You know when you really don't want something to happen, thereby begging the gods of nature to will it to somehow, against all odds, actually come true? Now, that is just cruel.
It was your first punk concert - more like an enormous mosh pit with some tunes in the background to keep everyone grounded, to be fair, or at least the closest version of grounded that could possibly be achieved in a setting like this. What was the setting? The famous (or perhaps I should say infamous) Tipsy Hippo Bar and Lounge, a Los Angeles establishment that is not just known in the City of Angels but by all forms of life around the world for its incredibly stocked jukebox, holding such a wide variety of songs that it is rumored that no one has ever walked away from the machine with a wisp of disappointment, at least that is the word around the mean streets of Silver Lake.
"Why do I do this to myself?" You mutter to the darkness under your breath after delivering a full fledged and well timed elbow to the unsuspecting gut of an oncoming cocktail waiter (there are cocktail servers at the Tipsy Hippo because this is one of those super hipstery punk concerts where it is also really posh and upscale while at the same time being a place that you would never take your grandmother or even risk telling her about it for fear of the thrill causing her heart to do the first ever 900 of its kind, a day that will go down in the history books for the rosiest of the organs along with the tin man's tall tale of tragedy, that thing where athlete's hearts are too big for their body and it is really scary but a metaphor for life at the same time and the fact that Necco's is not going to be selling their legendary sweetheart candies so y'all will have to do it old school and stalk your crushes from a safe distance instead of trying to slip them secret messages via the delicious candy hearts that have been fan favorites since they catapulted themselves onto the scene and shook the universe's sweet teeth loose (without even having to tie a knot around it and slam a door!... The tooth fairy was a legitimate gawd.). This is the kind of place that would have iPads built into the booths but they had an app right splat dip in the middle of the home page where you could just flat out order illegal drugs right to your table, without even having to alter your tush's level of cushiness.
You begin to hear a faint hum that seems to be emanating from the back of the bar, to the left of the giant ironic paper mache sculpture of a hippo leaning against a brick wall, casually sipping a Moscow Mule and adjacent to the elephant in the room, both giant animals caught in a massive spider web of trying to get the gorilla off their back, all of them paper mache'd and all of them spectacular in all their glory, sort of like a nativity scene for the Animal Planet or what the Crocodile Hunter is experiencing right now up there in Heaven (although there would probably be some paper mache crocodiles in the mix too if that was the case). It is unlike any noise that you have ever heard, unlike any noise that you believed to be possible for a human to create...perhaps the key word is human? But there are no animals allowed in the Tipsy Hippo Bar and Lounge, not even service animals, they have a special puppy kennel for them in the backyard by the barn so if you the booze start to wear off and you begin to feel uncomfortable in a social situation again, you can amble your way out back to the Cute Caboose (Trademarked by the Tipsy Hippo Bar and Lounge) to give your good vibes another kick in the rear end. The sound is almost other worldly, more powerful than the spiritual sum of ten thousand maniacs collectively shrieking their life story off the Golden Gate Bridge to a flock of befuddled onlooking tourists who have no idea what kind of mess they just got themselves into. You follow the noise because you have no other choice, at least not in your mind which has become overrun with emotion, flooded with curiosity and tidal waved with pure and sheer joy. Shoving your way past gaggles of punk teens and their step dads, donning matching black beanies, Bart Simpson themed tattoos and apathetic attitudes towards the state of humanity, you feel like now you are smelling the noise, if that is possible.
The hum is transmogrifying into more of a rattle as you inch closer to its unknown origin, skirting past the pair of barbacks who are making small talk (well, one of them is making small talk while the other one is pretending to make small talk while actually flirting, but who's keeping score anyway?) You wish that you could throw a net over the sound (go all Deadliest Catch on its sound waves) and stuff it into a bottle, next to your favorite ship model, the one of Captain Jack Sparrow's Black Pearl that you bought from a dude who looked like Johnny Depp on the Venice Beach Boardwalk, so much so that he caught your eye enough for you to slam on the brakes of your roller blades and ask the fella if he had ever bleached his facial hair or perhaps made the bold leap of faith to invest in scarves at a young age, only to see the accessory's stock skyrocket by more than tenfold right in front of his smirk which was more in vogue than the magazine.
You peer around the corner into the kitchen and see a bright light, almost to the point of blinding, shining out from the dish pit. Reinvigorated with interest, sparked with life, ready for your next hurdle in life, you bound toward the light and in the general direction of your destiny. Before you know what is happening, it is all over.
The last thing you remember was slipping.
Then you hit your head on the giant blender.
You thought you saw stars and tweety birds but maybe that was just an idea that you got from the movies that sort of slunk its way into your consciousness, insidious in its cartoonish ways. You woke up in the hospital...all your friends and family are there. Everyone who has ever meant anything to you at any point in your life - they all visited you at your bedside while you sat in that hospital for the next eight weeks... Your high school football coach. Your manager from when you worked at the Olive Garden who helped you study for the Bar Exam. Your friend from the fifth grade with whom you hucked an egg at the wall of the outside basketball gym and got called into the principal's office in return. The first girl you ever kissed. Your co worker buddy, Ted, who was a server at the Olive Garden and y'all partied and did Star Wars reenactments using a couple endless bread sticks as light saber substitutes. Your dad's best friend. Your mom's worst enemy. The evil record producer who tried to cop your band's sound and sell it to the radio for straight up cash, under the table. All the referees, umpires and officials who had the honor of working one of your many games throughout the years of your illustrious athletic career (they wanted an apology). The Olive Garden.
They were all there - everyone who ever made a difference for you and in you. These people meant the world to you at one point but now they are but a distant memory, relegated to the role of tent pole, forever destined to hold up the canopy of your life's narrative. These are the people that you will tell your grandchildren about, the ones who pop up in your dreams without warning and leave in just as quick of a flash, their back to you as they walk away out of your mind's dream theme park (your brain's personal 24 Hour Fitness, if you are more of a Sporty Spice). You were so happy that you cried. A lot. Tears of joy. And pain, with some concussion medication thrown in there to shake the cobwebs loose. But mostly joy...Joy that you were able to see so many people who were so critical to helping you become the person that you are today. Individuals that you never thought you would see again. Names that you forgot but faces that have opened personal checking and savings accounts, opened up lines of credit and taken out significant loans in your memory bank until the branch finally closes for good one day, hopefully many, many days from now.
Never.
You would never wish this traumatic event on even your worstest enemy. To be holed up in that hospital, unable to leave your bed without calling out to a nurse (and they were always so busy that you might as well have just been calling out to the heavens, let's make it the Crocodile Hunter's Heaven for good measure).
But if there is one good thing that can be taken from the whole incident, one saving grace that you can steal from the matter, it is this.
People.
"Why do I do this to myself?" You mutter to the darkness under your breath after delivering a full fledged and well timed elbow to the unsuspecting gut of an oncoming cocktail waiter (there are cocktail servers at the Tipsy Hippo because this is one of those super hipstery punk concerts where it is also really posh and upscale while at the same time being a place that you would never take your grandmother or even risk telling her about it for fear of the thrill causing her heart to do the first ever 900 of its kind, a day that will go down in the history books for the rosiest of the organs along with the tin man's tall tale of tragedy, that thing where athlete's hearts are too big for their body and it is really scary but a metaphor for life at the same time and the fact that Necco's is not going to be selling their legendary sweetheart candies so y'all will have to do it old school and stalk your crushes from a safe distance instead of trying to slip them secret messages via the delicious candy hearts that have been fan favorites since they catapulted themselves onto the scene and shook the universe's sweet teeth loose (without even having to tie a knot around it and slam a door!... The tooth fairy was a legitimate gawd.). This is the kind of place that would have iPads built into the booths but they had an app right splat dip in the middle of the home page where you could just flat out order illegal drugs right to your table, without even having to alter your tush's level of cushiness.
You begin to hear a faint hum that seems to be emanating from the back of the bar, to the left of the giant ironic paper mache sculpture of a hippo leaning against a brick wall, casually sipping a Moscow Mule and adjacent to the elephant in the room, both giant animals caught in a massive spider web of trying to get the gorilla off their back, all of them paper mache'd and all of them spectacular in all their glory, sort of like a nativity scene for the Animal Planet or what the Crocodile Hunter is experiencing right now up there in Heaven (although there would probably be some paper mache crocodiles in the mix too if that was the case). It is unlike any noise that you have ever heard, unlike any noise that you believed to be possible for a human to create...perhaps the key word is human? But there are no animals allowed in the Tipsy Hippo Bar and Lounge, not even service animals, they have a special puppy kennel for them in the backyard by the barn so if you the booze start to wear off and you begin to feel uncomfortable in a social situation again, you can amble your way out back to the Cute Caboose (Trademarked by the Tipsy Hippo Bar and Lounge) to give your good vibes another kick in the rear end. The sound is almost other worldly, more powerful than the spiritual sum of ten thousand maniacs collectively shrieking their life story off the Golden Gate Bridge to a flock of befuddled onlooking tourists who have no idea what kind of mess they just got themselves into. You follow the noise because you have no other choice, at least not in your mind which has become overrun with emotion, flooded with curiosity and tidal waved with pure and sheer joy. Shoving your way past gaggles of punk teens and their step dads, donning matching black beanies, Bart Simpson themed tattoos and apathetic attitudes towards the state of humanity, you feel like now you are smelling the noise, if that is possible.
The hum is transmogrifying into more of a rattle as you inch closer to its unknown origin, skirting past the pair of barbacks who are making small talk (well, one of them is making small talk while the other one is pretending to make small talk while actually flirting, but who's keeping score anyway?) You wish that you could throw a net over the sound (go all Deadliest Catch on its sound waves) and stuff it into a bottle, next to your favorite ship model, the one of Captain Jack Sparrow's Black Pearl that you bought from a dude who looked like Johnny Depp on the Venice Beach Boardwalk, so much so that he caught your eye enough for you to slam on the brakes of your roller blades and ask the fella if he had ever bleached his facial hair or perhaps made the bold leap of faith to invest in scarves at a young age, only to see the accessory's stock skyrocket by more than tenfold right in front of his smirk which was more in vogue than the magazine.
You peer around the corner into the kitchen and see a bright light, almost to the point of blinding, shining out from the dish pit. Reinvigorated with interest, sparked with life, ready for your next hurdle in life, you bound toward the light and in the general direction of your destiny. Before you know what is happening, it is all over.
The last thing you remember was slipping.
Then you hit your head on the giant blender.
You thought you saw stars and tweety birds but maybe that was just an idea that you got from the movies that sort of slunk its way into your consciousness, insidious in its cartoonish ways. You woke up in the hospital...all your friends and family are there. Everyone who has ever meant anything to you at any point in your life - they all visited you at your bedside while you sat in that hospital for the next eight weeks... Your high school football coach. Your manager from when you worked at the Olive Garden who helped you study for the Bar Exam. Your friend from the fifth grade with whom you hucked an egg at the wall of the outside basketball gym and got called into the principal's office in return. The first girl you ever kissed. Your co worker buddy, Ted, who was a server at the Olive Garden and y'all partied and did Star Wars reenactments using a couple endless bread sticks as light saber substitutes. Your dad's best friend. Your mom's worst enemy. The evil record producer who tried to cop your band's sound and sell it to the radio for straight up cash, under the table. All the referees, umpires and officials who had the honor of working one of your many games throughout the years of your illustrious athletic career (they wanted an apology). The Olive Garden.
They were all there - everyone who ever made a difference for you and in you. These people meant the world to you at one point but now they are but a distant memory, relegated to the role of tent pole, forever destined to hold up the canopy of your life's narrative. These are the people that you will tell your grandchildren about, the ones who pop up in your dreams without warning and leave in just as quick of a flash, their back to you as they walk away out of your mind's dream theme park (your brain's personal 24 Hour Fitness, if you are more of a Sporty Spice). You were so happy that you cried. A lot. Tears of joy. And pain, with some concussion medication thrown in there to shake the cobwebs loose. But mostly joy...Joy that you were able to see so many people who were so critical to helping you become the person that you are today. Individuals that you never thought you would see again. Names that you forgot but faces that have opened personal checking and savings accounts, opened up lines of credit and taken out significant loans in your memory bank until the branch finally closes for good one day, hopefully many, many days from now.
Never.
You would never wish this traumatic event on even your worstest enemy. To be holed up in that hospital, unable to leave your bed without calling out to a nurse (and they were always so busy that you might as well have just been calling out to the heavens, let's make it the Crocodile Hunter's Heaven for good measure).
But if there is one good thing that can be taken from the whole incident, one saving grace that you can steal from the matter, it is this.
People.
Buy Chris's books SPONGE CAKE & WHAT'S IN THE FRIDGE? on Amazon
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