When my kids were young, I used to load them into the car and make the drive up to my mom’s farm. It was a familiar trip — highway, gravel, long stretches of sky — and like any good road trip, it had a soundtrack.

Mine was a Reader’s Digest cassette collection of Elvis Presley. Not just Elvis in isolation, but Elvis alongside the songs of his era — the sound of the world between 1956 and 1977. I loved it. The kids… not so much.

They would groan as soon as the cassette clicked into place.

“Do we have to listen to this?”

“This is so boring.”

“Can’t we play something else?”

I’d just smile, keep driving, and let Elvis do his thing.

When we arrived at the farm, the pattern c...

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