In Concert

How do I get this blog off the ground? It's all gummed up. It's all gummed up for a reason. Or, because of a reason, anyway. Same reason I sat trying unsuccessfully to get lost in a crowd at a Fleet Foxes concert I thought I couldn't go to and then thought I shouldn't go to and then thought I wouldn't go to until Kyle said "You better go, so I didn't just wash my car for nothing," because going to the concert meant borrowing his car. So I tried to feel grateful for a friend like that, and I tried to laugh again about Lindsay asking "What band are you going to see?" when we could both hear before the question was all the way out that she knew she wouldn't know about or care to know about whatever band I was going to see. Then I thought maybe I should get out of my head and just listen to the show. I also thought cement was an awful thing to sit on and that I was a definite concert rookie for not bringing a blanket. And about that time the lyrics broke through—"And Michael you would fall and turn the white snow red as strawberries in the summertime"—and Niah had asked me if I wanted strawberries and cream, which was hilarious because Niah is three, which means that her offer really just meant that she wanted strawberries and cream—and hitched to that memory the solution to a problem I hadn't realized I was still working on came to me like inspiration. It was the best way to tie the string so that Niah could wear her glow stick as a necklace. It was that waxy kind of string that always wants to break or come undone when you tie it, and it had thwarted my attempts twice, but the solution was so simple I couldn't believe I hadn't thought of it when it was right there in front of me. And now it was too late. But it was no big deal, I told myself. It was just a string for a glow stick. Kyle or Lindsay could work it out. And I'd be better for it next time, I reasoned, still locked into the mood to care about such things much too deeply. And almost two weeks later I'm thinking, if it's got to be all mixed up, at least it's all mixed up together.