Meet Lauren Talley, the assistant city and state editor of The Daily Tar Heel.
My very first car was a 2001 Pontiac Bonneville with a broken gas gauge.
Sixteen-year-old me learned two things really quickly during that formidable year: how to utilize a trip meter as a gas gauge, and how to distinguish between music to be played when my mom was in the car and music not to be played when my mom was in the car.
I mean don’t get me wrong, my mom is pretty hip. She knows how to accessorize. She's never posted a Facebook story. She burns even spaghetti noodles, which meant I got to eat out a lot as a kid. She’s fresh. She’s cool. She’s Carol Talley.
But she doesn’t know who Cardi B is, and she has no idea Migos is three different people. She most definitely would turn down the volume on Mo Bamba, and she still thinks Lady Gaga sang "Wrecking Ball."
To sum it up, my parents don’t appreciate your average rap music playlist. In fact, they call it trash, and ask that I turn it off. And yet, if I don’t control the aux in the car, we end up listening to my dad’s collection of choral anthems on repeat until I can sing the alto, soprano and tenor parts of "Amazing Grace" all at once. We’ve all been there, okay.
But with Thanksgiving next week and Winter Break approaching, I hope to do us all a solid.
No more of your parents turning down that Lil Wayne song because he references weed. No more of your grandpa hearing multiple sexual innuendos because you decided to play your frat trap playlist on the way to your aunt’s house.
I promise that you can still listen to some good jams with delicate ears in the car. I’m happy to present to you an eclectic mix of songs that won’t have your mom screaming your entire God-given name as you’re barreling down Interstate 40 because a curse word came out of the car speakers.
