(no subject)
Short story I had to write for...writing...class...
I remember the first time I defied my parents. Or rather, the first time I failed at defying my parents. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and although my memory tries to place it in my first year of college, I know for a fact it was had to be the second. It had to be the second year because Kyle and I were in a relationship, and although we knew each other my first year at Ferris State, we weren’t together yet. That weekend I was supposed to go see Blind Guardian in Detroit with Kyle and his brother. I had told my mom at least a hundred times on the phone, “I’ll be leaving on Saturday to go to Detroit with Kyle” and she had no objections until I was mentioning it to her in person.
“I didn’t say you could go.” I just kind of stared at her, quietly. She could have objected much earlier, as opposed to seventy-two hours before the event, but for one odd reason or another, she chose now to intervene. “But Mom, I already told you-“
“Where will you put your things? Like your laptop?”
“Kyle’s friend Jeremy, his mom lives in Detroit, I can leave it-“
“You can’t leave all your stuff in that poor woman’s house!”
“I can leave some in the car-“
“What if your things get stolen?”
“Mom, it’s not going to-“
“Do you want to hear what you sound like?” It was at that point that she decided mimicking me would help the situation, and the argument was lost in an explosion of frustration. At the time I could not believe how she could have disrespected me so much. You think I would get used to it eventually, but I always ended up forgetting how little pull I had back then.
Kyle and I were so aggravated by that event, but he still kind of got me a present. “I got you something from the concert” he said, pulling out a silver ball-chain from his backpack. Dangling on the end of the chain was a metal dog tag with the band’s name scrawled on it. “Now, you can have this” he then reached for the tag hanging around his neck “or you can have my Sonata Arctica necklace.”
This necklace was originally a giant billboard that said “yes Kyle and myself were engaging in make-outs earlier this afternoon”. I liked to steal it from him and wear it as a good-luck charm. I always found it humorous when I’d catch myself fidgeting with it, because being a Catholic; I always thought it felt like an activity more suited for a rosary. Originally it meant no more to me then any other item of Kyle’s, but I do recall how Kyle got it. It was January; the second semester of my first year, and Kyle had just broken up with his high school girlfriend. I was afraid he’d want to start dating me next, but was relieved to find out that he was happy being alone for a bit. Instead he was more infatuated about seeing his favorite band.
He and his brother had made the trek down to “Harpo’s”, a bar-slash-concert venue in Detroit. Kyle was so excited; this was his first time seeing them live. They had come all the way from Finland to tour across North America. “They played Broken, and the Cage, and I swear, Tony pointed right at me during 8th Commandment!” It feels really weird recalling the songs he had mentioned, because they meant nothing to me then but they’re as familiar as hymnals now (although sung much more enthusiastically). Kyle slowly leaked bits and pieces over our nightly chats on IM, but I inherited the band’s entire discography the minute I started dating him.
I didn’t listen to them much at first. In fact, my darkest secret is how I got into them. I was watching the Gilmore Girls out of boredom over the summer, and Rory’s mom had said something that made me laugh so hard. Rory was talking about how a boy crashed a party and got into a fight with someone over her, and her mother took her arm and started singing, “Did you ever know that you’re my heeeroooo?!” I practically fell out of my chair! I never laugh at the Gilmore Girls, so I was greatly surprised about my amusement in this. Forgetting the rest of the song, I grabbed my laptop to look up the lyrics online. There, for the first couple of entries on Google, it read “WIND BENEATH MY WINGS: LYRICS - SONATA ARCTICA”. Apparently Sonata had done a cover of this song earlier. Now, rechecking my work I realize that the only credit that shows up now is “Bette Midler”, so obviously the gods were working in my favor that day. And, as a side note; the Sonata Arctica cover is actually quite good.
From there I slowly started to listen to them more often, and before the summer had even ended I had really gotten into the band. When I got back to school, Kyle excitedly dragged me to his new apartment, saying he had something to show me. Evidently, Sonata Arctica had made a live album while they were in Japan, and Kyle had wanted to show me their DVD so badly. He put the disc into the computer, and sat me down on one of the hard, plastic chairs that had come with the room. Twenty minutes into it I was at the edge of my seat. I had never seen any part of the band live before and, I had no idea how lively they were. Seriously! The songs they sang were often dark and dismal, and filled with anger or sadness, but they played them with such enthusiasm. Their vocalist Tony was so thrilled! He was practically bouncing up and down on stage. That’s when I understood why Kyle loved this band so much, and why he was so excited about the concert he had seen. But I didn’t get to truly share his experience until a year later.
Metal concerts are almost like a religious pilgrimage to me. I’m being specific because the preparations for other concerts I’ve seen are brief in comparison. But for Sonata Arctica, I had to get dressed up, pack an extra night bag and figure out what I needed a purse for and what I could keep on my person. For this event I finally got to wear my pants with the chains on them in a proper venue, as they jangled cheerfully as I walked. As an added bonus, I decided to bake cookies for what I thought would be the trip, with the band’s insignia on them. It’s over a two-hour drive to Detroit, but it didn’t feel that taxing. Kyle and I were going with Whitney and Jeremy, and then we’d meet up with Kyle’s brother Sean and his friends. As we got closer to Detroit the streets became steadily perilous, until I finally saw Harpo’s; it looked like a chunk of history sitting beside the rundown buildings.
When we finally went inside I never felt safer. You can’t get this kind of feeling from a church unless it was your wedding. It made me wonder why my mother was so cautious about this before. We quickly spotted Sean and talked about how excited we all were, and how much their last album sucked but it’s okay, since they only play a few songs off of it anyways. And we weren’t there just to hear the new album. We were there for the band itself.
Kyle led me into the pit and there had to be four opening acts. He hung on to me as we endured, and before long we heard the closing lyrics from “Call to Odin”, a song by a semi-local band called Miles Beyond. Suddenly the lights went down and you could here the band’s intro being played over the sound system. As their new guitarist Elias approached the stage my anticipation started to build, and I lost all composure when I finally saw Tony up front.
The concert was phenomenal. Kyle and myself could not stop singing and jumping around. But at one slow point, as we swayed back and forth to the timing of the music, I felt a sense of sadness in the back of my head. I had remembered learning about all these Christian concerts and bands, and how the music made you “feel in tune with God”. And I realized, their God or any god wasn’t really there. They had taken the euphoria and tacked a religious explanation on it, instead of letting the spectacle just be a spectacle. A god might have been the inspiration, but God wasn’t the one up there, playing the notes and singing the lyrics. And to tack a religious label on it only robs the moment of its unique nature.
After the concert, one of my friends had excitedly mentioned that you could meet the band if you waited around the buses long enough. Kyle quickly made me grab my cookies and wait for them. Seconds felt like hours as the crowd around us grew, few people rushing to their cars just to leave. Finally their drummer Tommy came outside with Tony trailing behind him. Tony explained to the crowd they’d be right back when suddenly, without my consent, Whitney pointed at me and shouted “BUT SHE MADE YOU COOKIES!” I could have died and been reborn right there.
Eventually the whole band came out, signing autographs as everyone was bombarding them with questions. I just kind of stood there, gawking. I mean, what do you say to someone who you listen to so regularly? Someone so integrated into your life you hardly think of him or her as a person? Someone you regard as so much higher than you are? Actually it doesn’t really matter because the minute you meet them, your mind goes completely blank anyways.
Tony stood in front of me and I blurted out “I MADE YOU COOKIES” and proceeded to hand him the Tupperware-knock-off that contained them. He thanked me graciously as my friends proceeded to interrupt with “You have to open it! You have to see the cookies!”
“Oh! They have the little A’s on them!”
“I ALSO DREW YOU THIS.” I handed him an inked sketch I had done. I wanted to color it or something, but with classes and preparations I had run out of time.
“Aww! It’s me!” the fact that he recognized himself immediately had thrilled me. It was a grossly exaggerated, cartoonish version of him with little devil wings, something that usually graced my notebook an unhealthy number of times.
“Would you sign it for me?” I almost collapsed. “You’re very talented. And modest.” The last comment was directed towards the fact that I couldn’t formulate sentences at this point. I quickly signed my name at the bottom as Kyle held the paper (“I can hardly write!” “I can hardly hold this up!”) and gave him back the drawing. Tony and I stared at each other for an awkward moment and I realized; we both had run out of things to say. He was as flabbergasted as I was. I know it sounds improbable, but he’s about as shy as me.
“Do you want me to sign your ticket?”
When it comes to “coming of age” or “religious experiences”, or meeting your hero for that matter, it becomes infinitely more special when that moment exceeds your expectations. Seeing how excited I was going into the endeavor, I am insanely happy to have my expectations shattered anyways. And as odd as it sounds, there’s a strange comfort in finding out that the person you look up to so much is just as self-conscious as you are. Because seriously. Tony’s kind of awesome. Someone needs to tell him that.
***
KAREN. DO NO WRITE SHIT AT 3 IN THE MORNING. IT IS EXHAUSTING.
Also? 2,000 words. Ow.
I remember the first time I defied my parents. Or rather, the first time I failed at defying my parents. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and although my memory tries to place it in my first year of college, I know for a fact it was had to be the second. It had to be the second year because Kyle and I were in a relationship, and although we knew each other my first year at Ferris State, we weren’t together yet. That weekend I was supposed to go see Blind Guardian in Detroit with Kyle and his brother. I had told my mom at least a hundred times on the phone, “I’ll be leaving on Saturday to go to Detroit with Kyle” and she had no objections until I was mentioning it to her in person.
“I didn’t say you could go.” I just kind of stared at her, quietly. She could have objected much earlier, as opposed to seventy-two hours before the event, but for one odd reason or another, she chose now to intervene. “But Mom, I already told you-“
“Where will you put your things? Like your laptop?”
“Kyle’s friend Jeremy, his mom lives in Detroit, I can leave it-“
“You can’t leave all your stuff in that poor woman’s house!”
“I can leave some in the car-“
“What if your things get stolen?”
“Mom, it’s not going to-“
“Do you want to hear what you sound like?” It was at that point that she decided mimicking me would help the situation, and the argument was lost in an explosion of frustration. At the time I could not believe how she could have disrespected me so much. You think I would get used to it eventually, but I always ended up forgetting how little pull I had back then.
Kyle and I were so aggravated by that event, but he still kind of got me a present. “I got you something from the concert” he said, pulling out a silver ball-chain from his backpack. Dangling on the end of the chain was a metal dog tag with the band’s name scrawled on it. “Now, you can have this” he then reached for the tag hanging around his neck “or you can have my Sonata Arctica necklace.”
This necklace was originally a giant billboard that said “yes Kyle and myself were engaging in make-outs earlier this afternoon”. I liked to steal it from him and wear it as a good-luck charm. I always found it humorous when I’d catch myself fidgeting with it, because being a Catholic; I always thought it felt like an activity more suited for a rosary. Originally it meant no more to me then any other item of Kyle’s, but I do recall how Kyle got it. It was January; the second semester of my first year, and Kyle had just broken up with his high school girlfriend. I was afraid he’d want to start dating me next, but was relieved to find out that he was happy being alone for a bit. Instead he was more infatuated about seeing his favorite band.
He and his brother had made the trek down to “Harpo’s”, a bar-slash-concert venue in Detroit. Kyle was so excited; this was his first time seeing them live. They had come all the way from Finland to tour across North America. “They played Broken, and the Cage, and I swear, Tony pointed right at me during 8th Commandment!” It feels really weird recalling the songs he had mentioned, because they meant nothing to me then but they’re as familiar as hymnals now (although sung much more enthusiastically). Kyle slowly leaked bits and pieces over our nightly chats on IM, but I inherited the band’s entire discography the minute I started dating him.
I didn’t listen to them much at first. In fact, my darkest secret is how I got into them. I was watching the Gilmore Girls out of boredom over the summer, and Rory’s mom had said something that made me laugh so hard. Rory was talking about how a boy crashed a party and got into a fight with someone over her, and her mother took her arm and started singing, “Did you ever know that you’re my heeeroooo?!” I practically fell out of my chair! I never laugh at the Gilmore Girls, so I was greatly surprised about my amusement in this. Forgetting the rest of the song, I grabbed my laptop to look up the lyrics online. There, for the first couple of entries on Google, it read “WIND BENEATH MY WINGS: LYRICS - SONATA ARCTICA”. Apparently Sonata had done a cover of this song earlier. Now, rechecking my work I realize that the only credit that shows up now is “Bette Midler”, so obviously the gods were working in my favor that day. And, as a side note; the Sonata Arctica cover is actually quite good.
From there I slowly started to listen to them more often, and before the summer had even ended I had really gotten into the band. When I got back to school, Kyle excitedly dragged me to his new apartment, saying he had something to show me. Evidently, Sonata Arctica had made a live album while they were in Japan, and Kyle had wanted to show me their DVD so badly. He put the disc into the computer, and sat me down on one of the hard, plastic chairs that had come with the room. Twenty minutes into it I was at the edge of my seat. I had never seen any part of the band live before and, I had no idea how lively they were. Seriously! The songs they sang were often dark and dismal, and filled with anger or sadness, but they played them with such enthusiasm. Their vocalist Tony was so thrilled! He was practically bouncing up and down on stage. That’s when I understood why Kyle loved this band so much, and why he was so excited about the concert he had seen. But I didn’t get to truly share his experience until a year later.
Metal concerts are almost like a religious pilgrimage to me. I’m being specific because the preparations for other concerts I’ve seen are brief in comparison. But for Sonata Arctica, I had to get dressed up, pack an extra night bag and figure out what I needed a purse for and what I could keep on my person. For this event I finally got to wear my pants with the chains on them in a proper venue, as they jangled cheerfully as I walked. As an added bonus, I decided to bake cookies for what I thought would be the trip, with the band’s insignia on them. It’s over a two-hour drive to Detroit, but it didn’t feel that taxing. Kyle and I were going with Whitney and Jeremy, and then we’d meet up with Kyle’s brother Sean and his friends. As we got closer to Detroit the streets became steadily perilous, until I finally saw Harpo’s; it looked like a chunk of history sitting beside the rundown buildings.
When we finally went inside I never felt safer. You can’t get this kind of feeling from a church unless it was your wedding. It made me wonder why my mother was so cautious about this before. We quickly spotted Sean and talked about how excited we all were, and how much their last album sucked but it’s okay, since they only play a few songs off of it anyways. And we weren’t there just to hear the new album. We were there for the band itself.
Kyle led me into the pit and there had to be four opening acts. He hung on to me as we endured, and before long we heard the closing lyrics from “Call to Odin”, a song by a semi-local band called Miles Beyond. Suddenly the lights went down and you could here the band’s intro being played over the sound system. As their new guitarist Elias approached the stage my anticipation started to build, and I lost all composure when I finally saw Tony up front.
The concert was phenomenal. Kyle and myself could not stop singing and jumping around. But at one slow point, as we swayed back and forth to the timing of the music, I felt a sense of sadness in the back of my head. I had remembered learning about all these Christian concerts and bands, and how the music made you “feel in tune with God”. And I realized, their God or any god wasn’t really there. They had taken the euphoria and tacked a religious explanation on it, instead of letting the spectacle just be a spectacle. A god might have been the inspiration, but God wasn’t the one up there, playing the notes and singing the lyrics. And to tack a religious label on it only robs the moment of its unique nature.
After the concert, one of my friends had excitedly mentioned that you could meet the band if you waited around the buses long enough. Kyle quickly made me grab my cookies and wait for them. Seconds felt like hours as the crowd around us grew, few people rushing to their cars just to leave. Finally their drummer Tommy came outside with Tony trailing behind him. Tony explained to the crowd they’d be right back when suddenly, without my consent, Whitney pointed at me and shouted “BUT SHE MADE YOU COOKIES!” I could have died and been reborn right there.
Eventually the whole band came out, signing autographs as everyone was bombarding them with questions. I just kind of stood there, gawking. I mean, what do you say to someone who you listen to so regularly? Someone so integrated into your life you hardly think of him or her as a person? Someone you regard as so much higher than you are? Actually it doesn’t really matter because the minute you meet them, your mind goes completely blank anyways.
Tony stood in front of me and I blurted out “I MADE YOU COOKIES” and proceeded to hand him the Tupperware-knock-off that contained them. He thanked me graciously as my friends proceeded to interrupt with “You have to open it! You have to see the cookies!”
“Oh! They have the little A’s on them!”
“I ALSO DREW YOU THIS.” I handed him an inked sketch I had done. I wanted to color it or something, but with classes and preparations I had run out of time.
“Aww! It’s me!” the fact that he recognized himself immediately had thrilled me. It was a grossly exaggerated, cartoonish version of him with little devil wings, something that usually graced my notebook an unhealthy number of times.
“Would you sign it for me?” I almost collapsed. “You’re very talented. And modest.” The last comment was directed towards the fact that I couldn’t formulate sentences at this point. I quickly signed my name at the bottom as Kyle held the paper (“I can hardly write!” “I can hardly hold this up!”) and gave him back the drawing. Tony and I stared at each other for an awkward moment and I realized; we both had run out of things to say. He was as flabbergasted as I was. I know it sounds improbable, but he’s about as shy as me.
“Do you want me to sign your ticket?”
When it comes to “coming of age” or “religious experiences”, or meeting your hero for that matter, it becomes infinitely more special when that moment exceeds your expectations. Seeing how excited I was going into the endeavor, I am insanely happy to have my expectations shattered anyways. And as odd as it sounds, there’s a strange comfort in finding out that the person you look up to so much is just as self-conscious as you are. Because seriously. Tony’s kind of awesome. Someone needs to tell him that.
***
KAREN. DO NO WRITE SHIT AT 3 IN THE MORNING. IT IS EXHAUSTING.
Also? 2,000 words. Ow.