Live Music Is Living My Best Life

My first concert was when I was 13. I didn't appreciate it at all at the time. It was with a friend who was almost a frenemy but my mom made me go. It was Billy Joel at F&M college circa 1997, 1998ish. My first concern I cared about what at Hershey Stadium. Hanson. I have no shame. It was huge and overwhelming and loud but so fun. I didn't see many other concerts until I was 18, but was lucky enough to see *NSYNC in south Florida when I was 17, which was awesome.

When I moved to Oregon and connected with music to get me through all my family stuff I started going to concerts. My dad wouldn't go with me, but would drop me off and pick me up or make my older sisters take me until I was about 19 and had large dude friend to look out for me. By the time I was 19 going to concerts was like a hobby and collecting tickets, bumper stickers, shirts, autographs, anything I could get was like a sport.

Last night I went to the radio station 97X's sponsored event called the "Freebie Weebie." I drove an hour to a dive bar to get the "free" tickets and an hour home about a month ago because a band I would have paid to see, was going to be free at my favorite venue, Jannus Landing and St. Pete, a mere 6 blocks from my office. I recruited a friend and off we went.

The band has now exploded onto mainstream channels, but started with one simple hit, "Broken." I heard the song early one morning and couldn't get past how amazing the lyrics were: "I like that you're broken, broken like me, maybe that makes me a fool. I like that you're lonely, lonely like me, I could be lonely with you." I did what I do best which was find them on Spotify and immediately devour the debut album of Lovelytheband.

Last year when I found this album my life was really in a huge state of upheaval for me. When I found this album it seems to reach out to all my mental health struggles, relationship struggles, feelings of inadequacy and lonely but surrounded by people parallels. I felt like it was written for me, which I hadn't felt in a couple years so it was really comforting. I quickly found multiple songs I loved but my favorite was called "Stupid Mistakes" and professed, "We all make stupid mistakes sometimes, but I make them more than most, and it's my fault that I live my life running away from ghosts. Too many skeletons, too hard to keep them in the closet where they've been. We all make stupid mistakes sometimes you're the one that I miss the most."

Going to concerts is like a religious experience for me. The way that some people connect when they are at church is me at a concert, especially a concert where the band's entire album or collection has profoundly affected me. These rights go to: Hanson, Death Cab for Cutie, Dashboard Confessional, Rilo Kiley, The Decemberists, Cake, and Ben Folds to name the most dominant. 

This free concert event came to me with reservations. I'm too old to deal with drunk kids spilling beer on me and being unaware and insensitive. The bar fights and people too drunk or high to know they are at a show aren't cute or benign anymore, they make me jaded and cynical and annoyed. But I wanted to see Lovelytheband before they were "too cool" and lost the ability to play small venues. 

The entire night was actually great. Not only did I have perfect company, but the opening band was from St. Pete and sounded fine, the second act I had just happened upon from the same station and they reminded me of other bands I loved back in my youth and they put on quite an amazing set, and Lovelytheband played all of my favorites off of the album. 

When they played their hit "Broken" the lead singer spoke about being young and being sad but not really knowing why he was sad and said, "Sometimes it's okay to not be okay and never feel badly asking for help. Asking for help is great!" He spoke about mental health awareness and it kicked me right in the feels. It was so perfect. 

I had had a weird end to my week with amazing news, frustrating news, relieving news, extra hurdles, late bedtimes, not enough food, too much stress and just feeling anxious about multiple things. I had felt the love and support from some of my favorite people while all the while feeling a little isolated. It was quite literally all the feels and happy struggles, but struggles still and then I had such an inspiring musical end.

After the concert I had a weird, miraculous event that I can only hope was some good karma after a strange week. I had walked my friend to her car in a neighboorhod I knew well. I had just had a kind homeless man tell my tired self that I looked beautiful while walking back to the parking garage at my work complex, which is apartments with retail space. Before the show I wanted to take the least amount of stuff with me, so I took off my car keychains, and my key card for my office. I thought, I don't need to get back into the building anyway, just into the parking garage so no biggy.

I had done this once before with no issue but had my whole purse and entered through the lobby. This time I didn't need all the extra stuff. I had just text the sitter that I would be exactly on time as predicted. The night had gone as I expected which was such a strange comfort. When I ran into the parking garage, they had lowered a gate and locked a doorway I had never even seen before. It seemed to have a weird punch code with numbers. And I didn't have my key card to get in through the building. It was locked in my car, behind that gate. Oh my gosh, HOW WAS I GOING TO GET IN TO GET MY CAR TO GET HOME.

I had thought quickly on my feet and called my friend immediately thinking, okay worst case she can get me home to the sitter, we could get my car tomorrow and I'd have to write the babysitter a check or get her cash tomorrow because I locked my money safely in my car so it couldn't get lost or stolen at the show. I dialed my friend and got 3 rings in. Someone pulled in to come into the garage and the gate opened, I followed them in. It happened to be the resident that parked exactly in front of my car and I mouthed a relieved "Thank you" to her while she was on her phone.

When my friend picked up the phone after I had scampered past the huge gate, I said, "I thought I had an issue but I'm good now." I rushed to get out as if worried I'd be stuck and on the drive home was just praying thankfully. I thought, I would have been there forever waiting. Or had to make my friend drive me home. Or pay for an uber. WOW. How weird that I didn't know they had a main gate, I'd never seen it closed. I didn't have my key card, which I always do, and a car pulled in to let me in as I had almost begun to panic. WOW. I felt like the universe gave me a pat on the back after the musical therapy as an affirmation that things would keep being muddled through and I would prevail.

Music has always been a form of therapy but after last night it just reminded me that I'm at my best when I'm around live music. My voice is hoarse today, I'm exhausted and look haggard but it was all worth it for the dose of musical serenity. I feel blessed. It was worth every dime for the babysitter and every extra yawn. If you ever want to know me well, take me to a concert, it nourishes my soul to be around music and especially a good crowd that appreciates it as well.

With that said I hope to lock in an early bed time as my party days are numbered but feel so blessed to have had last night as another part of living my best life in the books. I may not have gotten a ticket stub, t-shirt or bumper sticker but I got the full concert experience and had some good karma after. Now back to reality. 

I Am A Serial Plant Killer

I just finished devouring all of The Ted Bundy Tapes on Netflix and while, as an American, I'm naturally intrigued by serial killers and love crime drama type things, it has brought to light my own issues, which include my penchant for killing plants. I am a serial killer...of plants.

This isn't a malicious thing. I don't hunt and attack the plants. But if you give me a plant to water and care for, I will kill it. I mean, come and look at my yard. I'm the complete opposite of any kind of green thumb at all. I'm the black thumb...black death.

My problem is, I don't really care about plants, and again it's not like I want to purposefully hurt them, they just aren't on my radar. I keep my dog and my kid alive and healthy. The same just cannot be said for plants.

I haven't been given many plants, but I inevitably kill them all. I have at least a dozen that have met their demise under my care. I do okay with a bouquet of flowers but those are eventually supposed to die so I feel no remorse there. In the past few years though, I have received too many plants that have not survived me.

After the car accident people gave us a few "Our thoughts are with you" types of plants. These were simple grocery store or Lowe's garden section plants. Nothing impressive really, but they barely lasted a week. I forget to water. Or I over-water, or they get no air or sunlight. They are neglected. Even outdoor plants get neglected. Why water them? Ever heard of rain?

It was about a year and a half ago when we had a house warming that a church friend gave me a "mother-in-law" or snake plant type thing and said, "Don't worry, this thing is actually hard to kill." This one lasted the longest of any plant that I have received but I did, eventually, kill it. I think it was able to live with me about 7 months. Never would I claim that this plant thrived.

I even consciously wanted to keep that damned plant alive with no luck! The plants hate me, we just do not get along.

And now for my daughter's birthday my cousin got her something super cool, interactive and thoughtful...succulents. I think we may have already lost one or two. I've replanted with proper soil and am watering, sunning and trying, but I have made no promises to these plants. I fear the worst.

I watch other people who love plants and I'm in awe. I feel like I lack that capacity to adore and care for plant life. I can match outfits, arrange, organize, file, clean, type, write, even sew, but things involving plants are just not my forte. If it were up to me, we wouldn't even have a yard, just a huge screened enclosure with firepit, grill, and hot tub. Not kidding.

I love nature. I was raised in nature and with a deep respect for nature and it seems I may be one of the only people in my entire family who has no interest in caring for plant life and keeping it happy and alive. I have seriously and serially killed all plants that have come into contact with me. I may not be Bundy-style deranged and psychopathic but these poor plants have never even seen it coming!

Perhaps I'm too focused on my own personal growth!

Fire Pit Future: Simple Things Are Often Big Achievements

I was totally into apartment life when we first moved to Florida. Rent wasn't too terrible, and unlike in Oregon, there was a pool. Plus the neighbors were okay; we were comfy. I arranged and rearranged set ups and we even had a spare room for visitors. 

When we got the dog apartment life didn't bother me but I wanted a nicer apartment and neighborhood and dog parks. You gotta level up sometimes. So we made an upgrade and off we went to a place with huge bathtubs and walk-in closets right by my husband's job.

As soon as I had a baby though, I wanted a house, and not just because we lived on the second floor. I wanted to paint walls and hang pictures and decorate for real. I wanted to argue about curtains and flooring and have grown up furniture. Even just a little house. With a yard and a fire pit for roasting marshmallows. These were my simple dreams and goals.

The family that I nanny-ed for bought a new house after their daughter was born. It was like 4 blocks from their old one but set up much better for a little one to grow. And I loved their yard. They had a pavement two story patio (a lot of houses in Oregon are like that) that overlooked part of a valley and the middle school their kiddos attended. Their yard wasn't huge but they had bushes around the fence and 3 planter boxes with veggies growing. It was a homey place. Even after we moved and we would crash there, I'd sit on the patio and drink wine out there with my old bosses on an Oregon summer evening and think, "This is my goal."

Of course in Florida it requires a screened in porch and there are no valleys, but still. I wanted an outdoor area to decompress. Our first attempt at buying a house was harrowing. There was buried debt and we basically were told we were undesirable #1, Harry Potter style, when my daughter was 1. I was completely devastated but not unwilling to put in the work to get what I wanted. 

I had two dream towns in Florida and both, of course, were expensive. We finally found a kitschy house in Safety Harbor to rent, which was dream town number one, and I started paying attention. Places sold there fast and in my mind it seemed there were two kinds of houses: Old Florida where you needed to be handy enough to keep them going on your own, and newer construction that I like to refer to as "Pre-Fab Shit Boxes," or cookie cutter architecture. Of course there were also the monstrosities that mirrored those that lined A-1-A in West Palm, but I could never afford a Floridian 6 bath 6 bedroom on the water, nor could I maintain keeping that thing clean. The few in betweens that stood on their own were worth the hunt though. 

I just wanted an old Florida single level house I could clean on my own. It wasn't until after the car accident that when some money came our way we were less unfortunate-looking candidates for a home and were allowed to actually look. Most of the places I liked that my husband went to see were picture perfect but seriously flawed. One was slanted, and the other had the perfect screened in patio and pool, but was in a really rough neighborhood and also had some seriously evident water damage on the floors. The floor tiles were even loose. Another just had so many renovations to make it what we wanted. It was overwhelming. 

When we finally found our house, they had completely redone the inside, it was in a really good, quiet neighborhood and at the top of our price range but perfectly sized. There was a walk in closet from the master bathroom and...a small screened in porch in the back of the house that overlooked the next street over and below us, and all the trees that gave us privacy. This was pretty close to what I'd always wanted.

One of our first house warming gifts was a fire pit. I was so excited. The first chance we had to use it was at the edge of the porch on a cooler Florida fall evening. My husband gave me this huge, huge speech about how you can't put a fire pit on a wooden porch and it was a huge hazard so it would live in the yard. The first night we were out there was so nice, and then the mosquitoes ate us alive. Not my dream.

Then I used it in our stone driveway on new year's eve one night but kept the front window open so I could hear the kid in the house if she woke up. Then I got another speech about smoke in the house and it was the worst idea. It was kind of defeating. Don't get me wrong, I'm not always the sharpest tool in the shed, but I grew up camping and know how to start a fire and all the precautions that come along with it. It wasn't the BEST situation in either case, but we also weren't having huge bonfires. We were just having a little warmth and marshmallows.

After awhile I gave up on my fire pit quest for comfort and the porch became less and less a place of re-charging, and more of just another area on the property. Recently something happened that has been a big win and achievement: the fire pit has been moved into the screened in porch!

After a very calm and sensible discussion with the man of the house, he decided if we're keeping it really low and it's breezy enough and we keep our eye on it, yeah it can be in the screened in porch. This was the stuff of dreams coming true. Less than 24 hours of the fire pit arriving in it's new home and I was lighting it up! I was so excited to just hang out by the fire. And it's been Florida winter lately so it's super perfect for it too.

This might all sound ridiculous but these little wins are what life is all about sometimes. In the span of an evening we gave the porch a little up-cycle action and it took on a whole new vibe. I like being out there again, fire or no fire, and my daughter insisted on a fire-side picnic. We even got the dog to snuggle by the fire with us.

Why is this a big achievement for me? Because it means compromise and something homey. We've had the house for 2 years and it is just now starting to feel like home. We still have projects looming and goals to reach but this is home. And for this winter day in Florida, I'll be home and fireside, staying warm and basking in the small successes that make this house ours. Happy Saturday readers!