While I’m waiting for my seitan and wild rice took cook and before I put them in the oven with a harvest of veggies I thought I’d make a post while listening to Cub.
I got my new phone the other day and I’m still figuring out how to use it. Apparently the backup assist is not available on this model so I have to go into a store and have them retrieve the numbers off my old old phone. Just more annoyance for my stolen phone thing. This means I don’t have your phone number. If you text you should say who you are. I’d like that.
Tuesday night Paul and I rode downtown and met with Dan Hack to go see the Happy Monday and the Psychedelic Furs. Dan is rad. I wish we could hang out more. Too bad life gets too busy. The show was good and sort of surreal. It is just one of the ornaments of autumn decorating my memory tree these days but I’ll get to that later. I never thought I would see either of those bands live. Somehow they really didn’t seem to fit together but there they were delivering songs from my jr. high and high school years straight to my ears from instruments. Speaking of, I hear Morrissey is playing in Portland when I get back. The Pixies and Morrissey both in November? rad!
Yesterday we had our first rain that felt like fall. My friend Blue helps put on this event called Movie-a-roke. It’s like Karaoke but with films. She had captured a scene from my favorite movie Heathers so I sort of had to brave the rain. I seemed to have forgotten how to dress to ride in the rain over the summer. I put on my rain jacket that got soaked by the time I got there and switched to a jean jacket in my bag. Anyway, I rocked my best Heather Chandler channeling my inner bitch and yelling at a stranger how she was a girl scout cookie and no one at Westerburg will play her reindeer games. Good times.
The I walked a mile or two in the rain listening to my new autumn mix with plenty of Joy Division, Jesus and Mary Chain, Jawbreaker, Despitado, Sarge, Sleater-Kinney and Cub to keep me company. It was nice to walk in the rain for a bit. I thought about how this is my 10th autumn in Portland. I thought about my first autumn and, against my better judgment, who I was with and how we were were waiting for the rain so we could kiss in it. When the rain came we abandoned the couch we had been sleeping on to spend hours walking the bridges at night and reading zines to each other in dry doorways. I drank shitty coffee with free refills as he drank iced tea at late night places. Strange what you find yourself doing when someone tells you they like you, eh?
Which got me thinking about a conversation I had (on the internets) with my friend Zack about crushes and how rad they are and why they are rad. So, as I was walking in the rain last night I was thinking about crushes past present and future. When you have a crush on someone, whether they know or not is makes them shine a little brighter. Once the secret of a crush is out you can’t really put it back. Believe me, I’ve had my share of awkward reveals on both sides full of acceptances and denials.
The other part of a crush that Zach and I were talking about is pure ego when it comes down to it. When your crush is returned or when you know someone has a crush on you it means that someone else thinks you are as cool as you secretly wish you were so it makes you shine a little brighter no matter how fleeting it is.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I use the word crush but it isn’t always a romantic thing. I’m really susceptible to brain crushes when I meet someone new and to be honest, I have a lot of them. It’s like I just want to hang around hearing what falls out of their brain/mouth next. It’s like the person is a really great puzzle that keeps you going just enough not to stump you.
I think crushes are perfectly acceptable in monogamous relationships too. It’s like anything else, what you do with it that matters. I mean, how can you blame someone for having a crush? It just means they see good stuff in other people. Hopefully you have a partner who has crushes too and doesn’t feel weird and guilty about them and you can talk about them.
Wow, this is so something I would have written for my zine circa 1997… wait, I think I did write something like this for my zine in 1997!
Ok, my food is just about done. Time to go make some mushroom gravy. I was going to post some photos but I’m going to finish this beer and eat some food. Can you believe that Jubelale is out already? It’s not even really autumn yet and the winter ale is already out?
Alex Wrekk 