Two Songs from “Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical”

     What sense does it make, in this economy, to keep bringing home more children? We could buy a new car every year and get off cheaper. Shiny ones, too, with foreign names and Italian engines. We could park each of the fancy cars at its own mansion and it would still be a cheaper approach to happiness in the long run than raising nine children with their accompanying family trips, I-pods, soccer cleats, summer camps, tuitions, and Saturday night pizza-deliveries.

     Lyrics from “Hair” frequently cross my mind. The first are from “I Got Life.”

Ace Young as Berger on Broadway

     I still got all those things because they’re FREE!

     But this part is also true:

     Because life is the thing we have so much of now; life is what we’re rich in.

     On the flip side are the lyrics from “Ain’t Got No,” including:

     I ain’t got none of them things because my children took them.

     A few “Ain’t Got No” lines could be sung by some of those children, including: “Ain’t got no soap,” “Ain’t got no coins,” “Ain’t go no schoolin’,” and (one of the great lyrics of the 20th century) “Ain’t got no underwear.”

     The economy’s tanking, the Middle East is exploding; Madison, Wisconsin, resembles Cairo; and my children’s tuitions are due.

     Still:

So, tell me: what songs do you sing to yourself during the day and do any of them come from a Tribal-Love-Rock Musical?