I have a distinct childhood memory of sitting in the back seat of my family’s Volvo station wagon on a July Saturday night on Highway 8 and listening to Prairie Home Companion. Having fully exhausted myself from a day of swimming and sandcastling at Grandma and Grandpa’s cabin, I rested against the car window and watched a bright orange sunset dart between the knee-high rows of corn as the tender bass of Garrison Keillor and his Prairie Home Companion lulled me into a sweet, summer peace.

There was a sense anything was possible; summers activities were, after all, endless and carefree. Tomorrow I’d be swimming at a city lake, squirting my Super Soaker at neighborhood dogs, playing pick-up baseball games. But at that moment, I watched the summer light fade, drawn into a Lake Wobegon story, lost in a narrative and a place that sounded like it appreciated summers just as much as I did. I felt safe in my world (something the school year never allowed for) and safe in the hands of a noble storyteller.

Of course, this memory would have to last a lifetime, because as soon as my sister learned to talk, she’d make the announcement in the car: “God! I hhhhhhhhhate that man.”

It is true, my Minnesota-born baby sister could not tolerate Garrison Keillor’s sonorous voice, his folksy music, or ambling stories.

And when she hit junior high, the hate turned into “f**king hate” which, of course, caused a serious rift in the Anderson family’s Saturday night.

Dad, who was a contemporary of Keillor’s at the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Daily newspaper, almost took offense to such blasphemy.

After my sister’s declaration, my dad’s eyes would shift to the rearview mirror and he'd respond: “Watch your language,” or “That’s inappropriate,” or, if he was in no mood to parent, “Hush up!”

Mom would then twist around in the front seat and perhaps put a hand out to my sister and say in a calm voice, “There’s a better way to ask us to change the radio station.”

“Dad won’t change it. He loves this stupid thing,” she’d say.

I’d then chime in, “I like it too.”

“Of course you do,” she’d say, as if I was betraying my age.

She’d groan again, knowing she’d lost and say under her breath, “F**k . . . you guys.”

“What did you just say?” Dad would respond with gusto as if he was going to pull over the car but well-knowing there was nothing he could do.

The car would then go silent, save for the chant from the car’s speakers:  “Has your family tried them . . . Powder Milk.”

I tell this story because I was able to rustle up some tickets to this Friday evening’s performance of A Prairie Home Companion at The Greek Theater in Los Angeles. It’s a beautiful amphitheater nestled in Griffith Park, below the Griffith Park Observatory, and after a particularly difficult week (perhaps year), I cannot wait to see some golden-hour light glint off the city and surrounding hills; hear the old coot, Garrison Keillor, live; and hopefully find some of that summer peace, sans the f-word.