Most of my entries into the Diary were started a while ago, and the same is true for this one. I think I always knew the underlying experience/memory would be an entry but it rose to the surface a month or two ago because I found myself unable to sleep and reading Dave Grohl’s autobiography The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music (great fucking title by the way) up in my office at like 4:00 in the morning.
I was reading a portion of the book in which Dave (I’m just gonna go on first name basis) was describing a bit of his childhood and what it was like to play in his neighborhood, which was very reminiscent of my own childhood and the neighborhood I grew up in. He went on to recall an incident in which he sustained a rather gruesome injury playing in the neighborhood and casually made his way home to face his mother while covered in blood, and still bleeding. This also struck a chord, as it reminded me of a story of my oldest brother putting a sickle through his leg while playing in the neighborhood and then walking home to show my Mom (I think that’s the story but it seems weird that he would have a sickle to begin with, though I do recall one hanging on the wall in our garage and it’s weird that I never really questioned why the fuck that was until now, like why the fuck did we have a sickle on our 3/4 of an acre lot in suburbia???? Seriously, why?).
Dave’s eerily familiar childhood recollections and his mention of some of the Foo Fighters most famous songs caused me to pick up the “pen” and get this entry started on the page. It was also crazy to me how his book and collection of stories so resonated with what I had started with The Diary I Never Wrote, in collecting moments of life that were etched into the brain and finding meaning in them.
I picked it up again a few weeks back when I learned of the passing of Taylor Hawkins, the Foo Fighters 50 year old iconic and insanely talented drummer. This event made me again think of my oldest brother, as similar to Taylor Hawkins his passing cut short a life of talent and wisdom and fun and greatness that I could no longer interact with on this planet (I guess that’s the best way I have to express that). So the whole thing from beginning to end has an outstanding brotherhood related bond holding it together, which is solidified even more by the memories that are, in fact, the foundation of this entry. It’s crazy how life works sometimes and the curious timing of things. I’m always uncertain if it truly has a through line or if it really is just that you notice something simply because your mind was currently tuned to that “channel”, like when you think of a color and then look around you and all you can see is that color popping. Ultimately I suppose it doesn’t matter. Because now, no matter what the case, it’s my experience, in this moment, and then forever I suppose. Anyhow, that captures the newly created memories and experiences that brought these older, and diary worthy, memories to the surface.
A few years ago my brother-in-law gave my older brother and I this awesome Christmas gift, tickets for the three of us to go see the Foo Fighters. Looking back it helps me realize that the best gifts in life really aren’t truly appreciated at the time they are given. I mean the gift of “experience” is the ultimate, but at the time of opening such a gift you can’t really hold it concretely. It’s not until later, after the actual experience takes place, that the gift is fully appreciated. Something weird about holding something in your hands I guess, when after the “experience” you realize, cornily, that this is the gift that you end up holding in your heart. Shit, one day you may even write about it in a diary.
As I said, it’s not surprising that the resulting experience would be an entry as initially, even prior to me starting The Diary, I had started it in my head as a thank you letter to one of my brother-in-law’s friends, the reason for which I’ll get to (and at this point is probably confusing because you may be saying, well don’t you mean a thank you to your brother-in-law for the tickets and for sure that’s the case and I thanked him a number of times for the great gift but he probably doesn’t realize the full impact of the event. Shit, I’m sure I didn’t even realize it and am still, now learning of Taylor Hawkins death, appreciating the entire experience again and even more).
The concert, as I’ve gone back and researched, took place in July of 2018 and there are numerous memories strangely and not so strangely etched into my brain from that day. My older brother, brother-in-law and I had all planned to meet at my brother-in-law’s house as he lived a few minutes from the huge outdoor concert venue (remember what I just said there, he lived a few minutes from the concert venue). I went straight from work to my brother-in-law’s which also reminds me that one of the fellas working for me at the time had told me that day that he had tickets to a concert that night and so he wouldn’t be able to work as late as what had become the norm around that time. I responded to him that I also had tickets to a concert that night and so I was also not planning to work the stupid hours we had been working either, to which he responded, “Oh yeah, who are you going to see?” When I responded the Foo Fighters I think this young fella about fell over as he somehow didn’t know that I had been voted Best Rock Concert Attendance when I was in middle school (I’m fairly certain there wasn’t any voting). He thought I was just this older dude that was his boss at work and that I probably didn’t understand cool shit or do anything cool. Human beings, we’ll never evolve.
So after work I headed over to my brother-in-law’s house and I vividly recall walking into his house with my brother also there and asking my brother-in-law if my sister and nephews were there, to which he shook his head no. I then pulled myself up to his kitchen sink, looked out his back window and literally yelled at the top of my lungs. I just screamed, I mean screamed, and then I did it again. I did it to the point where my throat hurt, and then hurt for days. It was a scream I had needed to let loose for years and it felt damn good. It was a rage that was finally set free born from being so fed up and frustrated with my professional career that it poured out in that moment. Well that, and you know, life. I think my brother-in-law and brother probably thought I was insane, not a new concept for sure, but it felt damn good. So good that it feels good now just to recall it and it is etched in my brain as part of this experience.
As I stated earlier, my brother-in-law lived around the corner from the concert venue, the Blossom Music Center formally, and we decided it would be best if we took an Uber to the show from his place. That Uber ride, to go approximately eleven and a half miles, would end up taking about an hour and a half as I recall it. Apparently not only were we and the previously mentioned guy that worked for me going to the Foo Fighters that night but so was everyone else. I’m not sure if this has changed but the Uber ride cost was based on distance and not time, so like an hour and a half later and we owe this poor dude less than $20. I think we provided him a heavy duty tip on top of it but he was like, yeah, this is my last ride of the night which was probably also true because I think the show had already started by the time we got dropped off, and when I say show I mean the Foo Fighters, I have no idea if there was an opening act, and if there was we missed the entire thing.
We had lawn tickets to the show which was very cool as it was an awesome evening. We sort of meandered around and then found a good spot to just hang out on the left side of the lawn sort of near the pavilion. I haven’t found verifiable proof of this, but I heard that it was the largest crowd at Blossom ever, which seemed crazy to me, but standing there looking across the lawn I can believe it.
A good friend of mine had offered up a couple of pavilion tickets but I told him we were all good on the lawn. The fact I was passing on good pavilion tickets to hang out on the lawn didn’t bother me at all, which would not have been true back in the day when we would try to get as close to the stage as possible. Crazy enough, that would serendipitously happen anyhow.
Turned out my brother-in-law also had a friend at the show. A long time friend of his was there with his wife and they had these season tickets to Blossom that I didn’t even know were a thing. So he and his wife come out to where we were on the lawn to hang out for a bit. Apparently he and my brother-in-law hadn’t seen each other for a long time and so were having a good time catching up. So this guy’s wife, or maybe him, suggest that my brother and I, two former concert junkies who can still have that itch come up in a moment, go check their seats out in the pavilion while they keep catching up. My brother and I are like, cool, let’s check it out. Turns out his tickets were in like the fifth row center stage. Fifth row behind the “pit” that is, or the equivalent of a pit in 2018, which is really just people that have a lot of money standing as close to the stage as possible.
To provide some background, or context, or whatever, the Foo Fighters were never at the absolute top of my list from a favorite band perspective. I sort of came into them late and even then I wouldn’t say I went nuts for them. To be honest, I wasn’t a huge Nirvana fan either (for you non Gen Xers, Dave Grohl, the Foo Fighters originator and front man, was the drummer for Nirvana). They were disruptive to my historical hard rock/heavy metal/glam rock sensibility. I would find appreciation though, as noted in other entries…we mature as we age.
I remember buying that first Foo Fighters disc like 10 years after it came out and I was like, man, that’s damn good. I would end up leaving that disc in an Avis rental car shortly after I bought it and I’m still pissed off about it today. I also still think the opening to the two disc In Your Honor might be one of the best and hard rocking starts to any album. I loved it from the first time I heard it. It gets in your face and stays there.
I guess maybe I say I wasn’t a huge fan because it took me time to get into them and I can’t sing every single one of their songs no matter where you start them like I can with a good Poison jam.
I guess the Foo Fighters sort of snuck up on me, like when I listen to their greatest hits I’m blown away by the fact that those are all their songs and there are so many of them. That’s life I suppose. That being said, we were in the fifth fucking row and the place was rocking. I’ve been in the front row for a handful of shows and for some reason at this show, this just seemed closer and crazier than any of those times. Maybe it was because there were so many damn people there or we just happened to get to those seats when the band was hitting all of their biggest songs. We got into it big time and were singing and screaming and jumping around in a way that these two veteran concert goers typically never really did. We were always super cool (what????? we were) and taking every aspect of the show in. I think due to the fact that we weren’t super fans we were a little more loose with the whole thing, and we had just stumbled on to these insanely amazing tickets.
After a couple of songs we start feeling bad about hogging these sweet tickets and head back to the lawn to thank my brother-in-law’s friends and watch the remainder of the show from the lawn. As we’re heading back I hear someone yell my name and sure enough there is my buddy that had offered me those pavilion seats sitting center stage a couple of sections back. He’s like, what the hell, I thought your tickets were on the lawn. So I explain to him we stumbled into these sweet tickets right up at the stage and he’s like, holy crap you lucky bastard, you seem to always get into these amazing situations, and to some extent he’s surprisingly correct about this, I occasionally fall into some sweet situations (like going backstage to the Beastie Boys License to Ill concert, but then we’ve already been down that road), and, to be fair, my buddy is also a bit of an enabler as he offered me some pretty sweet tickets himself!!
Fella is a photographer too am I right?!?!?!?
So we make it back to the group on the lawn and explain that the seats are amazing and thank you for letting us check them out. Then we hang out for a bit and the fella and his wife don’t head back to their seats as they are still doing some serious catching up with my brother-in-law. Well the wife tells my brother and I, look guys, why don’t you go back to the seats and enjoy, these guys haven’t gotten together in a long time and it’s more important for them to catch up. We decline and say basically there’s no way we want to deprive them of these seats to this show and she goes on to insist, telling us that they come to every show here and it’s not that big of a deal, etc., etc. In retrospect she did this in kind of a whispering manner away from her husband, but we eventually give in, twist our arms why don’t you, and skip back down to the pavilion like people who skip when they’re super happy and giddy about something. On the way back to the damn near front row seats I stop off and see my buddy again and I tell him I’ll wave to him from the seats so I can show off how awesome these damn seats are…I mean so he can see where we are.
We get back to these amazing seats and are jamming out again and pretty much just watch the rest of the show from there, and it was amazing. I’m taking pictures and sending them to the fella from work and he’s like, what the hell!!! How did you get there! Take that for thinking I’m some old not very cool dude that you work for.
It was like those old times when my brother and I would try to find a way to get as close to the stage as possible to just be that much closer to our idols. It was amazing, but here’s the thing, while all of that is good and we got to see an amazing show, including Taylor Hawkins jamming and singing and just having a phenomenal genuine good time, and we got to watch this kid “Lucas” come out of the audience and play guitar as if he was a rock star, it wasn’t so much the show from that row that I was overtly thankful for to my brother-in-law’s friend. (Also, when it was all said and done I think his wife was more enthusiastic about us sitting in their seats than he was, so I have to be sure to say that this thank you is for sure to her as well, she’s the one that urged us to go back.) I mean I was absolutely thankful but the thank you note I wrote to them in my head wasn’t simply thanks for the awesome seats.
The thank you I had written in my mind was more related to the experience of being in that spot for really, at the pinnacle, one song in particular. During the time we were nearly front row the band played the song My Hero, which I can say is absolutely my favorite Foo Fighters song. My Hero came out a few years after my oldest brother had passed and I don’t think I ever directly attributed it to reminding me of my brother, or spoke that out loud and I don’t even think I ever spoke it internally in a cohesive manner either, but it without a doubt speaks directly to my feelings. My older brother and I happened to be in the near front row when the Foo Fighters played that song that night. He and I have never spoken of that experience that I recall, nor it’s underlying meaning, but when that song came on and we were standing together feet from the stage feeling alive and having a fucking blast it was just harmoniously understood. I think we sang every word of it standing there and just knew. It was sharing that moment with my brothers, in flesh and in spirit, at a rock and roll concert that I was most thankful for. The various gifts and events that got us there and into that place, at that time, that we wouldn’t have been otherwise, is something that I am genuinely, and will always be, thankful for. That was the essence of my Thank You Note I Never Wrote, thanks for letting me have that moment, it will be meaningful to me forever.
It’s those gifts that result in “experiences” that are absolutely amazing, as that evening proved out. The gift just keeps giving too as I look back now and appreciate that we got to see Taylor Hawkins living life to the fullest in that moment and I’m telling you it was evident that he was having a blast as his drum kit rose from the stage while he belted out a sick solo and then he was stepping out as the lead man singing classic rock and roll songs.
There’s a thread, shit in this whole thing there are various threads, and it may be some mystical intentional thing or it may be a patched together bunch of “coincidences” (which I don’t think is the correct word I want to say but I can’t seem to find it now), but it’s what’s happening in life and what has happened harmoniously coming together and I suppose it makes up aspects of who we are and our journey here, and I’m extremely thankful for it.
