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I just spent the last hour writing about a former love of mine...

hardcore rap.

I wasn't really able to come up with a conclusion or a redemptive ending, so I gave up. In my attempt to not always write with perfection or even with point, I think I am going to post it as is and leave it at that. Maybe it's because I'm still learning and the story's not over yet, but I don't feel the need to explain myself any further.
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When I was younger I had an obsession with hardcore rap.

While I am a die hard Tupac fan, still to this day...


my favorite group was undoubtedly the Wu-Tang Clan, the most revolutionary rap group of the mid-'90s. Based in New York City, the clan of nine was "designed to overtake the record industry." As their website puts it, "the idea was to establish the Wu-Tang as a force with their debut album and then spin off into as many side projects as possible." Most of the members of the Wu were just as well known individually as they were within the clan.

Let me say upfront that I am not promoting their music, I can just hear a thousand mothers contacting me right now asking what in the world possessed me to recommend the Wu-Tang Clan to their children. Therefore, let it be said I am not promoting or recommending... I am telling a story. Consider this your warning... part of this story involves explicit content... most of which is the lyrical content by the Wu-Tang Clan.

This is a true story about a 10th grade white girl who fell in love with a hardcore rap group.

Sometimes the truth is offensive.

I grew up in the South, you know... "we'll rise again, this time we'll win," the people who never got over losing the civil war. My dad was a preacher and my mom, a Sunday School teacher (there's potential for a rap in there somewhere). I was raised to say "yes ma'am" and "yes sir." I went to cotillion to learn about manners and how to butter bread properly. I was trained well in Scripture... Jesus = good. Devil = Bad. By all appearances, I was a good kid.

Now, in my opinion, I actually was a good kid (for the most part), but I say "by all appearances" because if people had known the type of music I was listening to, they would have laid hands on me and prayed the demons out (that is, if Baptists laid hands... I'm pretty sure they don't even raise hands).

I don't even know how it happened... I went from singing "Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world" to "shame on a nigga who try to run game on a nigga. Wu buck wild with the trigger!"

Don't get me wrong, I still loved Jesus, but by 10th grade, I had completely entered the Wu.

Having grown up a preacher's kid, I feel the need to clarify... sometimes parents, teachers, Sunday schools and childrens books can do the absolute best they can to mold a child into an "upstanding citizen" or a "good Christian," but when it comes down to it, the child grows up and makes his/her own choices.

I was taught to hate the devil (including the devil's music), but I still ended up not only listening to, but loving music that I wouldn't exactly call "Jesus music."

I think part of what I loved about the music is the freedom I felt when I listened to it. People expect the preacher's kid to have the best manners and their bible verses memorized. What people don't expect is for the preacher's kid to own a CD labeled "parent advisory: explicit content" and know every word to every "song."

Looking back, maybe it was just a form of rebellion... not so much against my parents, but against the church. I felt so much pressure from the church community to live up to certain standards that I jumped at any opportunity to prove that I was just like any other kid.

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I don't know why, but I couldn't finish writing. I intended on writing about my transformation from rebellious kid to responsible adult, all the while making my parents oh so proud, but I just couldn't finish. Maybe its because it didn't feel quite right to say that I don't listen to the Wu-Tang Clan anymore, which I don't, very often.

While a significant transformation has taken place in my life, I think it honestly didn't feel quite right to end my writing with rebellion being a thing of the past.


As long as I live in my skin, I am prone to rebellion. I still desire it. I still seek it. I still do it.


I am a sinner, in need of a savior.


Father, forgive those who know not what they do... and forgive me, for I know what I do and do it anyway.


I am a sinner, in need of You.