Since my blog gets some attention from Peace Corps applicants and volunteers, I want to make sure to mention progress on my own Peace Corps journey at least once per entry, even if I'm still a year away from departure. Right now I'm trying to take care of my medical/dental paperwork, every applicant's nightmare. The good news is that I've got a dentist appointment on Wednesday with a dentist who is part of the International College of Dentists, who offers free x-rays and basic check-ups for Peace Corps applicants, which is totally awesome. Of course my teeth are in terrible shape and I know this, so I'm not expecting great results, but we'll see. Next, I tackle medical.
At the start of my closing shift, Jason comes by all excited about a meeting with Reading Partners and the evolution of Old Soul’s plan to adopt a troubled school. Apparently the school has been picked (welcome to the family, Peter Burnett Elementary) and come August, Old Soul will be officially sending volunteers and money at these kids to help raise test scores and all that jazz, and I’m totally interested in being a part of this and I’m glad Jason recognizes that and I hope he keeps me in the loop. Weird to have all this education reform going on in a coffee-shop and my instinct to seek a higher paycheck is conflicted with a curiosity to see where it's all going to lead.
Of course when it’s a night when I want to get out of work early, people start showing up an hour before closing and decide to hang around with their friends, opened laptops, and French presses. I’m listening to this scraggly-haired fellow named Bill talking about the encyclopedia of voices in his head, scribbling notes on the front page of a newspaper as he asks me to look up the phone number of a private attorney. Joe’s having me fill his cellphone with music from my netbook and acts like it’s an achievement on par with putting a man on the moon. Kirsten stops by to say goodbye (she’s moving to the Bay to avoid her sister) and then decides to go get us a pizza. Jenny comes by to do a little reading, and I can tell she’s bothered with Kirsten being around, but I can’t do anything about that right now as I try to clean the espresso machine and answer this other lady’s questions about buying green coffee-beans and she's on the phone getting asked a thousand questions and I have to bullshit her about which bean has the most chocolately undertones.
I finally make it to 7:00pm without much prep for the close and start kicking people out. Jenny disappears. Kirsten sticks around outside where she’s been cornered by Matty, who’s going on and on about being eighty-sixed from Temple Coffee. I put on Foster The People to get amped for tonight’s show and bring in the chairs, the signs, do a quick sweep, count down the register, close down the machine and get started on dishes.
It’s around 7:20 when a large group comes wandering inside and I greet them and tell them we’re closed for business. I tell the young guy at the register that our other location at H and 21st is still open, and he asks me how to get there, and I’m stunned for a moment because this is Midtown, we live in a grid system, and you get to H and 21st by knowing your alphabet and how to count. The mom-figure of the group points to the radio and says, “Well what if he’s in the band that’s playing?” Here is where I totally lose my ability to formulate words and I get completely flustered. I’m still trying to count how many blocks it is to the other Old Soul, but now I’m stumped because the Foster The People song that’s playing isn’t even one of their popular ones, so… Is she telling the truth? Is this guy actually in the band? I’ve only seen a couple photos of them, and though I’m a huge fan of their radio single, I wouldn’t recognize any of the band members in real life. But this guy suddenly looks really familiar and I’m still stumbling over my words, part flustered from running late, part flustered because I’m star-struck, so whatever jumbled dialogue I sputter out of my mouth probably makes no sense. I feel myself blush. I may have even broken into a cold sweat. I definitely don’t take advantage of this happenstance meeting with a member of Foster The People, the band whose hit single in my music library has been played 84 times since February (that's 5.6 hours of listening). The group wanders outside and vanishes down the alley. I keep doing dishes. Moments later I start feeling like a big idiot because I let them get away without even verifying if, in fact, that guy was actually in the band or not. But of course he was, and he’d come with his family. The band is in town performing tonight at Harlow’s, so of course they’d come to look at Sacramento and get dinner and coffee before the show. Why not? And I was playing Foster The People’s new album so loud that they must’ve heard it from the street and wandered in.
For whatever reason, I feel the need to rush over to the other Old Soul and see if I can’t catch them there, where I’d foolishly sent them, and, I don’t know, apologize or just get a second chance to say how much of a fan I am. Kirsten’s still around so I ask if she wants to tag along and she does, so we rush over there once I’m clocked out and, unfortunately, I’ve missed the chance. They're not there. Instead I just feel like an embarrassed idiot. But whatever. I still have an awesome show to look forward to.
I say goodbye to Kirsten and bike over to Jenny’s around 8:00. I go on and on about my little star-struck escapade and she’s trying on a thousand different outfits, half-listening, and I just feel dumb talking like some fifteen-year-old school-girl who bumped into Justin Beiber at the mall, so I finally let it go and Jenny admits to being in a funk because of Kirsten and we talk it out and move past it and then it’s finally time to go to Harlow’s.
Ross meets us outside while we’re waiting in line, alone and with extra tickets because some people bailed on him, and he asks if we know anyone who'd want to see the show. Knowing she was jealous of our plans, I text an invite to Jessica and she says she’ll gladly take one of those tickets and, across town, she starts to get ready. In the meantime, Jenny and Ross and I head inside and get our wristbands and drinks at the bar, cheers, drink, and wander toward the stage.
The opening band, The Chain Gang of 1974, does a great job of fueling the crowd with energy and the lead singer, who looks like the first evil-ex from Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, even brings the microphone down into the crowd to sing and dance among the people. Everyone’s taking photos with camera phones, squeezing together on Harlow’s little dance floor, and really getting into the music. They wrap up their set and clear the stage.
It’s literally an hour before Foster The People get up there, and by that time people are growing restless, booing, chanting, fidgeting, and it’s getting so hot inside that we can’t breathe. I guess they were having sound trouble. Jessica arrives. We start pushing toward the front of the stage, moving past these lumbering fellows who dance like orcs. An older woman drinking white wine notices that I smell like smoke. Jenny and I invite her to come to one of the Hump-Day Bonfires. Finally the band comes on stage and we start cheering.
And yes, the guy who came into Old Soul with his family was, in fact, in the band, with a guitar slung over his shoulder and the same brown coat I saw him wearing at the coffee-shop. Everyone in the band is young and the lead singer (Mr. Foster himself) has a high voice that takes a second for my ears to adjust to, but with the drums and the guitar and the dance-happy melodies, it quickly gets my feet moving. Everyone’s dancing, taking camera-photos, spilling drinks, bumping, jumping, singing along, cheering, smiling and having a great time. They play all the songs off their album, wrapping up with “Pumped Up Kicks” and really putting on a great little show that finishes strong, and we’re all left fulfilled and sweaty and hot with our ears ringing and voices strained, wandering aimlessly toward the exits for fresh air.
That night I have an amazing, epic dream about a zombie invasion and excitedly tell Jenny all about it in the morning.
We get brunch at Old Soul and I find out that my paycheck is delayed for another week, which sucks, and I leave Jenny to get money from the bank and pay my rent, then find out how broke I am and we decide against impromptu plans for a trip to Santa Cruz. When Jenny comes by to pick me up on the way to get her leaky tire patched, she’s in a panic because the tire is way worse than she realized, so all the way to Walmart she’s worried about a catastrophic blow-out. We make it just fine. She gets the tire patched. I buy some underwear. We head over to The Beat and she buys an Adele album. Then it’s a lot of lounging at her apartment, Jenny makes an amazing salad, I finish my short story and she invites Meg and David over. Fast forward to ten o’clock and we’re heading over to The Townhouse with Meg, David, Jenn and Nick, but the place is filled with smoke and lasers and nothing else, so we spend the next hour at Alley Katz instead, this hip bar that we all thought was a strip-club. It’s super social in this place and they serve tons of great beer and there are people everywhere, talking, laughing, playing pool and foosball, waiting in line for the bathrooms. They serve these tall three-pitcher beer towers, which we order once we’ve snagged a booth with these three other strangers, and conversation picks up and we all become friends over talk of high-speed rail, shared office buildings, where we went to high school and the such. I have a pretty good time, though I really just feel like dancing, and marvel in the meantime over what all these strangers are talking about around me. Meg and I play a game of pool to win the table, just before closing time, and we win and it’s beautiful. Next we go back to Townhouse with our stamped wrists and like magic, the place is full of people and noise and I lead us immediately to the dance floor and the dancing begins. We pick up abandoned glow-sticks from the floor and swirl them in the smoke and get lost in the techno, being goofy, having fun, and we’re all pretty drunk and high off the energy and I disappear with Jenny for a while and we get touchy-feely on the staircase, against the wall of the dance-floor, and we’re so into each other it makes the world fade away and I’ve never felt anything so amazing. Eventually we slip outside and head back to her apartment where we eat breakfast at 2:00am and I don’t even remember falling asleep, but it happens.
- Left to Fry
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