Mother Censor in the hizz-ouse

I am not a prude.

Of course, anyone who starts a sentence with this statement will, in fact, BE a prude.

But I'm not. Truly.

I am a lover of the hip hop and rap music, from back in the dayz of when more people knew about Chuck D instead of Flavor Flav. I HAVE the original NWA CASSETTE.  Come on. That's Hard core. OG Gangsta rap on CASSETTE!! And I lived in VERMONT at the time. Do you know how hard it was to get rap music in Vermont?

So, my love of the Busta Rhymes and Dr. Dre notwithstanding,  I do have the wherewithal to edit some of my more adventurous musical tastes when in the presence of my daughter.  Cripes, I even turned off "Like a Virgin" recently because I saw the question coming and I frankly did not have the ovarian fortitude to delve into that tidbit of vocabulary.

I will fast forward songs in my ipod if we are in the car...anything overtly sexual, anything with ALOT of swearing, anything in which the lyrics invite creepy pervs to "If you seek-ay" my daughter. I'm not looking to break out the mandolin and row Micheal and his boat ashore, BUT....a little discretion.

As a segue to this tale of non-prudery, our daughters school has an end of year picnic and welcome to new families every June.

Can YOU see where this is going?

Because I was not prepared for the DJ the school committee had hired to start his set off with "You spin my head right round, when you go down, when you go downtown". Nor was I any more prepared for the exhortation regarding ones wish that "Your girlfriend was a Freak like me" or Snoops wish for me to "Drop it likes its Hot".

I sat on my blanket in the park, staring in middle aged parental horror as children aged 5-13 danced around.  As I desperately hoped that each new song would tone it down, I frantically looked around for consternation on SOMEONE elses face.  Nope.

It was at 50 cent's declaration of simply "having sex, I'm not into making love" that I stood and folded my blanket.

Really?  Had I known it was THIS type of picnic, I would have worn the bustier and fishnets...but I thought we were welcoming the incoming families..not holding stripper auditions.

Finding Em, I announced it was time to head home. She continued to dance next to me, oblivious of what the words in the songs meant.

I felt, and still feel, old after this. Have I become that mother? Have I become the Censor, measuring hemlines, or how far apart a couple is during a dance? Am I alone in this? And where do we draw a line?

Original post to Canada Moms Blog. Dawn also blog at "I am Doing the Best I can", and "True Wife Confessions"