Elivis in Blood

At some point in my life I crossed the line.  When it was, how it happened, I don't know.  The line was as blurry as my memory of breakfast last month.   Every generation has experienced this feeling because music is effectively a time stamp on our minds.  For whatever reason the teenage years are the most susceptible to this impression. I don't think there is a human alive that can't close their eyes and think of a song that was once playing on the radio or archived on an LP or a cassette tape.  Of course both of these terms alone are a generational divide.  Even before our very eyes the CD is giving way to the .mp3.

Perhaps it is a result of a fundamental resistance to change but each successive generation has also despised some new music just as the one before it did.  From Duke Ellington to swing.  From swing to Elvis and the Beatles overtaken by the psychedelic and rock.  The latent violence and sexuality of rap and the screaming beat of punk each seemed to reach new heights, leaving all others before it lost in a trail of notes.   Somewhere in my life, I crossed the line.  I became the wrinkled nosed parent wanting to shield his eardrums from my child's youthful rhythms.  Sounds that to me seem more like finger nails on a chalk board or a pig squeal in a closet and your locked inside.  For the most part these sounds can be avoided with the exception of the car radio or a thumping stereo in the house.  At least this was true until the fateful words, "Pop, you have to take me to the Van's Warp Tour."

To tell the truth I sowed my own fate.  The seeds were planted in a suggestion months before when my son wanted to attend a concert with his favorite singer.  It was one hundred miles away and on a school night and despite his enthusiasm I yielded to my parental responsibilities and told him, "no way."  Every parent hates to see their child suffer so in compensation I suggested the possibility of attending a summer concert festival when his singer would again play.  Of course my secret hope was that the issue would be forgotten however in the mind of a child a suggestion is a promise and a promise must be kept.  Consider your words written in blood.

So the months passed and as the concert approached I tried to avoid it at all cost however, it became apparent that this would be an impossible task.  Eventually I succumbed to my sons prostrations coupled with incessant whining and agreed to take him and two of his friends.

I think I was likely the oldest person there.  At 43 I frankly felt quite ancient.  There may have been a few other parents hiding in the shadows but it was difficult to say.  Aside from my command authority over my own child I seemingly surrendered all other forms of respect at the gate.  The place almost felt like a teenage version of Lord of the Flies.  The only problem was, I was in serious danger of becoming and adult version of Piggy.  My first act was to cram ear plugs in my ears which likely made the difference between sanity and ears bleeding.  I claimed a spot in the amphitheater and hoped against hope that I might find something aside from screamo bands.  Oh how disillusioned I was.  The great variation seemed to exist somewhere between screaming and screaming punk fusion.  There was one break when a guy named Mike Posner came out.  Using only prerecorded music he delighted the female set with his croonings that seemed lost somewhere between the worst 80's melody music and electric pop.   After realizing it was not some kind of joke I crammed my earplugs even deeper into my head. 

All around me teenagers sported tattoos and piercings in all places imaginable.  Putting aside the parents I wondered how they even could afford the procedures.  I spotted a few parents whose level of cool far surpassed my own.  They sat with their daughters and boyfriends allowing them to lip lock in their midst.  I did however gain a few points when my son and his friends returned to announce that their favorite band would not come out until 8:30 in the evening.  We had already been there an hour and it was only noon!  Surrendering to my child's joy I said we could stay and they happily ran off to watch one of the bands playing on some five other stages.

The temperature was over one hundred and like a man stranded on a life boat I rationed sips of cold water from bottles I had slipped in.  I also commenced seat hopping on a regular basis to avoid the ever shifting sun.  Oh the sun, it burned, driving me in a sick and demented way ever closer to the stage, deeper and deeper into the amphitheater.  After entertaining myself with wild speculation on the cause for security hauling several barely lucid teenagers out of a mosh pit I finally decided to take a walk.  We had been there seven hours and I needed some kind of break.

I walked around navigating between teenagers escaping their parents for a speck of freedom and found the booth dedicated to the band my son wanted to watch.  There was a white board with a sign scribbled on it and a rather rejected looking chubby man sitting behind a table.  The sign announced that the singer had a tonsil infection and would not be performing.  Next to me a young girl was in tears.  "Can I write Chris a note?" she asked.  "Will you give it to him?"

"Sure." the fat man answered as she commenced scribbling words of affection and wishes for a healthy recovery.

When I finally found my son and his friends to inform them of the cancellation joy turned to disbelief.  While my son was horrified I was at least given the gift of an early departure.

After feeding the crew two Baconater burgers and a salad,  I drove the hundred miles back home with a melodic tune in my mind.  It was one from two generations before me and seemed as innocent as a virgin on a snow white morning. With two boys sleeping behind me and one studying his ipod beside me, I wondered quietly when would they cross the line.