Illustration by Marissa Maciel
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you would be able to judge a book by its cover. Literally. You’d never waste your time reading books that would only disappoint you.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, when you were a kid, every time you had a question about anything (“How do you spell ‘loquacious’?” “Do sharks sleep with their eyes closed?”), LeVar Burton would tell you to take a look, it’s in a book. And when you complained about how annoying Dad was being, Yo-Yo Ma would play a slow, sad song on the cello, and they’d laugh at you (never unkindly) as you stomped away.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, no one would be permitted to “joke” about arts and humanities majors’ dead-end jobs in your presence. No one would even want to.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, among your most cherished childhood memories would be the epic yearly camping trips you took together. You would eat hot dogs and s’mores around the campfire while LeVar Burton told the spookiest ghost stories, never the same one twice, and when you couldn’t take it anymore—oh my god WHAT WAS THAT NOISE???—Yo-Yo Ma would bring out his second-best Strad (he doesn’t like to bring “Petunia,” his favorite cello, when you guys are roughing it) and play soothing concertos and Appalachian lullabies until your frayed nerves and racing heart finally calmed down, and various woodland animals (only the cute, friendly ones) would creep out of their dens and burrows to listen, too.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, they’d have three scrappy tomcats named Pablo Casals, Mtislav Rostropovich, and James Joyce. Pablo would rule the roost, Mtislav would be the valiant hunter, and James would essentially be a dog in cat form who would come when you called and sleep at the foot of your bed when you visited.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, there would be overflowing floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in all the rooms in your house—even the bathrooms—and every time you borrowed a book, LeVar Burton would make you choose another one to donate to the library. As you got older he’d make sure that every time you bought a book from the bookstore you also bought one to give to someone else, and this would be your religion, a practice you would never stop as long as you lived.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d have a gorgeous, light-filled, airy study to work in every day, and your desk would always be perfectly neat and organized, and your window seat cushions would be many and soft.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d be able to carry on casual conversations in six or seven languages, and when you referred to yourself as “a citizen of the world” somehow it would always sound sincere, never smug.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d never experience writer’s block. You’d see amazing ideas everywhere, from that baby with the ducky shoes who tried to eat a chopstick you dropped in a restaurant to the guy dancing all by himself on the subway. You would never lack for inspiration, and you’d always know exactly what other people’s stories needed, too.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, they would’ve fully supported you when you insisted you weren’t going into the arts just because they did; you were going to be a doctor: “You’ll be a great doctor! Always good to have one in the family!” They wouldn’t say anything when you came home from frog-dissecting day in biology class with a pale face, vaguely smelling of puke. When you changed your major from pre-business to comp sci to communications to history, they’d tell you that they just wanted you to like what you were studying. And when, two years into your job as a paralegal, you finally quit and called to tell them you’d decided to get your MFA, there would be only the briefest of pauses, and then LeVar Burton would say evenly, “That’s wonderful news, sweetie,” and Yo-Yo Ma would add, “As long as you’re happy,” and you would tell them you loved them, knowing that as soon as you hung up they’d be high-fiving and whooping with delight.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, they would come to every performance of every student play you wrote or produced or appeared in. They’d argue over whose turn it was to bring you flowers, and then you’d just end up with two equally beautiful bouquets every night.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d have perfect pitch, play four instruments (including one so obscure only two virtuosos are currently alive in the world), and sing so beautifully in the car that other drivers would non-creepily compliment your voice at red lights.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d all be friends with all the Obamas. They would leave you birthday voicemails and “love” all your Facebook photos and save you primo seats at the Kennedy Center Honors (even in those years when your dad wasn’t performing). And of course you’d be sure to call them “Mr. President” and “Mrs. Obama” out of respect, but you’d all know that once 2017 rolled around and they were living semi-private lives again and dining at your dads’ house, it’d be “Barack, can I refill your wine glass?” and “Michelle, I told you I’m never playing Trivial Pursuit against you again; I have my pride.”
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, reading would always be allowed at the dinner table, so long as you were willing to provide a brief summary and explain why you would recommend it to the group.
If Levar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, your orchids would never die, no matter how much you overwatered them.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you would be able to come up with the perfect, funny yet gently crushing response to every unfortunate comment or microaggression uttered in your presence. No one would ever get mad at you for saying it; everyone would just leave the party or classroom or subway car talking about your wit and compassion and how cool you were under pressure, and on your way out strangers would thank you for really making them think.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you would be a travel goddess: no matter how long the trip, no matter what the season, you would be able to fit everything you needed in one small roller bag and one reasonably sized tote. You would never suffer through an unplanned overnight layover in the Atlanta airport, your carefully packed shirts and dresses would never wrinkle, your hair products would never explode mid-flight, and you would always look and feel like yourself no matter how long you’d been on a plane. And on those nights when you found yourself all alone in a strange hotel room in a strange town where no one even knew your name, you’d order comfort food from room service and watch your top three or four favorite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Netflix before falling into a sound, refreshing sleep.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you would know how to take a compliment graciously and also fight like hell for what you deserve—like that raise you’ve had coming! With extra paid leave, too, because if your dads have taught you anything, it’s that family is important.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, your favorite moments from childhood, your all-time best days, your greatest personal triumphs would never fade away. All your dearest-held memories would be forever accessible, as bright and vivid as if they had occurred only yesterday.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d never accidentally read a spoiler for a book you’d been dying to read. And if anyone happened to be talking about intriguing plot twists in your vicinity, their words would magically fade just before reaching your ears, and all you would be able to hear until they moved on to another topic would be the deep, soulful notes of Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you’d treat each and every person you met with kindness and compassion, recognizing their individual worth and talents and their limitless human potential, because you’d want to, because that’s who you are—and because that’s what your dads would want you to do.
That was such a satisfying, comforting read. I feel like I just entered a warm, lightly tea-scented cocoon and now I never want to leave.
My cocoon smells faintly of tea, but also of lilacs and old books.
Oh, lilacs! I love that smell so much.
And I can see happy little trees out the window.
I literally read this in bed, with a green tea scented candle burning, just after doing yoga and drinking a lavender chamomile tea. Oh, and rain is pattering on my roof. I feel llike the Rock-a-By Lady from Hushaby Street is going to show up any minute now.
This is everything I didn’t know I needed today
feel free to bookmark and return to this when days ahead seem dark.
This is definitely going in my “Gemütlichkeit” folder, because sometimes English doesn’t have quite have the right word for “a sense of cozy belonging/ warmth” that this piece absolutely encapsulates! Thank you so much for this, I needed it today
If you like Gemuetlichkeit, can I interest you in hygge? It’s a similar concept in Danish, so it’s basically got more twinkly lights and candles and blankets (and risalamande, because EVERYTHING is better with a helping of rice puddling).
Hygge (pronounced hue-geh?) sounds delightful! As does that rice pudding, I may just have to try making that soon!
“Michelle, I told you I’m never playing Trivial Pursuit against you again; I have my pride.”
HnnnnnHHHHhhhhhggg do want Nicole oh gosh this is so specific and speaking DIRECTLY to my soul on this Monday.
…something about Yo-Yo-MAMA jokes but I don’t know I’m too tired…
Or not, please! It’s not great when Asian names get made fun of.
(greatest sitcom cameo ever or GREATEST SITCOM CAMEO EVER)
Greatest cameo in the history of cameos.
It’s just so real, y’know? Much like the video for the Reading Rainbow app kickstarter, where the entire school library staff freaked the fuck out.
It is SO real. It’s 100% the way I reacted when I randomnly met Neil DeGrasse Tyson. You like to think you’re gonna be cool, but you AREN’T. Especially if you don’t have time to prepare (I’m better when I can prepare in advance)
Back when I was still keeping up my blog I wrote about that exact scenario! http://goddessoftransitory.blogspot.com/2012/08/w…
I made an undignified out-loud noise when I saw that LeVar had posted this twitter.
Oh, when they all looked at him and couldn’t do anything but sing the song!
This is it. The big one. Everything I could possibly want from an If X Were Your Y post. I can’t possibly get happier than this, not even if “If Janelle Monae Were Your Girlfriend” popped up.
…okay, maybe a little bit happier.
Usually when I read “If X Were Your Y,” I am filled with yes, happiness, but also longing, which as we know is the root of suffering.
I am currently filled with peace. Only peace.
…are we twins though…
The Big One? Nope, still waiting for “If Lin-Manuel Miranda were your big brother”.
Good god, I had never realized before how perfectly Yo-Yo Ma and LeVar Burton can embody the “slightly doofy but kind gay couple” role.
“Slight doofy but kind”= #peakdad 🙂
So, the Theorbo or the Viola de Gamba?
Baritone shawm.
Who are you people and why aren’t you coming to my band’s concerts?!?
(OK maybe you are, how would I know?)
Already deliriously happy about this post; early music references in the comments is the icing on the cake.
My best friend’s wife plays the viola de gamba! I know what that is!!!!
That is all.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, there would be overflowing floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in all the rooms in your house—even the bathrooms—and every time you borrowed a book, LeVar Burton would make you choose another one to donate to the library. As you got older he’d make sure that every time you bought a book from the bookstore you also bought one to give to someone else, and this would be your religion, a practice you would never stop as long as you lived.
Does this strike anyone else as the perfect faith for the official Church of The Toast?
And “the library” includes prison libraries, hospital libraries and libraries in under-served areas, not just the rich, fancy library in a rich, fancy town. LeVar would be ON THIS. You don’t have to take my word for it!
(This is so good.)
Also to include the Little Free Library that LeVar would have built in front of your house.
If LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma were your dads, you would never leave your cello in a taxi.
like *some* people…
I’d have nightmares about it for *years* if I did that.
“[Y]ou would be able to judge a book by its cover. Literally. You’d never waste your time reading books that would only disappoint you.”
This may displace “instantly summon public transit” as the best practical superpower.
Yo-Yo Ma’s camping vest makes me happy. He looks so content to be playing melodies under the crescent moon.
A+ dad dreams here.
That artwork, plus the camping mention almost has me looking to see where I can go camping next. I also love how they both have sturdy sensible hiking shoes!
I hate camping, but this is such an ideal depiction of it that I might be almost fooled into thinking it’s a good idea.
Girl Scouts tricked me young into really liking camping. If all camping we’re like that picture I would never leave, and I’m okay with that
I saw through the Girl Scouts’ thin tissue of camping lies early on. One stomach bug + latrine situation was more than enough to convince 7-year-old me to refuse all future invitations to the great outdoors.
That’s unfortunate. Strong impressions from childhood can take a lot to overcome, it took me over a decade to try brussel sprouts again after someone had the bright idea to have my third grade class eat raw brussel sprouts that we had grown in our little garden… to this day I don’t know why they thought that would make us like veggies
It’s probably my fault somehow, since I ADORED raw sprouts as a kid. I’m so, so sorry.
“As you got older he’d make sure that every time you bought a book from the bookstore you also bought one to give to someone else, and this would be your religion, a practice you would never stop as long as you lived”
BRB starting this religion.
God, LeVar Burton is amazing. He is in my top three TV personalities who just made the world such a happier, nicer place (Mr. Rogers and Bob Ross are the other two, obviously). If more people lived by the philosophy of “Would Mr. Rogers, LeVar Burton or Bob Ross be disappointed in me if I did this” half of our issues would disappear overnight.
I am signing up for this religion. Just last week, I gave my friend the last book I bought at a bookstore (and before that, I gave a different friend a book I’d won from a Goodreads giveaway), so I feel like I’m mostly there. Also, I do so watch Star Trek: The Next Generation for comfort (though Geordi episodes tend to be disappointing). LIVE THE DREAM!
If you’ve ever read Gretchen Rubin’s “The Happiness Project”, one of the things she recommends is to “imitate a spiritual master”, someone whose virtues and qualities you strive to student and emulate (since transcendent values are an important component of happiness). Mr. Rogers is legitimately my spiritual master.
If Mr. Rogers were your dad!!
You know what? I just forwarded this passage to several book lovers with children. Definitely on the bandwagon!
JUST GONNA POST MORE GIFS BECAUSE WE ARE ALL TROY IN THESE
but don’t forget…
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WE ARE TROY; TROY IS US
THANK YOU, A+ PUBLIC SERVICE
greatest gif selection combo ever the end.
Clearly the most outlandish, fiction-y item here is “you would always look and feel like yourself no matter how long you’d been on a plane.” I can’t even laugh.
It is legitimately such a weird feeling, like you’ve been on planes and in airports FOREVER and now space and time no longer have any meaning, because all the spaces look the same, it’s just rows of seats and Cinnabons and departure gates and bathrooms with motion-sensor soap dispensers that ignore you, until you no longer know who or what you are and you end up crying into a bag of McDonald’s.
YES, this precisely
I watched that pretty 2015 BBC version of And Then There Were None yesterday and was completely distracted by the gorgeous scenery and costumes and shifty-eyed assessment of all the characters by the opening scene. They all travel via open-top car and train and whatnot to a seaside town, board a little boat, and are motored a far enough distance offshore that they can no longer see the mainland. They land on a beach and trek up the hill to the house, and are all, “oh, cocktails, how jolly!”
I’m all “remove every stitch of tweed immediately and immerse yourselves in hot baths, you are each of you wrinkled and sweaty and your undergarments have fused to your skin!”
It just made me think of how terrible I would be at living an upper-middle-class (or above) lifestyle in the 1930s, because even before the murders started the house party setup sounded like an utter nightmare. All that enforced socialising!
And at some point you just accept that this is your life from now on; you will never be anywhere but on a plane, unable to stretch out or lie down flat, the constant dull roar of the engines your eternal soundtrack, drinking water that never tastes quite right out of a plastic cup, with absolutely nothing else to do and yet unable to hold an interest in any of your available entertainment options. It’s like being in a sensory deprivation tank, except there are sensations; they are merely dull and rather unpleasant but not *quite* excruciatingly so, but similarly unchanging. Has it been five minutes? Has it been five hours? Who knows? Time has no meaning. Stop trying to count, you are never going to arrive anywhere. This is it. This is the only thing you will ever experience, EVER.
Everything is perfect, now.
I have just now discovered that I need a lot more dadships and momships also, please.
check out if stephen colbert were your dad
OK SEE I WAS SAD AND NOW — I’M NOT SAD ANYMORE
I was not allowed to read at the table; clearly the problem was that I had the wrong parents.
Oh how I wish Yo-Yo Ma and LeVar Burton were my dads
I love this so much! It makes me feel warm and cozy.
I’ve been watching old Mr. Rogers episodes with my toddler, and there’s an episode where he visits Yo-Yo Ma and his son, Nicholas. Nicholas was about six years old, and he was clearly thrilled to be talking to Mr. Rogers. Yo-Yo just beamed with pride as his son excitedly told Mr. Rogers about music and school and stuff. He looked like an awesome dad.
oh god. i’m getting verklempt over this!
SAME
Beloved Sister is having a rough week. Hang on while I email this to her.
That was lovely, but also I’m really needing to mentally add a lot of information about how the cello was kept safe on the camping trips, because the idea of taking a Strad camping is really stressing me out. The dry weather! The danger of it getting smashed! The security risk! Please tell me that Yo-Yo Ma’s mere presence is enough to magically protect the cello…..
I think it isn’t really a Stead, for all those excellent reasons. I think it’s a decent but not remarkable student-level cello, something that wouldn’t represent a loss to the world if it were destroyed, but he plays it so beautifully that it sounds like a Strad in the moonlight.
Don’t worry! Yo-Yo Ma’s mere presence is enough to magically protect the cello.
I mean, he once left his cello in a taxi and got it back unharmed, so clearly the man has some magical cello-preserving powers ordinary mortals know not of.
Much like a couple of my band friends in high school who had nice wood clarinets for concert season but used a cheaper plastic clarinet for marching band season, I think Yo-yo Ma would have an “outdoor” cello.
My dad’s friend gave my dad a plastic clarinet a few years ago because he [the friend] was so stressed out that my dad played his wood clarinet all the time, even parades in the rain! My dad’s wood clarinet would cost like $20,000 to replace, but it never occurred to him to get a plastic one himself? Dads, man.
For my brief band career my mom found an old wood clarinet at a garage sale and my piano teacher hooked us up with a friend of hers who could restore it. It wasn’t until I accidentally chipped the mouthpiece and we took it for repairs that we discovered it was a model normally played by professional musicians- an exact replacement for my mouthpiece would have been twice what we paid for the clarinet and refurbishment.
I quit band before I was old enough for marching band so I did not have to switch to plastic (which was apparently required – the school didn’t want to be held accountable by angry parents if a wood clarinet got ruined) .
He does. Apparently it was so cold for Obama’s first inauguration that he and other musicians did the instrumental equivalent of lip-synching while playing modern instruments. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/arts/music/23ba…
i just… this singlehandedly lifted my spirits out of essay hell? thank you?
But that last one though! It’s the person I want to be!
Okay, so you all know that the fake tags send you to Google? Click on “#but you don’t have to take my word for it.” You’ll thank me.
No, you guys, I mean it, this is the single most beautiful thing I have ever read. I might want this read at my memorial service, so that all the (presumably millions of) mourners who will obviously be there to rend their garments: will instead be filled with peace and hope and an unquenchable desire to be kind to all who cross their paths.
Also, speaking of Calming Influences from My Childhood: does anyone remember the name of the show where the white guy with the impressive mustache would read a story while illustrating it with charcoal and pastels? With the somewhat obv follow-up question: where can I find this online because I really need to watch it compulsively at work to cheer myself up share it with this 5yo I live with.
Is this it? http://www.tv.com/shows/readit/
No, but I totally remember that show!
Cover to Cover? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye_u7d3yrk0
YESSS I am in your debt, kind person.
Oh my God I loved this show, thank you for reminding me!
Oh my heart, my heart is calm and full and buoyed.
When I was very very little I told people I wanted LeVar Burton to be my boyfriend even though I didn’t really know what that meant. I think I just recognized his kind nature and love of books.
This was around the same time that my imaginary friends were the characters from the Strawberry Shortcake Gang.
So totally 80s.
he’d be a GREAT boyfriend, it’s just a FACT.
If anyone hasn’t seen 10-year-old Yo-Yo Ma’s letter to Leonard Bernstein, here you go.
MY EMOTIONS!
I love my parents and think they are wondeful but you have now made me feel like I’ve cheated on them in my heart
I was, many years ago, slightly acquainted with Yo-Yo Ma’s son, who was the sort of person who is very good with small talk to slight acquaintances, and who remembers to ask kind and appropriate follow-up questions the next time he sees you. In other words: Yo-Yo Ma is probably as good a father as imagined.
I would like to believe that this was conjured by my family’s enthusiastic discussion at brunch yesterday of the “If X Were Your Y” series.
This essay inspired me to comment for the first time to share The Time I Met LeVar. It was at a Star Trek convention (of course) and I brought a brand-new copy of “Keep The Lights Burning, Abbie” – brand new, because I read my childhood copy to shreds, as it was the only book I’d ever found with my very own name. I approached his desk with the portrait I’d shot with him the day before, and my book, and held it out while babbling about how he’d been the voice of my childhood and when my classmates made fun of me for preferring to read through recess instead of …whatever they were doing, he was there to reassure me that it was OK to be a voracious reader.
And he looked at me, and in the kindest voice, said, “Oh, yeah, Abbie really wasn’t a common name in the 80s at all, was it?” And took it from my hands and started inscribing it while I babbled, and handed it back to me and signed my picture, and said, “Read it.”
His inscription? “The lights are always on for you, Abbie.” And then he shook his hand and smiled at me, and it was like an angel from heaven had blessed me.
My best friend had to take me to the ladies’ room and sit with me for the 20 minutes it took me to stop crying from sheer emotional overload. Then I called my mom and told her what happened, and she and I cried on the phone for another 20 minutes.
At his Q&A that weekend, he led a group sing-a-long of the Reading Rainbow theme. It was an absolute dream come true.
I have to go make dinner stop making me weep and causing me goosebumps.
waaahhhhhhh this is PERFECT
Feeling excruciating longing now.
There’s a book called Midnight Hour Encores, about a world-class cellist in her teens and a road trip she takes with her dad, who has raised her, to go meet her estranged mother (and audition for a cellist she admires beyond all others).
I thought when I was a teen that I envied the protagonist because she was such a great musician. I realized, rereading it as an adult, I envied her the awesome relationship she had with her dad. Doofy and kind sounds *perfect*. My brother and I did not win the father lottery– we got undermining, hypercritical, and angry. At 40, I am a little too old to be adopted, but DAMN this is the family I want.
I REMEMBER THAT BOOK. It made such a huge impression on me the way she described her favorite cellist, the way she recognized his playing by the quality of his silences. And how her teacher had told her not to talk when she went onstage before she started playing: “Hold your spell and they’ll miss your first three mistakes. More than that you shouldn’t make.”
I am so delighted that someone else remembers this book! Those passages were among my favorites. Ditto her talking about how when she played, she stopped being smart and basically started being music. That was my first model of an overthinker who found a way to get out of her own head on occasion. <3
Looks at bedroom wall lined with over-full bookcases, cello hanging from hook, cairns of books recently purchased from festivals surrounding unwieldy cello case… um, can I have a do-over? I think Levar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma should have been my parents.
I feel dirty (and old) now because when I was a young thing I had a big crush on Yo Yo Ma.
I just saved a copy of this picture so that I can look at it as needed in the future.
waaahhhhhhh this is PERFECT
True story: once upon a time I worked in New York on the margins of the classical music business, basically gofering. I once worked on a project that involved Yo-Yo Ma and met him a couple of times (basically one step up from offering him coffee).
Fast forward three or four years, and I’m now working for a consultant and traveling a lot. I’m standing at security at Amsterdam, realizing the lines are incredibly long and slow, and as a result I’m probably going to miss my flight, a royal pain as there weren’t all that many flights then to Accra, Ghana.
Suddenly there’s a rush as several Very Officious Types ushering some VIPs go by. Yo-Yo Ma is one of their charges (I think with his quartet at the time, but I don’t remember). There’s a brief pause and he looks over. His face lights up, and he beckons me over. “Stuck in line?” “Yup, and going to miss my flight.” “Come on!”
And that’s how I floated through in his wake. I suddenly had so much time before the flight I went and got myself a good strong drink in his honor, and I still toast him whenever the fickle gods of travel smile at me.
But what amazes me is what a memory he must have, to have even vaguely recognized that we’d met before.
i love this story so much
For real, though, I had a phase where those Appalachia albums were all I listened to.
i love this story so much
Welling up with tears, somehow, and comforted on a day when I needed a little comfort. Thank-you, Toast! You always seem to have just what I need just when I need it.
Somehow I am crying now and desperately wishing this was real.
Y’all got shared on Reading Rainbow!
And here I’d settle for just one wonderful dad.
This was indeed the policy in my house growing up. Even at restaurants.
Great! I like this story. It is really good story. I will try to make a animation video on this story, LeVar Burton and Yo-Yo Ma Were Your Dads. Thanks for sharing this.