Posted on Mon Aug 4, 09:29 PM in Music
After Pegasus, from Pittsburgh to Milwaukee.
During tear down and load out, some weirdness crept back in. Earlier in the night, a TDC fan from a previous-this-year show made an appearance. Short story is that she is barely legal and flew up from NC to see all the bands tonight, and was going to stay with a friend at one of the colleges in town. She was a very well-thought, mature person for her age, and it was cool to find out the lengths she went to get there tonight. Fast forward to bar time and load out… Luke somehow assures her that she can stay with the band tonight, if her friend can’t put her up (I guess it was up in the air). The problem with that is that we were guests of the promoter that night, not hosts ourselves. When he asked me in the middle of load out if that was okay (in front of her), it was kind of uncomfortable! I said, “You’ll have to talk to Jim.” I left it at that.
In the alley with all the equipment, and Dan and Dave getting the van, Luke and I realized that we forgot one thing: the merch tub. It is a rather heavy bulky thing (Dan was feeling optimistic). I asked Luke if he could get it, since I cannot lift it. He refused (and is quite able to lift it himself). I tried it again, and he refused again. I am dressed, in heels, yet don’t want to hold up the show, so I march around to the front of the building again, walk down a long flight of steps, and let the doorman know I’m just getting a merch tub. This is when the doorman lets me know that “there’s someone who is still here who needs to talk to someone in your band.” I look around the near empty club and spot the young girl, talking with TSN. I get her attention so I can see what’s up. Sounds like she doesn’t have a place to stay, and where Luke left her last, it sounded to her like she could stay with us, and needed a ride, and…
Here’s where I kind of lost my shit. This was clearly not this girl’s fault, and I wasn’t about to go off on her. I really wanted her to be safe, and I felt a bit empathetic towards her situation. I also was feeling not a little ticked off at Luke for making me do something I couldn’t, and I was in a hurry to get the trailer loaded and get out of the way for the other bands to load out their gear. I told the girl to follow me. I picked up the merch tub as best I could and marched up the stairs in heels, up the block, and around the corner to the alley. I had to stop twice, and finally gave up, letting the side of my right leg take the weight and sort of push it forward. I forgot about the girl behind me. I marched up to the rest of the band loading in (Domi was also helping) and spouted a few choice swear words about the situation, not caring really how loud I was. Ironically, adrenaline kicked in, and I tossed all the gear I could lift to the mouth of the trailer. Then I took all the personal stuff (suitcases, backpacks, suits) and loaded that into the van. During this process, Luke seemed to be following me around trying to start up a conversation, which I ignored; as I was loading the van, I watched him crack a beer and watch everybody, which made me want to do real damage. When I was done, I finally told Dan that he needed to speak with this girl and sort the situation out, because I knew nothing. I sat in the front of the van and waited for the steam to dissipate; I just did not want to start drama. Eventually Dave came in to chat, and that helped. I stayed there until we eventually drove away, following Jim to his apartment just outside the city.
As it turns out, Jim did welcome the girl who flew up for the show, and Domi played the role of big sister and kind of watched out for her around Luke (I guess he was flirting with her). Back at Jim’s, it turned really casual and fun. Although we were all ass tired, we stayed up to chat and trade road stories. All the while, the young girl was really watching intently and at times had her mouth open in disbelief at what she was hearing (kind of cute, really; to my ears we weren’t talking about anything all that scandelous or “secret” but I suppose to someone in her shoes, it was a whole other world). Jim has a two-bedroom apartment that he shares with an incredible amount of Star Wars memorabelia. Most of the walls are covered with unopened toy boxes. It is truly something to behold. Jim is a sweet guy with a great sense of humor, and he opened his tiny place to all six of us.
A mere four hours later, we piled into the van to get on the road (Domi, bless her heart, took our young fan to the airport on her own way out of town and back to DC). It was about 7:45am local time when we hit the highway. The first rest stop off the turnpike that had a Starbucks we stopped for coffee and breakfast. Dan took the first part of the drive back, and Dave took much of Ohio and Indiana, with Dan getting back in the driver’s seat for Chicago and the rest of the way north. At this point we were all pretty wiped, but managed to have some fun. Dave managed to scare the poo out of me with Rammstein (it was loud, I was tired, so sue me). Luke wanted to streak during a long stretch of the turnpike where traffic was backed up, but ultimately decided not to (we were gonna pay him, I think… but we also said we might not be there when he got back, so it was really up to him). It became apparent around Gary that we weren’t going to make it to Milwaukee by 5pm, which is when we needed to return the trailer without getting hit with an extra day of rental fees, but we did our best, and got to our house by about 6:30pm. We quickly unloaded the trailer, and Luke offered to drive Dave home, so Dan and I returned the trailer before they closed at 7pm… and they didn’t charge anything beyond the 3 days we signed for, so hooray for U-Haul.
Dan and I ate out for dinner because neither of us wanted to cook. We got back, unpacked, and crashed.
Go ahead, have your say!