I think shellshag are a
great band, like this thing that has been happening in the other room that is
close to you but you will not open the door to intrerrupt that activity out of
respect for it. When I first heard them play “fuck society / fuck sobriety” a
cover song, at this theater for a food not bombs fest, I thought it was
incredible. Why. I don't know. they watched each other while playing, snarling
is the word, but its not mine, it's the word you'd use in a music zine to
describe them. Look online, you can’t find a copy of “fuck society” anywhere,
but once I got it in the mail for donating to razorcake, where I write reviews,
but which frankly is a bearded dude show magazine to maximum’s raging radical
show magazine, musically and mindfully I guess I’d like to be with maximum but
I’m at razorcake, ho-hum, we pass the lesson, onto the song—It was fall when I
saw shellshag and I biked there on my blue Schwinn letour, upon which I
resemble a prince, especially if I am 23 and wearing my white helmet. I went by
myself, leaving May Linn with her mom and her mom’s friend to hang out in the
front room chatting after dinner, having pie. Her mom’s friend went to brother
rice, a really nice guy from the southside, a nice guy for all of those factors
is what I’m saying, he balanced being nice with knowing how to fix things,
qualities which, when joined, amaze me most of all other parts of being a
person, like you have these qualities that are of value to the world and see
nothing to do with them but help and lounge and not charge people by money or
otherwise. I left them because I wanted to see the arrivals. I love the
arrivals. Why. I just do. At the theater, maybe the portage park one or maybe
another, I saw a friend who I always meant to hang out with more, she was
wearing a sweatshirt like my mom wears without the collar, says usa on it, a kohl’s purchase for sure,
she waved and I waved and I thought, whoa, Oh my God, it is so good to see
smiling almost-friends, these platonic hi and hellos feel so good to me that I
can only express them on the fly, they don’t need to be analyzed or explained,
so much better than flirting which is almost always bad and weird, but we waved
and I was still relieved to not have to talk, so then I went inside—did I drink
a beer? I always felt like I needed to drink a beer to have fun at those
events, you have to hold something anyway, I must’ve had a beer, but I was
cautious too because it was a Sunday night and I was teaching everything for
the first time then, careful with my lesson plans and notes for class (the short
story unit, I’m guessing), maybe I had two beers, what I wanted was something
to eat, but the burger king was closed pardoning the drive thru and they don’t
serve cyclists. I saw shellshag, watched them play that song, which was
beautiful in circumstance though I know I cant explain it to you I just have to
say it—“it’s beautiful,” etcetera, and then the arrivals played songs from
Cocktail Molotov along some songs that were almost as old as me, and then,
what? I biked home, back to Cordelia street or Cornelia street, one of the daughters
from King Lear, the hangout session was over, maybe I leaned in May Linn’s
doorway and explained things to her, asked how the night went, went to sleep
myself and woke up to smelling trees in the courtyard, and that’s what I miss
most right now, not shellshag’s great song, which is a cover anyway (I’m really
coming around to covers and the thing of the performer, just this musician who
has like five great songs or good ones, and the rest are not theirs at all, I think
that's great and the opposite of pathetic, which, whatever, other thoughts) but
the smell of the courtyard, that’s what I could go for now, greenery, with the
window open, greenery with the window open and I wouldn't complain about the
smokers and their cigarette butts mixing with the leaves. Jesus Christ can it
be spring already?
