James's Beard

A place for me to write.

Name:
Location: Cleveland, Ohio, United States

Just a young man trying to make it on sheer wit, guile, and dumb luck.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

What I Got Out Of The Cow Pasture



“Come on, Seth. I need some beer. Just get out on I-24, drive North, South, East, West, I don’t care. Just bring me some beer. I can’t get it myself. I gotta get out of this cow pasture.”

She had a high, forceful backwoods voice. It was pitched somewhere between human and feral dog. It was the kind of squawk I always imagined issuing from Flannery O’Connor Characters. She was brash, and loud, and more than a little frightening. I certainly hope Seth brought her some beer. I fear for his wellbeing if he did not.

“If you bring me beer, I will marry you. I will marry you to-fucking-night. My dog will be the best man. Hell, I might even turn straight for you…ah, naw, that ain’t true.”

It took me awhile to turn around and sneak a peak at the girl. I was terrified she would catch me looking. Who knows what kind of raged boiled within this hillbilly lesbian. I imagined her perfectly willing to quite literally chew my face off. But I took my chance and stole my glance. She was smaller than I expected, thin – she might have weighed all of 90 pounds – with a bony compact frame and short, brown boyish hair. She looked like Huck Finn imbued with old man Finn’s anger. Her size did little to alleviate my fears. She could certainly gouge my eyes out and kick a hole in my chest before I could swing a fist. It’s axiomatic: crazy beats strong every time.

Eventually, Marissa and I turned one way and the hillbilly lesbian turned another and walked off into the Tennessee night, wandering among the tents and cars howling for Seth to just bring her some beer with the unabashed force of a backwoods banshee.

The hillbilly lesbian was by far the most interesting, and entertaining person I ran into at Bonnaroo. There were other people. For instance, the gentleman shaking and shivering as he begged every passing person for speed was the saddest. The young couple we met waiting for Elvis Perkins in Dearland: the most earnest. Our campsite neighbors who kept a careful schedule of what psychotropic drugs to take and woke us up at 5 A.M. with by yelping “ You know what we need right now: MARSHMALLOWS!”: the most annoying.

When people ask me why I went to Bonnaroo again (which is a perfectly legitimate question since Bonnaroo contains so many of the things I hate: immense crowds, not showering for three days, hippies, hipsters, druggies, frat bros, smug self-importance, and unrelenting heat to name just a few), I do have a few answers. I went because my fiancé, Marissa, wanted to go. I got a chance to check out bunch of bands. I love road trips. But in hindsight the thing that draws me to this sort of gathering, is the people. I am an inveterate people watcher. I’m not always much for social interaction, but I do have a fascination with observing people interact. Bonnaroo is like a big, steaming, seamy, often quite gross petri dish for the science of people watching. People are away from home, in a permissive atmosphere, and perfectly willing to make fools of themselves. It is really quite wonderful. So, while I could knock out some quick blog post about all the bands I saw. Rank them from the pretty great (The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Phoenix) to the pretty terrible (I’m looking at you, MGMT). I’d much rather just write about some of the more mundane, stupid, mystifying, and interesting people and events I witnessed over the weekend.

Bonnaroo fosters the sort of open, permissive atmosphere that makes what I imagine to be fairly normal people to act like total idiots. This is immediately noticeable in how people dress. Most people don’t pull out Speedos as clothing, but I saw it, along with pink jump suits, Transformers masks, and even one person wearing a perfectly accurate Teen Wolf costume (Okay. I might make fun of everything else, but the Teen Wolf costume was freaking awesome. It was uncannily accurate, like he spent five hours in makeup before hitting the festival. We only saw him for a second. He ran out of the pit at Nine Inch Nails and off into the night too fast for anyone to get our cameras ready. The only way it could have been more perfect is if he reverse two-handed dunked into a random basketball hoop then jumped onto the roof of a Style’s driven truck).

By far the most baffling fashion trend was girls wearing fairy wings. I don’t really know where this comes from. I’m going to take a shot in the dark and guess it has its origins in the club scene. I have absolutely no idea what goes on in clubs these days (or ever for that matter), so that’s my all-purpose guess for where things young people do I don’t understand originate. Do the kids still go clubbing? Do they call it clubbing? Do they still do the ecstasy I heard so much about in the 90’s? Do I really care? Back to the point, girls be wearin’ wings. It seems like an odd fashion choice for a music festival. When moving through a large crowd is it really a good idea to add a two foot wingspan. The fairy wing craze did lead to one of the more memorable moments of the weekend. Again at Nine Inch Nails – before the glory that was Teen Wolf – we were standing behind a group of young women all wearing fairy wings. One cute little girl was wearing her wings with a bikini top and really pushed the outfit over the top with a pink tutu (Because why the fuck not). Suddenly, we saw a gentleman running up from the stage area with his hand clamped firmly over his mouth. It looked like someone drank a little too much, and was ready to… ah… get rid of some excess. Unfortunately, the fairy girl did not see the gentleman, and was not able to get out of the line of fire. Her friends ended up wiping vomit off her back. It was awesome.



I saw surprisingly little vomit this trip, although there definitely seemed to be a much more prevalent party drug vibe. We did overhear this chestnut: “The guy at the tent next to ours came out, looked up, and said ‘It’s raining. I’m going to go back to my tent and do meth.’” We, on the other hand, spent the rainy portion of the trip in our tent playing Crazy Eights. To each his own. So, I guess meth has hit the party and/or hippie crowds. Or maybe, it’s always been there. I don’t really know much about meth. Or the party and hippie crowds, for that matter. But we did have a fun game of spot the meth addict running for most of the weekend. You know who won? We all won. Except for the meth addicts. They’ve already lost, pretty much everything.

It was a good weekend for people watching. There was a lot more I could write about. For instance, the show off jumping over a large puddle only to land on a guy carrying a beer in each hand. There are also probably a ton of other things I’ve already forgotten. Still, it was overall a good weekend for catching some bands, and a great weekend for watching Americans acting like assholes. And that’s what it’s all about.

Shalom

Monday, June 08, 2009

James and Marissa Come Out To Play

There are some impulses so strong in the mind of man, it is almost as though they have been chiseled into the marble of man’s psyche. The allure of the high seas, the call of the open road, the native drive westward. There are forces almost beyond man’s control. There is an animal call within all of us to fulfill them. Some routes have been scratched deep within men’s souls long before they have been transcribed to mere paper maps. The draw of these journeys are so strong you may embark on one and only realize after you have already begun that you walk on the path of myth. So it was for me when I stepped onto a simple train, but onto the route of legend.

It was nothing, just a simple trip to the aquarium, a way to spend a day on my most recent trip to New York City to visit some family. It seemed an innocuous activity. Marissa, my charming fiancé and adventuring companion, loves aquariums. It was on Coney Island, a part of New York I had yet to visit. It was not until we had already been on the train – as we passed the Fordham station in the Bronx – that it hit me. We were travelling from the Bronx to Coney Island by train and subway. We had found ourselves quite unwittingly following the exact path of the Warriors.

Can you dig it?

Well, I can and I did. I dug it. I dug it real good. I giddily reported my realization to Marissa. She seemed interested and intrigued although I am not really sure if she has ever really seen the film. She does have enough nerdy friends – and one fairly nerdy fiancé – that she understands these sorts of things. In case you have never seen the film, it is about a simple, desperate journey. The Warriors attend a meeting of all the gangs of New York in the Bronx. Cyrus the leader of the largest gang is killed. The Warriors are wrongly accused of the murder. They have to make it back to Coney Island with every other gang in New York after them. Oh yeah, and every gang has a theme with costumes and – sometimes – face paint to match. There is even a gang that dresses like mimes. That’s right mimes. They’re called the High Hats, and I can only assume they’re awesome. I have to assume because you only see them for a second at the beginning, but they never actually do anything.

As soon as I realized we were following in the footsteps of the Warriors, I knew our journey would be fraught with peril. It was. Just as the Warriors fought to return to Coney Island before countless bloodthirsty gangs in kabuki make up destroyed them, we had to get to Coney Island before the Aquarium closed at five. Also, Just like the Warriors we were safe as long as we were on the train, but peril awaited us when we stepped foot outside.

Of course, the Warriors peril took the shape of Baseball Furies, a group of youth who dress like Kiss fans playing sandlot, where our peril took the form of our own stupidity and general lack of experience with the New York subway system. At Grand Central Station, we had a hard time figuring out which subway line would be the quickest. We ended up staring at a subway map forever. Making an abortive attempt to get to another stop, before coming back to Grand Central and actually asking for some assistance. In true NYC fashion, the girl in the booth was brusque and seemingly annoyed at having to talk to some rube from out of town. The directions where given through one of those microphone systems like they have at McDonald’s making it almost impossible to discern. We did finally figure out which train to get on. I’m still not a hundred percent certain we made the best decision, but I knew we would get there. Eventually. At least we didn’t have to fight anyone on roller skates.

Sadly, we did not run into any gangs. Although we did see a couple on the train dressed disturbingly alike. A youngish couple – late teens early twenties – sat across from us for about twenty minutes. They both wore a Batman logo tee shirt, khaki shorts, a necklace with a shamrock pendant, sandals, and carried black messenger bags. I did not hear them say anything, but they did occasionally whisper some secret back and forth. For our part, Marissa and I didn’t say anything and occasionally whispered to each other secrets such as: “what’s up with those guys?” “ “Why don’t you ask them?” “I don’t want to ask them. They might be in a gang. Why don’t you ask?”

After a long trip by subway, we finally reached Coney Island. We rushed from the train to the aquarium. It was 4:30. We discovered the aquarium closes at 5, but they stop selling tickets at 4:15. We were crushed, but it was donation day when the aquarium accepts donations instead selling tickets. I floated the idea of bargaining a $5 donation just so we could see the sharks. Because, really, the sharks are the coolest part of any aquarium., and if I wasn’t going to see any High Hats I might as well see sharks, which was the name of a gang in the other movie I’ve seen dealing with New York City gangs. On a related note, I have a warped view of actual gang culture. Unfortunately, the guy in the ticket booth was having none of it.

Crushed, we went out to the boardwalk. We figured as long as we couldn’t see the aquarium, we might as well see what Coney Island is all about. Picture a seedy carnival built among the projects and you pretty much got Coney Island. I quite like it. There are various rides available. I did drop $8 dollars to ride the Cyclone, the world famous roller coaster Alvy Singer grew up under. I almost got duped into playing some sort of carnival game involving fishing ping-pong balls out of a bucket. I’m not really sure how it worked, but the guy with an accent assured me I could be a big winner if I gave him $5 dollars. I managed to get out of that without losing any money and I won an American flag keychain, which is awesome, I guess. Then Marissa and I stopped for a beer in some tourist trap called Beer Island – or Oasis or some other such nonsense. Basically you could drink beer behind the beach on a patio made to look like a beach. It was okay, but we were subjected to a terrible classic rock cover band. I don’t why I needed to travel almost 400 miles from Pittsburgh to New York to hear yet another shitty cover of Hotel California. When it comes to shitty classic rock cover bands I think Pittsburgh has it pretty well covered. As a matter of fact, that might be one form of culture we have all over New York.

We walked around Coney Island a little longer soaking in its majesty. We saw the Wonder Wheel. We thought about getting a hot dog. We saw a carnival style barker trying to get us into an honest-to-God freak show. We saw a scary looking haunted house like ride with an dummy made to look like it was projecting vomit and diarrhea at the same time. We didn’t go into any of these. We did go into a public bathroom, which was scary enough. Finally, we completed our Warriors-styled adventure the same way the Warriors did, with a long walk on the beach. Only where the Warriors walked alone along a clean stretch of beach, we were greeted with a beach strewn with every type of refuse known to man. There were broken bottles, empty potato chip bags, a lonely swimsuit, and more needles than I care to think about. Maybe, we did have it as tough as the Warriors all along.

Shalom