Multi-culturalism gone wild

   I'm really getting into this multi-cultural thing. I've been working on

my family tree and, apart from a few squirrels that took up residence there

over the years, I found that I'm about as multi-cultural as a guy can get.

   In fact, when it comes to diversity, I'm a one-man United Nations. One

side of my family moved straight from  Finland to the Upper Peninsula of

Michigan. Yep, I'm part Yuper.

   The other side is pure Californian. My great-great-grandfather helped

develop Coronado Island in San Diego. So, like wow, man, I'm, like, a truly

Californian dude.

   Add to that the fact that I was born on the Island of Guam, and have

lived in seven states from Alaska to Florida, and I'm so doggone culturally

diverse I don't know what to do with myself. (Maybe that's the problem.)

   All of this occurred to me the other day when I picked up the Time

magazine with Ricky Martin on the cover. For all of you culturally

non-diverse folks out there, Ricky Martin is one of the hottest new Latin

music stars. And Latin music is hot, hot, hot.

   Which got me to thinking. My wife and I have been bugging our kids to

learn a foreign language. My wife is pushing for Latin ­ gag me with a past

participle ­ and I've been pushing for Spanish or French. I know a little

Russian, but I also know that the likelihood of using Russian ranks right up

there with Latin, Swahili and Tamil.

   Our kids are leaning toward French, mainly because my wife is fluent in

it, and I even know a little.

   Besides, our kids say they already know Spanish.

   "Una mas cerveza," our 11-year-old says. "See, I know Spanish."

   Let me explain. One of my favorite bands, multi-cultural or otherwise,

is the Texas Tornadoes, which a brother-in-law once played non-stop for two

days on a fishing trip. One of the extremely multi-cultural songs they do is

"Una Mas Cerveza."

   Actually, their songs" lyrics are very poetic. "I've got some dinero,

You get your Camaro,  We'll get some cerveza, and go up on the mesa."

   Longfellow never sounded better.

   Where was I. Oh, back to Latin music. Anyway, Time had a listing of

Latin musicians who paved the way for the current popularity  ­ Richie

Valens, Carlos Santana, Gloria Estefan, but, incredibly, the Texas Tornadoes

were left out.

   I was looking at the pictures of the current stars ­ Jennifer Lopez and

Ricky Martin ­ and it seems that the main ingredient of their image is a

willingness to be photographed in various states of undress.

   I can do that. Plus I'm a Modern Multi-Cultural Kind of Guy.

   So I started taking off my shirt and asked my wife if I was as sexy as

Ricky Martin.

June 3, 1999