Music can be medicine, and in the car, magic.

It’s a sixteen-year-old, with Metallica too loud for home blaring, just out for a drive.

Because they can. The window open. The world passing by.

It’s singing Maria Carey’s “Hero” at the top of your lungs, talent be damned.

It’s Moby quieting a fussy baby.

It’s Raffi bringing together three sweet little voices into a giggle-filled rendition of “Banana Phone.”

It’s “Hey, have you heard this one?” for a teenager, and a parent, both looking to connect.

Something about the way music brings the motion to life. The way the sounds make a car feel like a private place, where conversations can begin. The way music and motion make silence between people, comfortable.

In our car, the kids pick the music. One of them recently told us they were in a friend’s car and had to listen to their parents’ music. They wouldn’t believe him when he told them how things work in our car. As a parent, when the right song comes on, all of a sudden you can be learning all about your child. You’re talking about the hard stuff, and the good stuff. Or, like a fly on the wall, you hear them speaking to one another or their friends—the music providing a blanket over your presence, like magic.

Classical music is long drives with my mom, tapping her finger on the steering wheel.

Country is my sister, on a road trip unfortunately timed to correspond with the height of Billy Ray Cyrus’s fame.

Barenaked Ladies is a first date, on the way to a movie.

It’s a mixtape you spent hours crafting, only to have it get stuck in the tape deck.

It’s camp songs on bus rides, and Ani DiFranco cross-country, late at night, across the plains.

Broadway is hours of Hamilton and The Book of Mormon on the way to school, until we know every line by heart.

Hip hop is the music they play for us, as we calmly explain that yes, we know who Kendrick Lamar is.

Coldplay is New York City, because it was playing in the taxi the first time I ever saw the skyline, and now that’s how the city sounds: like “Yellow,” and traffic speeding past and my heart beating with excitement.

The car is the sanctuary, the music a soundtrack for the escape. Freedom to go, physically and emotionally. To travel, to get away from whatever is, and move into whatever can be.

Alison and Scott Stratten are co-authors of five best- selling business books, co-owners of UnMarketing Inc., and co-hosts of not only the UnPodcast but also of five children, two dogs, and two cats. They have advised companies that include PepsiCo, Saks Fifth Avenue, IBM, Cirque du Soleil, and Microsoft.