First Gig Back and with Matt, Sig House, Southwestern University

What a riot tonight. At 10:45, five people milled about the Sig house. Leery that the show would remain a dud, I took some of my xanax, readying myself for the awkward claps and the deeply humiliating silence between weak claps at the end of each song. 

Then, a flood of bodies came. Slow at first, then more rapidly, steadily that way for the rest of the night. It was fucking rock. I felt the spirit. I rocked with Matt. It was his first show. I drank from beer and poured water in my hair and sometimes surveyed the audience. I chuckled inside my brain. Everything is very strange, inexplicable, and at times ridiculous. I surveyed all their faces. Who are they and why are they here? Just all the faces; I was satisfied with whoever looked back at me. Who knows; the feeling is bizarre. I like people better out there together, a big picture of emotion. Something in a line of faces is pure because it is shared. I did not mind and even liked them as they all danced and eyed us from a few feet away in the near dark and the loudness. 

We finished with Dream Collector and were quickly cheered back onto stage for an encore. We played Magazine Soul. Then the one more song chant began. After a quick deliberation- Walker warned that 100 angry people might descend on us if we didn't close with another one - after that conference, we elected to close with petty's Won't Back Down. A success. I then drifted between crowds as Trav took around the mailing list. One girl waited in front of the monitor, right in front of my pedal board, no one around. Some drunk guy was asking me if he spilled any beer on our equipment. I said no, but stepping over my pedal board I slipped past her with my head turned away and angled shoulders. She was a nice, pretty girl; I am sure of it. Right now, really recalling all that body movement and that one space in time, I think that it was heartbreaking what happened. A small failure, between the two of us.

Tonight, I shared a romance with everyone in the building. I enjoyed seeing them all walking, laughing, encountering one another. I wasn't inclined to feel this affection for them because they had liked our music. The nice thing was descending out of the lights and into the movement once again. I felt like a secret father, some uncle or best friend watching intently from across the yard  at their own son that will never know the truth. I watched them with that relaxed pride. They did not know, but that did not matter. Secretly, they are mine and I will protect them.