Eventually I married my roommate’s boyfriend, and we had kids, and to no one’s surprise those kids are huge 311 fans too. When Connor was a newborn, he cried every night from about 7:00-8:00. The only things that would settle him down were if I carried him around outside, or if we played Creatures by 311 really loudly and danced while holding him.
Last year, the 311 Day concert was held in Memphis (March 11- get it?). I had a ticket, and insisted I was going despite being 38.5 weeks pregnant. Unfortunately, I had a dramatic spike in my blood pressure that morning, and after spending the day at the hospital was allowed to go home only if I promised to rest until my c-section appointment that Thursday. I sent Chip to the concert without me and spent the night at home crying. Fortunately, HDNet was on hand to film that concert for me. (Still not the same as being there!) We recorded it when it aired, and Connor was thrilled. Lately he’s been wanting to watch the concert daily. He likes the songs where “everybody jumps!” and the ones that “rock it out!”
This week at his school is rock star week, where he is supposed to dress like his favorite rock stars and bring their CD to school. And here’s where the problem lies. This band is not at all preschool-friendly. Their audience is mostly stoners (which we aren’t, and never were, but we like them anyway) and the lyrics to the songs talk sometimes about smoking pot and often have bad words. Connor hasn’t noticed any of that, because in his mind “butt” is the only real bad word. In fact, he can point out the song lyric when they say “knock you on your butt,” but has never once taken notice of an f-bomb. I don’t know how I’m going to break the news to him that he can’t take any of their CDs to school this week. I am certainly not going to tell him why. I’m prepared to discuss bad words when the time comes, but there is no way I’m going to point them out to him. In the meantime I’ll send him to school with a Death Cab for Cutie CD and be thankful that he’s not into gangsta rap. Yet.
2 comments:
I spent an afternoon making the world's only kid-friendly Prince mix CD. From 25 years of collected works, I managed to pull exactly 40 minutes of child-appropriate music.
We ended up making a mixed CD with a few of his favorite songs- only one 311 song made the cut, but nothing by "Handsome Prince." As always, Shake Your Booty by KC and the Sunshine Band was the headliner.
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