Today at Target, while walking past the CD section, I caught a gander at something that made me freeze in my tracks.

It was some sort of “Dancing to the 80’s” or “Clubbing to the 80’s” or “Bubble Gum 80’s” kind of CD display.

I am such a dork. I totally spaz out whenever I see these. Of course I HAD to look at the different compilation CD’s and check out which had what songs. I have about 5 or 6 of these CD’s. They actually make great workout music — especially when you need to put in some serious quality time on a treadmill or elliptical trainer because you, oh I don’t know, ate a ginormous DQ Blizzard for lunch.

So I picked up a CD and immediately noticed a song that catapulted me back to 1986.

One sunny day, on our way to the orthodontist, I begged “The General” (aka my mother who was the most nervous, easily excitable person on the planet) to let me listen to MY music. She relented. A minor miracle! I knew hard rock would be out of the question so I chose a soft rock station — Y98. A great tune was playing. The sun was shining. And I was smiling my stupid smile of disbelief/good fortune. “Hey”, I thought. “Maybe my mom is just a wee bit cool afterall.”

And all of a sudden, a certain song came on that went a little like this:

“Not a word. From your lips. You just took for granted that I’d like to skinny dip. I quick hit. That’s your game. But I’m not a piece of meat. Stimulate my brain….”

The refrain? “We don’t have to take our clothes off. To have a good time. Oh No. We could dance and party. All night. And drink some cherry wine. Uh huh.”

My mom lost all sense of reasoning and composure. She couldn’t turn the radio off fast enough. The woman was angry, flustered, and bewildered — sort of like a cat would be if after cuddling it for an hour, you grabbed it by the neck and dipped it into a vat of tar. (I like cats and would never do this. I’m just hypothesizing here.)

Her reply? “Humph. That is JUST horrible! I can’t believe what they play on the radio these days. Stupid crap!”

This was as close to a “sex talk” as my mom had ever had with me.

I knew trying to reason with her was of no use. Even if I would have said what I was thinking which was, “Mom, I’m 13. Although I wish some boy thought I was pretty, I’m still kinda scared of them. Do you really think I’m so lamebrained that this song is going to make me want to get drunk and have sex?” I slunk back into the seat while she put HER music back on — country music of the 80’s era.

So today when that memory flooded over me, I had to laugh. I dumped the CD into my cart. Once I got into the car, I tore off the wrapper, played the song, and laughed about my mom some more.

I’m so happy to be a grown up.