Topic 1 Week Nine

I am old enough to remember the back lash that Pearl Jam had after the Columbine Shooting—a complete unjust to Pearl Jam and their music. I remember the outrage when after Eminem dropped his first album. Looking back at Eminem’s first videos through mature adult eyes, I see nothing less than comedic entertainment by a talented rapper. However, neither one of these widely known controversies ever affected me. It is probably because my mom was awesome and is the one who introduced me to Pearl Jam, and danced to Eminem while cleaning. In my step grandmother's eyes, I crossed the line with Creed, P.O.D, Skillet, and Linkin Park.

My step-Grandmother was a very religious woman. We watched the 700 Club every day followed by Bible stories, daily verse, and prayer. When I introduced my step sister to Christian Rock music, my Nana lost her mind! To her rock music was ‘devil’ music. That summer was the worse summer I from my childhood—granted I was in summer school did not help the situation. Nana already looked down on me for being in summer school and not Seventh Day Adventist. She went out of her way to pray in front of all of my cousins for my heathen ways. Her extent of openly belittling me caused me to call home crying on a nightly basis. My mother ended up driving 13 hours to set this woman in her place.

My mother beautifully handled the situation. She hand wrote the lyrics in her flawless bubbly cursive on pretty stationary--the first being Alive by P.O.D. Nana enjoyed reading these poems. After my mom explained them more to her, she saw the connection to the Lord. She then carried on complementing the writers in how they honored Jesus, and what a great way to spread 'the word'. The epic part was seeing her face of embarrassment after my mom played her the songs, and she realized what she had read the lyrics to my heathen music and not poems. Needless to say, she finally began to smile at me more and stopped publicly praying for me, but never offered any hint of an apology. There were lessons learned by all involved in the situation.

I am a lover of all music, thus it is hard to pick one genre to say is my favorite. Currently, I am finding myself in an alternative rock mood--probably because I am thinking of this event from my past. However, I listen to everything from Irish Bagpipe instrumental, to Salt and Pepper, to Marshmello, and Metallica. I am a sucker for bumping bass and guitar solos.  I like a lot of 90's Alternative rock. My all time must have artists on my mixtape would be, Pearl Jam, Linkin Park, Alanis Morrissette--my husband calls it "angry vagina music", Steve Miller Band, and In This Moment.