2008 was kind of an oddly dark year for me. School was getting harder, I still wasn't finding love or anything (and made some really dumbass decisions that prevented me from doing so), and though the band was strong, we kept having issues with our rhythm guitarist and had no idea when he'd quit the band. I guess that being said, it's no coincidence that this was the year I obtained Pinkerton, weezer's 1996 album that's often hailed as being emo before emo was cool. Also it didn't suck.
I can almost put an exact date on when I got the thing too. Well, of course I can since I got it the same day The Red Album came out, June 3, 2008, which seems about right since school can't have ended. The only reason I know that school can't have ended is that there's a person that I associate Pinkerton with, and I have an incredibly vivid memory of her and I sitting on top of the desks in Art Class (which reminds me of another memory I have of watching her face as the teacher failed several times to draw a circle) and her listening to this CD I made of my band for another guy. Pinkerton is relevant because that was what I was listening to that day with the portable CD player she was using at that minute.
Anyway, the affection I had for this girl, Lauren, was really odd for me, since it wasn't straight up at all. I was still sort of used to "see hot girl, realize or make up something good about her, swoon over her like Romeo on Valentine's Day." Lauren was different though. For one, she didn't fit the everyday definition of "hot." She was quite a big bigger than I was, and had more rounded features rather than some svelte hot chick. She was not, and I hate this word because it's brutish, ugly, but again, she wasn't ugly, at all, by any means. On top of this she didn't seem like the type to date or anything either. That and distance that tend to make me back off and reserve my feelings for people.
The thing that impressed about Lauren was her personality. Brazen, up front, and ballsy. She was going to tell it like it was, even when no one else was going to. She didn't have any fear, it seemed, which is totally the anithesis of me. Plus, all of this came with a fantastic wit. When I first sort of met her, I remember shaking my head at that personality. In one class, she was called "Your Majesty" and that seemed like the total, self-inflating ego that I was growing very averse to. Lauren was more of a Kamina though. Though she was undoubtedly intelligent and capable of performing any academic feat she wanted, her outspoken manner concealed someone who didn't quite believe in herself. It was something I saw in myself too. She took her failures and shortcomings very very seriously, and once a problem began in her head, it never seemed to let go.
But back to Pinkerton, which was really just a timing thing. It's a great album, full of Rivers Cuomo's rawest, darkest emotions. For a young guy who can't find anyone to like him, Pinkerton is the Bible. It tells stories of hopelessness, potential delirium and the effects of constant rejection, among other things. For anyone who wanted to curl up and let it all out, Pinkerton was the way they could do it. It's a blast of emotion the likes of which can be found no where else in music. It really is emo done right.
So naturally, on principle, thoughts about Lauren mingled in with these songs. She became the girl from No Other One, the thing I shouldn't bother with, the person who was a lot like me in El Scorcho, the random lesbian that was impossible to get in Pink Triangle, and the person who I was falling for. Most of all though, she was an 18 year old girl who lived in a small city in Japan, way across the sea. I think that when I got really brave, I once had her listen to the song and told her that it made me think of her. Naturally, she pointed out that she wasn't Japanese, and for whatever reason, that didn't stop me.
Of course, I was much like the main character in the song still. I was still thousands of miles away, only wondering what this girl who was befriending me was actually like. The sea epic vibe of the whole thing (and honestly, the fill in this song is one of the best musical depictions of the sea I've ever encountered) kinda fit the new grounds I was at least looking at emotionally. Of course, I wasn't thinking about this psychological point of view back then. Back then I was only thinking about whether or not I actually liked this girl, because despite it all, I thought I had a shot with her if it was what I really wanted.
So there really was no rhyme or reason to why I associated Lauren with Across the Sea more than any other song on Pinkerton. The main point of the song was there, yes, and even then I cleverly phrased my explanation of the song in my head as "maybe across a county is just too far away" in the cute way I always used to do. For whatever reason, it was my favorite song on the album, and it just happened to be the one I related to her most. That's how it is, and anyone who's ever had developing feelings for another person knows it. There really aren't reasons for it, they just are. To this day I think about Lauren when I hear that song, and how far away she is, kind of like back then.
With all the certainty of a meek youth, I really was a Cuomoesque kind of guy, minus the sweaters of the Pinkerton Years. On the outside, I was very very reserved, not outspoken at all, but on the inside there was this sea epic going on. Better still, Pinkerton was music, a medium through which I was learning to express myself, so it quickly became the best thing ever...a part of me, like some of your favorite albums do. So not only does Pinkerton tell a story about whatever Rivers Cuomo wrote about in the 1990s, but also a story about my life in 2008. It tells about a time when the going got rough and I didn't want to get going. It told a story about an internal battle I was having about whether or not I should risk having my heart broken by a girl who might not even be interested in the prospect that I was. It was also about the girl herself, who avoided being captured by anyone song on the album, and had to settle for one that wasn't quite right. That's the beauty of dissonance though, especially in music. You take something that isn't quite right and make it work just because you feel it's so.
Still, more specifically than the album, Across the Sea is a special song. It's the one that popped, just like I said. I don't know why or how, but that song is about a girl that Rivers Cuomo hadn't met and lived in Japan, yet at the same time it's about a girl who lived within a half hour of me and went to my school. I had class with her, I saw her every day, and she was my friend. For whatever reason, there seemed to be this sea between us, that ultimately was probably one I made with my indecisiveness. But the chorus asks Why...Why are you so far away from me? I didn't know. I had no idea what was holding me back from a love that could have been, and that I only started to hint at. I remember only gaining confidence at the very very end of the school year, you know, right before we'd stop seeing each other every day.
So a word to the wise...take a chance. Row row, fight the power, and make it across the sea. Who knows what history you may make in doing so.
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