Bringing Home Bow Wow

I said Lil’ Bow Wow

You just don’t know

The way you move so fast

Across the floor

I mean you run through my mind

Like all the time

To the point that I just wanna take ya home

These lyrics, the chorus for “Take Ya Home,” epitomize my preteen lust for Lil’ Bow Wow. I became a fan when he released his debut album, Beware of Dog, a couple years prior to this track, in 2000.

I was 11 and proudly owned a burned copy kept in a CD case with a black-and-white photocopy of the album cover. At lunchtime, I played it for the girls at my small private school. They had all seen the music video for his hit song “Bounce with Me” on TV. When his second album, Doggy Bag, was released, I bought the CD, thus solidifying my fandom.

A slew of Lil rappers gained popularity in the early 2000s and Lil’ Bow Wow, born Shad Moss, was, in my opinion, the best, and the only one who is recognizable today. Some of my female classmates would claim that other young artists like Lil’ Romeo or Sammy were better, but to us, the worst offense was claiming to have the same crush as another girl, because we were very possessive with our crushes.

Knowing more about him than anybody in my circle gave me significant claim as his betrothed. I wasn’t just obsessed with his music, I was convinced that I would marry Shad Gregory Moss. I loved the way his name matched his silky smooth confidence.

He had a swagger that intoxicated me. He kept his hair long and neatly braided. His light brown eyes lit up his symmetrical and androgynous face. He was criticized for being short, but height was never an issue for me.

I paid tribute to my love a few different ways. My password for the library computer was “ShadGM.” I had a fan book, called The Lil’Bow Wow Scrapbook. It detailed his 14 years of life at that point and I sketched one of the photos of him. The only thing that would have made this sketch better was if I signed it “Amani Ali-Moss.”

I filled pages and pages with my adopted signature: Amani Moss or Amani Ali-Moss. I tried both not to be progressive, but truthfully because I wasn’t sure if my first name went with his last name. Nevertheless, I spent hours practicing both signatures. I took the time to sign his name as well. Using his name made me feel close to him. Thinking back, it never occurred to me to have him take my last name.

It was after the release of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl in 2003 when my crush on Bow Wow began to wane. Now I was eyeing a broodingly gorgeous Orlando Bloom acting as Will Turner. His accent, his wavy hair and his bravery on screen grabbed me- and just like that it was on to the next. My magazine clippings of Bow Wow gave way to Orlando Bloom.

Over the years, Shad has simultaneously tried to reinvent himself by dropping “Lil,” and later dropping his stage name altogether, while trying to convince us that he is still relevant on a couple of occasions.

His shams sparked #bowwowchallenge which, as editor Nick Bailey put it, “involves users posting a pair of images side-by-side, with the first seemingly a glamorous representation of their life and the second image depicting the harsh reality.”

Bow Wow began acting shortly after gaining fame as a rapper. Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift, released in 2005, was the last time I followed his career. Like many child stars (Bow Wow started performing as a toddler) he couldn’t shake his childhood persona, but it seemed like, in desperate times, he tried to fall back on the person he once was. The swagger that I once swooned over now stinks of desperation and I no longer want to take him home.