I was in Lawrence this evening to see The Shins and as I walked around town it dawned on me that I had a rather odd question on my mind. I wasn’t thinking about how good the band was going to be or where to grab dinner or even whether or not spending late nights at concerts in college towns is good for me from a career path perspective. No, I was wondering whether or not I should wear a coat to the concert or leave it in the car. Given that there was a below zero wind chill, this was a pretty serious internal debate.
In the end, comfort won out and I wore the coat. (My body is telling me more and more that my next move should be to warmer climate. When you’re walking around and your fingertips begin to go numb even though you are wearing gloves it’s a sign that all of those Chicago winters have taken their toll. Admittedly, global warming will make this a moot point in five years.) It was a rather interesting internal monologue as I had to decide between looking cool and freezing to death.
As I thought through it, I figured out that it doesn’t matter what I look like at these shows because my odds of meeting anyone are so slim anyway. I don’t walk in the door planning on chatting up a 19 year old sophomore or a 22 year old senior. Running into a cool grad student would be nice but that has almost never happened. And for a show like the Shins it is worse because when I walked in I was seriously the oldest guy there who wasn’t somebody’s dad.
I mean, shows like this and Carbon Leaf remind me of the fact that I am getting old. When I moved here a few years back going to shows in Lawrence was fine. I was just out of grad school and being around college kids was normal. (Hell, like all ND students I had a St. Mary’s girl who, well, I don’t know if I could say that she liked me. More like, she didn’t out and out despise me.) But then as the years went by the kids who had X’s on their hands began to look just like that, kids. And on Saturday night even the people who were drinking looked way too young to be in a bar. It’s tough to realize that you can no longer walk into a college bar and fade in. Now, my best hope is for people to think I’m just the guy working on his third graduate degree. Which isn’t that far from the truth.
(Though I do have to say, over the years in Lawrence I have had some interesting nights. For some reason, my best luck in meeting women has occurred at Ani DiFranco shows. Possibly due to the odds being in my favor, possibly due to the fact that I stood out like a sore thumb. Then there was the Mindy Smith show where I met my stalker. And then there was the woman who asked me if I had any pot at a Gillian Welch show of all things. So yeah, my batting average at these shows is not very high.)
The show was good. I’ll write about it tomorrow. Right now, I want to rest my feet. Another sign that I’m getting old: standing in one spot for three straight hours causes every body part to ache. It’s one thing for my bad shoulder to start hurting; it’s done that every morning for nearly a decade. Tonight my good shoulder decided to get in on the act. Some people claim I’m not enthusiastic for the bands, in reality sometimes cheering is just too painful.
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