I have never sung karaoke. I consider this a public service.

The closest I get to karaoke is singing when I’m alone in the car, and these days I spend half that time coughing after cracking on a high note.

In public, I’m more of a head-bobber. If singing is involved, vastly prefer sing-alongs. I might murmur along if my husband is crooning away with Frank Sinatra; I might be almost audible if he and my son are both in the car and harmonizing. If I feel drowned out by my peers, I’m quite happy to join in on the ba-ba-ba’s of  Sweet Caroline or the chorus of Livin’ on a Prayer with a large crowd at a ballgame or dueling pianos bar. Stick me out somewhere by myself? It’s 50-50 I’ll sing or barf, and that is only partly dependent on how much I’ve had to drink before landing myself in such a ridiculous predicament.

I am in awe of people who can get up and belt out a number. Doubly so for those people who can’t carry a tune in a bucket and go for the gusto anyway. It requires some quality that I lack—confidence, brazenness, lack of self-awareness, I don’t know what. I used to blame this on being a band geek; I always played an instrument, I never soloed with a choir. Or maybe it’s my Midwestern reserve surging to the fore.

Whatever my problem is my son did not inherit it. He truly enjoys karaoke. It doesn’t hurt that he actually CAN carry a tune—in fact, he has a great voice, which for some reason surprises me all over again every time he uses it. He’s always has a musical bent, and it’s one of my Annoying Mom Traits that I continue to wish he’d pursue something along that avenue despite his insistence that he hates practicing, he doesn’t like any instrument enough to spend the time required to get proficient on it, he doesn’t want to hate music and he would if he had to practice and get proficient, and he is MUCH more in tune with himself than I give him credit for.

All that said, he apparently does take some amount of care in his karaoke outings. He says his standby is Life During Wartime by the Talking Heads, but that he prefers to do a different number each time and work out the lyrics and some measure of choreography before going in. He sends us videos occasionally, and I am delighted to report that his performances are warmly received and my parental bias is validated.

I am quite content to go watch other people enjoy themselves on stage this way. I’ll stick to writing!