And she is back to blogging.........

I know, you've missed me! Believe me, I have missed me too! I've been so busy fitting into perfectville, living the hectic life of wife, mom, employee and the official 'doer of everything' (just ask my husband) that I nearly lost me in the chaos.
However, I was recently reminded of the real me Sunday night in the funniest of ways, more to come on that, but first a little background..............

Depending in which of my lifetimes you've known me, you may or may not know that I am a huge music fan. I've always believed music to be my very first (and always dependable) love!!!! It has seen me through some of the toughest years of my life, given me strength, inspiration, and plenty of excellent dance moves.

Feeling God clearly understood the meaning of music in my life, he blessed me with the coveted part-time job every 16 year old in Snellville applied for, cashier at Turtle's Records and Tapes. Come to think of it, God either blessed me with this ever so coveted job or he blessed me with a middle aged pervy boss who liked my legs and gave me the job??? And so began my increased love affair with music through the gift of the live show.

I know I am dating myself, but does anyone remember actually having to 'camp out' for tickets to see your favorite bands???? What you may not have realized is if you were the first 'camper' in line and needed only 2 tickets, the ever so resourceful Turtle's employees would pull an additional 8 tickets for themselves totalling the maximum of 10 tickets we could pull at one time. This scenario went on and on until we had enough tickets for ourselves to attend our favorite concerts, with the best of seats. I continue to blame my loud talking and lack of hearing on being front row too often with a speaker next to my ears blaring out Ratt, Poison, Billy Idol, The Scorpions, Motley Crue, Guns and Roses, Pink Floyd, REM The Smiths, The Cure and by far my favorite show of all time, David Bowie. Oh those were indeed the days. Did I mention, I was a heavy metal, hard rock groupie (or groupie wannabe)

Now back to the present.....

Sunday night, The Cult played at the Tabernacle in Atlanta. Did I mention they are one of my all time favorite rock bands??? If not, I will.

It was their 'Love Tour' or as I like to call it.... the I have pissed away all of my money on booze, drugs, and women, am almost 50, and need to do one last tour, playiny songs from our best selling albumn, Love, tour.
As you can imagine The Cult wanted to shorten the name of the tour for marketing purposes.

It was an excellent EXPERIENCE. And as much as I would love to say it was amazing because The Cult still has it, I cannot. Instead I was faced with the many faces of me at the show, and some of them were not too pretty. I emailed a friend with a review of the show, who responded that my review sounded more like a blog post, and hence I am back here posting. My review of the show went a little something like this...............

Cult Review (not that you care to hear all the details, but here they are)

The concert was an amazing experience. Hearing their music live has always been like a religious experience for me. And I am happy to report that Billy Duffy (the guitarist) is still a rock god. He did not miss a beat, was absolutely fantastic. He's taken good care of himself over the years and his guitar riffs were as good as they ever were.
On the other hand, Ian Astbury (lead singer) may be back on the sauce of some sort(drugs, alcohol, cheeseburgers??). After being sober and HOT, he traded all of that in to be a Jim Morrison look alike. And not the good looking Jim Morrison. The I've had a dew too many cheeseburgers and cocktails Jim Morrison.
And if being overweight and stoned were not enough, he traded in his rock god status and look for attire that looked more like Delta lost his bags, so he grabbed random pieces of clothing from his band mates and roadies. What a huge waste for me, Did I mention he used to be hot???

I was impressed with their sound in the beginning of the show. They still had it, they were spot on until about mid point. Much like the fans in attendance, you could see and hear the strain of the years in the last few songs Ian sang. And Ian's moves were less then stellar. After 20 + years of playing one instrument (the tamborine) you'd think Ian would have the kick the tabomrine from the floor to his hand down pat, but after the second try, he sadly gave up. I was left wondering if his larger belly or the extra drinks or simply his age that were slowing him down? Although Duffy remains the man as far as his riffs are concerned, the disconnect between he and Ian was palpable. They never stood near one another or made any eye contact. It was as if they were playing at two seperate venues.

On a more positive note though, the people watching was great! Everyone at the show was our age(30 + 10 and up). The only youngsters were with their parents who were clearly there for the cult.

You could tell which were frat boys grown up, rock fans who became responsible adults, rock fans who continued to grow their hair and their bellies, groupies and redneck ladies who remained groupies and rednecks ladies (I am using the term broadly), and moms like me who although were big groupies in the day, grew up too!

We had a loud mouth redneck 'lady' sitting behind us screaming about pretty much everything, but my overall favorite quote of the evening was when she shouted to her hubby 'you ain't in no danger of getting a dui tonight, because the beers were 10 bucks a pop. Who the hell can get drunk when beers are 10 bucks a pop'.

Given the fact that we arrived at 7:30 pm, and the show began at 9:15, my tolerance for drunk redneck 'ladies' was growing thin so I talked an usher into letting my friend and me move into the reserved section, second row, much better seating and company.

And did I mention the fight in the pit. I swear it was like reliving my old rock days. Two men protectin' their little ladies and the ladies tryin' to hold their big men back from fightin' each other.... Priceless!!!!

Toward the end of the evening, I realized I was very aware of my surroundings. I was no longer lost in the music of The Cult, but rather lost in my thoughts about them and the people sharing this moment. I realized this experience was more than a show for me, but rather a reflection of me.......... And in this reflection I saw the me

who believed in Rock Gods
who is still moved by music
who was a groupie
who at times has been the loud mouthed drunk 'lady'
who held back my man from a fight
who at times thinks of herself as younger then her years
who is getting older, the strain of the years showing
who may or may not have had her fair share of cheeseburgers and cocktails
And finally, who realizes how pricesless it is to be a compliation of all of these past me's, the present me, a classic.