Life lesson #? - Conditioner

I have dreads. By accident. Combination of sweat, hairspray, and a beer shower being moshed around in the pit at the Nickelback concert for 5 hours. I sang, I jumped, I headbanged my fake F* Me hair, and I rocked to the music with such verasity that sheared off both oversized zebra print earrings and nearly loosened a breast or two from the double push up support they were so eagerly trying to inch out of since I strapped them in at 2pm. Although not as permanent as the time I broke my toe at the Filmore in San Francisco while climbing the stairs to see 3 Doors Down, I did my best to honor the Rock Gods the right way tonight! Rock and fucking Roll my friends! I was even told I made it on the jumbotron. Check that one of the list!

Oh yeah, and I bit some guy's nipple. My girls, as in friends, were stuck talking to him as I came up double fisted with not 1 but, count em, 2 large Coors Lights, when they shouted "touch his nipple!" that was ever so glaringly staring at me through his shirt fabric (pause for dry heave - ew, hard man nippoles). So, I did what any other double fisted beer holding, already drunk, altered state of sober mind person would do and bit his nipple through his blue under armor shirt. Twice and yelled "I just took one for the team!" before wandering back to front and center. It was Nickelback. In the pit. I just had not other choice.

You see there's something nearly spiritual about being that close to music. Close enough that the beat of the drums makes your aortas jump in your chest and the heat from the pyrotechnics warms up your face skin. Nickelback has escaped us for a few years now for one reason or the other, but tonight we made up for it. Oh we made up for it.

The party bus of co-workers and friends was 19 deep and the drinking began as soon as the wheels started going round from our meeting point. Seems like I am always either the driver or the self-proclamed safety person, so finding a place and a group to let loose with is the exception. I let go...figuratively of course, cause I was hanging on to the handrails on the party bus grinding on weary passengers like a monkey searching for a banana. Take it out of context, go ahead, I'll afford you this one.

Sometimes I'm more country than rock and roll, but tonight, I was all at the mercy of the rock gods. I hung with the group for the opening acts before the pit filled up for the headliner but when the rock hit the roll, I grabbed the baby sis and made a b-line for the closest spot to center stage. I spend the approximate small budget of a small nation on summer concerts and this one was THE concert ticket to get this year. I can't say I've ever been in the pit with the baby sis. I can't say that I've done a whole lot with the baby sis, but I plan on making up for it in the next few years. I went as far as to tell one of the girls in our group "if this place catches on fire, I'm getting Briana, and that's it. The sis comes with me out the door and you all can fend for yourselves."

At some halfway point in the headliner's set, I grabbed said younger sibling of about 7 years and sang every word to Far Away..."I love you, I loved you all along..." I had this thought that I could not imagine my world without my sister. It just wouldn't make any damned sense. I have a lot of revalations and conversations with myself mid-concert experience. Most are good, a few are zany. Tonight they were all good...shortly after Far Away, in the mid-summer air of Northern California under the dark, slightly starry sky of Marysville, I offered up a prayer as Chad Kroger sang them:

Cause nobody wants to be the last one there
Cause everyone wants to feel like someone cares
Someone to love with my life in their hands
There's gotta be somebody for me like that
Cause nobody wants to go it on their own
And everyone wants to know they're not alone
There's somebody else that feels the same somewhere
There's gotta be somebody for me out there

And them I moshed some more.

Thank you concert for being awesome.

***post edit, while I was in the shower today before work washing out last night's adventure, the summation of another Lauren Life Lesson came to me:

You know how good the night before was by the amount of conditioner you have to use the next morning.