On Tom Lehrer

My childhood weekends, once chores were completed, often centered around jockeying for the choice spot on our capacious living room sofa with a favorite book or the latest issue of Popular Mechanics. Dr. Demento's radio show played a significant role in these weekends, and it was through Dr. D that I first encountered Tom Lehrer.

My parents divorced about ten years ago. The older brother with whom I fought for couch space died by his own hand in 2003. I don't know where the couch is, but the living room in which it once sat has now been restored with loving care to the house's original 1904 glory and the house itself is likely going to become an AirBnB.

Dr. Demento announced recently that his beloved show will come to an end in October of this year.

Last Sunday, Tom Lehrer died. He was 97. I cried.

I also remember how my parents didn't bat an eyelash about me learning the lyrics to "The Masochism Tango." They never did explain what those words meant, though, just as they never directly gave me the "birds and bees" talk. They turned an interesting shade of red when they bequeathed me a filing cabinet that they thought was empty, but turned out to have an entire stash of their spicy love letters that they exchanged before they were married. (They were embarrassed enough to overlook that they'd never given me the key to the filing cabinet and that, being a practical child, I taught myself lockpicking on that day.)

Knowing the lyrics to "The Masochism Tango" has driven away many a weak-willed suitor, by the way, including a guy who thought he'd win my heart by buying a Tom Lehrer album at a bookshop and playing it in his car so that he could sing along to "The Elements." Oh, honey. My sparkling rendition of "We'll All Go Together When We Go" sealed the notion that we would, in fact, never be together in the first place. In retrospect, thank you, sir.

I was thrilled as a junior Sailor to learn that Lehrer had served two years in the Army as a mathematician. Anecdotal evidence states that he invented the Jell-O shot as a means of sneaking alcohol into the staid halls of Arlington Station. I don't know if that story is true, but I do know that the Agency later on did have beer vending machines in the cafeteria.

Now that I am 40 and perpetually exhausted and can forecast the weather with my arthritis, I think I understand his songs a little bit better. The faces on the TV screen and the voices on the radio waves may change, but the current of their messages stays the same. Doom is just around the corner, Lehrer says, but we can't do anything about it - and it doesn't mean we can't critique it with our art.

I read in his obituaries that he died childless, unmarried, and with no immediate heirs. That said, he made his entire music catalogue public domain in 2020, and in that way, I think Tom Lehrer gave us all an incredible gift. Those of us who are cheered by his sharp wit, dazzled by his intelligence, and inspired to carry on his incisive creative spirit may not be his legal heirs, but we certainly are his artistic heirs. I think that's a magnificent legacy, don't you?

Thank you, Tom. We'll take it from here. Hopefully we haven't fucked it up too badly.