The Wild One, Forever.

Tom Petty died today. Or maybe he didn't really, the news is still catching up to the truth of things. It's weird how that happens, how there can be a declaration of literal life and death, and then someone can take it back. Retract it. Just kidding, I imagine news sources saying. My bad. Timing is a fickle mistress.

I posted this on Facebook yesterday:

Driving over the Howard Franklin Bridge is beautiful at sunrise. By "sunrise" I mean 8:30 AM. By "beautiful" I mean what am I doing with my life.

I honestly didn't put much thought into it, but sometimes when I blurt out dissonant observations on social media those little snippets of half-cocked snark get lots of reactions. It's weird how that happens, too. It's like other people understand what I meant even if I didn't. I imagine them imagining me driving over the bridge with my windows down and radio up, my sunglasses doing nothing for my tired eyes except to shield the driver next to me from the mascara smeared all over my eyelids. I imagine it's easy for those who know me to imagine it: "Ah yes, there goes Keri. Driving over the bridge she hates more than anything else in the world. She's mildly impressed with the clear sky and easy waters, but she's also wondering what she's doing there to see it. She knows why she's there, of course, but she's still wondering how she got there. Not "how" logistically but "how" emotionally. Yes, they are entirely different questions, especially to someone like Keri. I will give her a "like" to show my solidarity."

I mean, is that not how you imagined it?

I saw Tom Petty in concert once, sort of. I am trying to remember the specifics, but if News Sources can get their facts wrong, maybe I can too and be forgiven. My bad. It's fuzzy. It was some sort of festival or political rally or something other than a headlining tour. He was just performing at some place. And I wasn't really supposed to be there, I just happened to be on the right adventure at the right time with the right people and the right friend of a friend had a thing or knew a person and then before I really knew why or how, I was watching Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

I am an absolute sucker for a good live performance, no matter the artist or genre. Admittedly, I am not a huge Tom Petty fan. I'm not opposed, just apathetic. My favorite thing he ever did was his interview in the documentary Sound City. But what caught me by surprise immediately when I saw Tom was how intimate it was. And how familiar. And how that familiarity fed into the intimacy in a neverending feedback loop.

It was like telling a friend to grab you a drink while they're at the bar and they bring you the exact double-Jameson-and-ginger you wanted because they know you. And you take a big sip expecting some watered down bullshit, but there it is, a manifestation of the relationship you have been knowingly or unknowingly cultivating for nearly a decade. It's refreshing and overtly strong all at once. And it's easy to get drunk on; not just logistically, but emotionally.

It was like an innocuous gesture that turns unexpectedly into a great comfort, like a hand reaching out for yours in the darkness to steady you as you cross the boardwalk down to the beach. It's a kiss on the forehead that doesn't make you uneasy.

It was like how the rule of threes can be somehow comforting until a hack blog writer calls it out and ruins it, much like Jimmy Fallon laughing at his own jokes.

The night I saw Tom Petty somewhat accidentally, I knew every song, or at least some part of every song. It hit me then how pervasive his music was, how deeply ingrained in pop culture he and his music are. Whether I sought it out or not, I had been casually acquainted with Tom Petty, the Heartbreakers and their work for years, possibly forever given my age and the span of their undeniable success. And so, even just being a passive fan, I enjoyed the hell out of that night. We all went back to a bar and someone played twenty dollars worth of Tom Petty songs on the jukebox. But not the same jams we'd just experienced. These songs I didn't know as well, and when I heard "The Wild One, Forever" it really (I can't help it, sorry) struck a chord with me in a big way. It was the last verse that got me.

"Because somethin' I saw in your eyes
Told me right away
That you were gonna have to be mine
The strangest feeling came over me down inside
I knew right away 
I'd never get over how good it felt
When you finally kissed me
I will never regret,
Baby, those few hours linger on in my head forever..."

Concerts (or shows as my younger, more pretentious self would insist on saying) are a strange and wonderful phenomenon to me. You have this crazy connection with a band or a singer or the music or the live aspect of the performance or even just the lyrics and you exist on this totally different plane of reality. For a few hours, at least. Someone calls out "I love you," and you say it back and you mean it, but do you really? You're strangers. You aren't going home with them in any sense. You don't commiserate over daily life together. You aren't even friends, really. You don't meet up for drinks or a movie when you have time. You don't even live in the same state. They don't know you at all, but you think they get you. Or you get them. But it's fabricated and coerced, not just logistically but emotionally. And yet, it is still very real somehow. Visceral. Palpable. So you buy into it. Or maybe you already bought into it when you bought the tickets, and now you are just denying that you bought into it all because it makes the lie seem real and that's okay with you. OR MAYBE, on that weird Narnia-esque, Through the Looking Glass plane of reality that you find yourself on at concerts, you really do love them and there is a crazy connection and it is familiar and it is intimate and they feed into each other in a neverending feedback loop. The time-space-music dimension is a fickle mistress.

Waking up in a hotel room always throws me off. It takes a minute to remember where I am (or how or why) but I feel safe and at home even before I have figured out the other answers. Concerts kind of feel the same; it's raw and cathartic and dangerous, but also safe. It's structured. There are boundaries. There are rules. The hotel is not your home, but you can live there. The concert experience is not how you actually or always feel, but you can access those emotions there. For a few hours anyway.

I used to say that certain concerts changed my life. They really didn't. I've never seen a band, even one I really like, and then changed anything even remotely significant about my life or the way I live it. And it makes me a little sad to admit that, honestly. I think that's why "The Wild One, Forever" really gets to me. "I knew right away/ I'd never get over how good it felt/ when you finally kissed me/ I will never regret/ Baby, those few hours linger on in my head forever..."

Man. The speaker has really liked and/or wanted this other person for a while and been patient and been understanding and finally had that Through the Looking Glass moment and experience, it was blissful, but it was only a few hours. And while those few hours will linger on in his head forever IT WAS ONLY A FEW HOURS and from the lyrics I can't tell that anything significant has changed about his life or how he lives it at all. It's like he was at a concert with me. There was this golden moment of familiarity and intimacy and then it was over and life moves on. You wake up in the hotel and you're disoriented and then you feel safe and then you check out.

I told you all of that just to explain how "The Wild One, Forever" ended up being the only Tom Petty song in my music collection, but still a song I reach for at very specific times in my life. I imagine you imagining if there is a point to all of this. Do I ever really make a point? I'm just trying to get used to this kind of writing again. How's it going? Yeah, I'm not sure either.

Driving over the Howard Franklin bridge was actually very pretty the other morning. But it was also quite odd. I had the same feeling I'd felt so many times after really good concerts. Did that happen? Am I the same person in real life as I am in that mosh pit? Will I ever see those people again? I know it really happened, but was it real?

Those are weird rabbit holes to go down. The Night Before The Bridge, when I was in St. Pete visiting an old friend, I overheard this conversation about what a number actually is, if it's real or just some way we impose meaning onto the universe. I thought about contributing a line my friend Derek told me once: "math was not invented, it was discovered." But I don't even know if that's right. What is right? How do you define... something, something etymologically true... burden of proof... words about stuff... reference to a book I never read. The conversation moved so fast and I felt so uninformed and uninteresting and I'll be honest, I was only half listening because I was so focused on the fact that I was drinking some kind of pineapple IPA aberration and it somehow did not taste like garbage. And that is a rabbit hole of which I am really afraid. Sure, numbers are bullshit and language is a fallacy and we are all leading lives full of agony and existential choices that only bring about more suffering. Fine. BUT HOW DOES THIS BEER NOT TASTE LIKE GARBAGE?

The rest of the night was full of weird rabbit holes and that concert-going feeling. Safely dangerous. Dangerously safe. And it was incongruous in many neat but functional ways--like a quilt stitched out of cotton and plastic bags--awkward but it worked. It was undeniably fun, even down to the Britney Spears karaoke song that I really enjoyed and was judged for enjoying. (How can you not love a lost man-child with an affinity for obscure metal trying his absolute best to sing "Toxic?" Isn't that why karaoke exists?) I met new people that felt like old friends right off the bat. The beach bar had this weird crowd that liked all kinds of music and this lady (there's always one) danced to EVERY song. She danced to music between songs. She danced while she sang her own song. And then there was the bartender, a cute girl who had exactly zero time for people's bullshit. And there was the guy who sprayed his beer like a total dickbag from the stage and got shitty Budweiser all over the dancefloor, which put the Dancing Lady in actual danger. And then there was Willie, the security guy who came to clean it up and tell Tool Bag to knock it off. But the karaoke lady was already giving him the business for cursing into her microphone. She doesn't like cursing into her microphone. And then there was last call, that magical time where some people can finish up, cash out and move on and other people are relentless in trying to get that last, wholly unnecessary drink and stand around, 100% in the way. All bars can be really similar if you let them. Familiar. Intimate.

I went to St. Pete to live deliberately, and I gotta tell you, I think I nailed it. But I stayed because I felt like garbage. (Maybe that's why the pineapple IPA didn't taste like garbage?! Oh man, I have to Scientific Method the hell out of this. You know, for science.) I'd been running a fever and fighting with my sinuses, unsuccessfully. The decision to stay was the right one for safety and a thousand other reasons. And when I woke up in the hotel I felt disoriented and then I felt safe and then I left.

And driving over the bridge that morning was actually very pretty. But it was also quite odd. So I reached for my phone and played "The Wild One, Forever." I played it over and over as I made my way home, my sunglasses doing nothing to help my tired eyes except shield the driver next to me from the mascara smeared across my eyelids. Windows down, radio up, I sang the words confidently and knowingly and a little sadly, already mourning the night that was but wasn't. The stage was empty, the Dancing Lady was gone, the footprints I'd left in the sand under a bright half moon were undoubtedly washed away by now. And even if they were still there, I'd already left.

The night was amazing and scary and familiar and new and fun and safe and out of my comfort zone and unexpected and somehow already written all at the same time. It was vulnerability gift-wrapped with a pretty bow of boundaries. It was unforgettable, if only mostly remembered.

That night, however, did not change my life, even if I wanted it to, even though it had the power to do so. That many commas can't be right. But that night has changed a part of me, and maybe that will be enough to somehow upheave my life somewhere down the road if it needs it. When I need it. Timing is a fickle mistress.

And if nothing else, "I will never regret... those few hours linger on in my head forever."