Future girlfriend? Check. Future career? Check. Future rehab clinic? Currently scoping out the options...

Last Wednesday night, Rob and I escaped the house sans Milo to go see our friend Luke Doucet play his phenomenal brand of alt-pop rock 'n roll at Richard's on Richards, a bar in downtown Vancouver.

(A thousand thanks to Milo's Grammy and Grampy for cheerfully agreeing to babysit. I love Milo to death and all that, but still, sometimes it's nice to hang out with the big kids in a place where babies aren't allowed, even if it is Dick's on Dicks.)

Luke rocked the house, as usual. He's one of those uber-talented people that makes you want to bang your head against the wall until it bleeds, because his consummate skill with his chosen instrument of expression (read: geetar) is so transcendant that it makes the artistic attempts of us mere mortals seem like feeble kazoo squawks in comparison.

When Luke's not touring the world promoting his music, he can often be seen onstage alongside of Sarah McLachlan. He's been the lead guitarist for most of her live shows for over a decade now.

Personally, I've never been particularly drawn in by Sarah's music, but I've got to say this for her: the woman has taste. In guitarists, at least.

Yes, Luke is that good. Kind of makes you sick to see so much talent packed into "136 wet dog pounds of skinny white boy," to quote the man himself.

So you can imagine the audience's surprise last Wednesday when Luke was totally eclipsed by a guest singer he'd invited onstage for the last song of his set. For the duration of that song, everyone forgot about Luke. All eyes were fixed on the pint-sized performer on the stage beside him: his nine-year-old daughter, Chloe Winkelman Doucet.

When Luke introduced Chloe and she first bounced up onstage, the audience was clearly charmed. She's a tiny little bird of a girl who looks just like her dad, and she was clearly thrilled to be onstage in front of a crowd of hollering concert-goers.

Scanning the crowd, I saw that most people were smiling indulgently at her. "Aw, how cute," is probably what they were thinking.

Then she opened her mouth and began to sing, and all those indulgent smiles widened into egg-shaped O's . The sound of jaws hitting concrete might have been audible, had it not been drowned out by the far more impressive sound of Chloe belting out the opening verses of Tom Waits' "Gun Street Girl."

That little girl's got pipes, I tell you. Already, at the tender age of nine, she can sing circles around all those vacuous over-produced bubblegum pop stars that usually tend to dominate the music charts.

Hardly surprising, when you consider the fact that her dad's a rock star and her mom, Tallulah Winkelman, is herself a talented actress. Ever since Chloe was born, everyone around her has been counting the days until she takes center stage in her own right. Clearly that day is not long in coming.

And so, as I watched Chloe upstage her own father and wildly surpass all of her biggest fans' expectations, only one thought dominated my mind: "Oh, sh*t. Sh*t. Sh*t. Sh*t. Sh*t. Sh*t."

Just a couple of months ago, when Chloe was telling me about a band that she and some of her friends were putting together, I jokingly made her promise that as soon as he was old enough, Milo could become a member of her band as well.

"Sure!" she cheerfully agreed. "He can play the drums! And when I'm 21 and he's 13, he can go on tour with me."

Suddenly, that proposition doesn't seem nearly as far-fetched as it did back at the end of summer. Chloe's definitely going places, and I can all too easily see Milo wanting to hitch on to her star and go along for the ride.

He's already showing a definite ear for music. He wiggles and squeals when I play my djembe for him and he watches Rob with wide-eyed amazement when he sings and plays guitar. We've got no shortage of musical instruments in this house, and Rob and I are going to do our very best to encourage Milo to learn how to play every single one of them.

And so, against my better judgment, when he turns 13, I'm going to remind Chloe of the promise she made. I feel I owe it to my son. I mean, wouldn't nearly ALL teenagers kill to travel the country with a rock band fronted by pretty girl with a wicked voice?

Lord knows I would have. That was my dream growing up. Of course, in my dreams, I was the pretty girl with the wicked voice. But alas, the Fates decreed otherwise, and so I leave it to my son to do what he can to fulfill my unrealized dreams for me. Damnit, if Joanie Cunningham couldn't go on tour with Leather Tuscadero, and if I couldn't sing backup vocals for Bon Jovi (who, now that I think of it, has borne a marked resemblance to both Tuscadero sisters at different points in his career) , then I swear by all that's good in the world, Milo's going on tour with Chloe!!! Just you wait and see if he doesn't!

And yet I can't seem to shake the fear that some day in the not-so-terribly-distant future, I'm going to be calling up the Betty Ford Clinic to ask if they have a cot available for a washed-up, strung-out 13-year-old drummer boy.

He heard the siren sweetly singing...