8 Ball, the Rubik’s Cube, the music of the times and the commercials on television, that I can recall with precise detail, it is the mixed tape that I am most endeared to in this book right now.
When Joe and I were first dating, he made me a series of three mixed tapes. On these tapes were many songs I had never heard of from bands whose names I vaguely recognized. When I listened to these tapes, with little interest at first (I did not think I was a fan of any of the music), I slowly understood their significance. I would play them over and over and find little treasures in each line or lyric, in the strength of the voice and the angst with which it was sung. It must have taken Joe hours to choose, compile and record these for me. I imagine that before, and while, he was making them, there were moments of contemplation. Does that line sound too forward? Is there too much sexual connotation in that one? Is she going to think I am ridiculous?
The answer was, No, she did not find it at all ridiculous.
On the contrary, I was extremely flattered and touched that Joe felt I was worth the time and effort to make the tapes. It meant that for a good period of time when we were not together, he was still thinking of me. It meant he cared deeply for me. It meant that love was growing and he knew somehow that making these tapes would pay off in the end.
Recently, the Mixed Tape made another appearance in my life. I was watching an episode of Family Guy, a crude, but hilarious animated show for grown-ups. I am certain that the show’s creator, Seth MacFarlane, grew up in the 80s along with me. He experienced all it had to offer, as is clearly seen in the all the references he makes to common every-day things and places of the 80s on his show.
In the Mixed Tape episode, the character of Stewie – a harmlessly demonic, slightly effeminate, off kilter baby with an adult voice and almost unidentifiable accent is smitten with his hot, blonde bombshell babysitter named Liddane. In conversations mostly with himself, Stewie is convinced that he and the babysitter have a thing going and will end up together.
To show her his undying love, Stewie makes her a Mixed Tape of love songs. However, Stewie finds out that Liddane has a boyfriend. He is so enraged that he plots to kill the boyfriend and frame Liddane as a drunk, so his mother, Lois, will fire the girl.
Stewie is unforgiving, as Lois tears into the girl after finding Liddane asleep surrounding by empty beer bottles Stewie painstakingly placed around her. Lois fires her on the spot. Then, as a confused and teary Liddane leaves the house, she tells Stewie “I’m gonna miss you, little man,” and hands him a mixed tape that she made for him.
The significance of the mixed tape is not lost on Stewie who, suddenly remorseful, cries to get back his babysitter, to no avail. Out the door and at the top of his lungs he yells after her: “Liddane!!!!!!!” sounding eerily like a young Marlon Brando as Stan Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire as Stan yells up to his wife, "Stella!! Sttteeelllaaaa!".
The mixed tape from Liddane, as the one Stewie made for her, represents a love and understanding between two people. In this case, it was romantic love for Stewie and motherly love for Liddane. Either way, what came across in Family Guy, like in the book The Namesake, is that when someone takes the time to make someone else a mixed tape there is a deep love brewing and it is well worth taking the time to cultivate it.
I remain continuously impressed with how observant of the human psyche Seth MacFarlane’s writing is. What we see as coincidence, he sees as worth documenting. I believe Family Guy is so wildly successful because of his ability to touch upon things we can relate to and understand and, mostly, because of how nostalgic a nation we really are.
Sadly, the Mixed Tape is a rapidly dying art. Today few (if any) new stereo systems even come with a tape deck. The tape has become a kind of relic and its player something you must request to be included, at an additional cost to you. Soon you will no longer be able to choose all the songs that remind you of that cute boy or girl and put them all together in a unique compilation made especially for that person. Somehow, “downloading” the songs and emailing them to your sweetheart does not have the same appeal.
I feel sorry for the young lovers of today who will never exchange a mixed tape. I think it is a small piece of yesterday and it is a shame we are going to lose it. I recall fondly how happy my tapes from Joe made me. He was the only boy ever to take the time to do such a thing for me and its sweetness remains alive all these years later. What I am is nostalgic for that kind of sweet love that was so keenly representative of the times and will soon be no more. What I feel is lucky to have been around for it.
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