i kind of forgot about this saved draft. it's mad old but still fun.
april 21st, 2009
from beginning to end, last night was magical. from deciding a day earlier on a whim to go by myself, meeting up with people i'd never have seen otherwise, and walking 18 city blocks in the pouring rain to get the tickets (not to mention the 13 more to the venue after that) i have never been so sure that i was right where i needed to be.
i walked out of there with two new friends who live half an hour away; i met them in line and riz, them & i enjoyed the show together. joey degraw's set felt entirely self-righteous so i was not into it (he introduced one of his original songs with "this is one i think you guys might know." like...who are you again?), but honey honey was kind of great. would totes download.
riz went to get a beer during honey honey and joey degraw stepped on me, excused himself, and then elbowed me out of my spot so talk to the vip's at the tables behind me. when riz came back, we made it really obvious that we were there together and that there was plenty of room for all three of us to stand there if he would just move his big stupid self out of the way, but our efforts were in vain. we danced him out, eventually. it was funny.
i came back from the bar after honey honey's set to quite a commotion - apparently hayden panittiere (sp?) and lee norris had seated themselves directly behind us, where they remained throughout the duration of the show. mouth and me had a ~*moment even!
when gavin came on, i was getting a drink. i remember no joke feeling him enter the room and if that makes me crazy so be it. i recognized the first few measures of "dancing shoes" and almost lost it right there. as soon as i got back to my spot, i called katie from my new friend melissa's phone and left what i could of the song on her voicemail. it felt like the right thing to do. it was also the only thing i knew how to do in that moment.
overall, the show was only okay. a lot of songs from the new album, so not very many sing-alongs. "chariot," "meaning," "belief" and "chemical party" all made their appearances though so i was satisfied. riz "reluctantly" (notice the quotations; he loved every minute of it) took me to national underground (gavin's bar) for the afterparty, which was open invite, holla at officially being able to say i've been to an afterparty of anything besides prom. within the first fifteen minutes joey fucking degraw had statoned himself directly on top of me, which was awesome of him, i thought. we them proceeded to "talk" (or should i say, he gave me the privilege of listening to him talk about himself/his music/his bar/his hopes and dreams) for 20 minutes which ended with him hitting on me, which was comical at best. riz and i celebrated 420 for a bit, in which i broke my bowl :(, and met up with ilana and nicole who flipped when she found out she was in the very same place as minkus from boy meets world.
lan and i left nicole to stalk out lee norris and have a cigarette, which is right about the time gavin arrived. let me tell you what, i was more emotional than i thought i'd be. it was weird being there with people who are legitimate, real-life friends of gavin when all that i know of him is his music, but in a way it was kind of more meaningful when she backed off because i didn't have to share my time with anyone.
i had planned what i was going to say in the moments before, and i was feeling really good about it. we introduced ourselves and i told him how much i enjoyed tonight's show, and that it was my first in four years. he said, "welcome back, thanks for coming!" i wasn't going to explain how he broke my heart with his second piece of garbage album, so i just said what i had planned. i told him to forgive me because i didn't have words to make me sound less creepy or weird, but that he was one of my favorite people in the world and that his music has gotten me through a lot. i was choking back tears i meant it so much, but let's be real, i was not going to cry in front of gavin degraw. he grabbed my hand right then and thanked me from the bottom of his heart. i apologized again and told him that it just really meant a lot for me to be here at his show tonight for so many reasons, i asked him to always stay true to himself, and he held my eye contact and my hand in his the whole time. i only really truly believed he understood me when he said "really, thank you. your words humble me, and stop apologizing because you've said it well."
and that's kind of when i stopped caring what happened next because i'd said everything i wanted to and he understood and cared that i was a real fan of his music. that's all any fan ever really wants to know, anyway.