A Night of Luke

I typically write in the morning, but this am I went to my classroom to sift through the graveyard of crayons and notepads that aren’t being used, and began organizing a new learning packet. This called for a break from blog writing and then an immediate jump back into blog writing, because of the stress it provoked. Since this will be more of a later afternoon, evening blog post, I will warn you, it’s gonna be a little PG 13 readers!! I know I know, look out, power down if you can’t handle swearing or muddy concert viewing. It’s about to go down.

So it begins, last summer, in the month of August. This was a time before face masks, before proper hygiene, before and dare I even say it, Dr. Shah was made famous. This was an easy time in the lives of many and I was invited by my best friend of several years, Shawnna to attend a Luke Bryan concert. Three other beautiful women would also be in attendance, but I only have Shawnna’s permission written in blood, to fully transcribe the evening, so I will refer to them by their fake names, in order to save them shame and social status. This type of goodwill will not be bestowed to Shawnna and I however. So any who, I was invited to this concert and I really hemmed and hawed about it because I had already spent A LOT of money last summer, mostly on trying to finish up a month long class at Thomas College and in trying to enroll my kids in 45 summer camps to build up their muscles which have since disintegrated into nothingness. So I initially declined the invite, as a lot of Moms do right? I mean I think it was 100 dollars or something, it was in Bangor, I don’t even think it was on a Friday or a Saturday you guys? How could my house hold up without me? But Shawnna, being the used car saleswoman that she is, convinced me. She even offered to pay for my ticket, what a sweet soul she is and so then I was booked. A night away from the whole fam, a night of girl time, drinks and good will. I then felt a little panicky. What should I wear to an outdoor Luke concert? At this time, I had already seen Luke twice and I don’t care if you like country music or not, if you are male or female, young or old, republican or democrat. Those hips do not lie. They just do not. I don’t know how he gets those pants on, how he makes that sound at the end of a song, how he seems to sing only directly to me. Okay I”m getting off topic. My outfit, yes I was worried about my outfit. I hadn’t attended a concert in awhile, because well, to be frank, I’m just not very cool. I don’t do an awful lot. Some of this is because my kids are a time suck and some of this is because I really need to get out more (haha). But in my mind , I was thinking what would Luke like? I opened up my closet and I find this midriff top that I had been sent from Stitch Fix. My stylist Bridget she knows whats up. A midriff tank top you guys? No, I quickly close the closet. Who am I Paris Hilton? Kim Kardashian? I am over 30 for pete’s sake. But my mind, it would not leave that tank top. I had been doing a lot of arm work outs, a lot of ab workouts. I tested it, just for funsies, I paired it with some short denim shorts and bam, I was basically an extra in his music video.

It was now time to head to Bangor, my girl picked me up in an abandoned Sears parking lot and we were off to the races. When we got to the hotel (this is basically the Hangover movie) I noticed that my outfit did not match the outfits of my concert associates. As we took an Uber to dinner, I heard our driver make fun of a few of the skanks (her words not mine!) walking down the side of the road, in their crop tops and their shorty shorts. You guys, that was me. I was ALSO and ADDITIONALLY wearing that skankified outfit. Was there time to change? Was there time to make this right for Luke? There was not. If this situation ever comes to your doorstep, I want you to face it head on, like I did, but also gulp down the closest beverage. That helps too. So we had our dinner, which was fairly uneventful and after being let into the concert, I had an eyes wide open moment. As an aside, I have never been to a concert in Bangor before, and let me tell you it is an experience. I think people in the front pay more money, but we were not in the front, we were back field people and really everyone should know themselves and I certainly do. I deserve zero front row treatment, especially with the voice I was born with. Now on this particular day, the field, it had turned itself into a muddy swamp of a shit show. I was wearing cute sandals from TJ Max, paired with my less than decent jean cut off shorts and needless to say, it looked like the girls and I had signed up for some kind of Strong Woman, He Man competition, some kind of soiled Escape Room that isn’t even legal. I went to go buy a bevie, because when you are knee deep in soggy bog water this is a must, and it turned out one beer was the same as my car insurance. No matter, absolutely no friggin problem. I love to spend that much on a can of liquor, I’m a mom y’all, out on the town with no kids in sight!

After Luke made himself known, a few life changing moments happened to me. I won’t say I was involved in them, they literally happened to me and I had an observatory response to them. The first was that I got hit on. I know, you must be thinking what the hell right? This woman in her 30’s, is standing knee deep in brown shitty mud, wearing inappropriate clothing and she gets hit on, but it did happen and I have witnesses. Two guys and a very cool hispter girl approached us from across the mud and one of them said “my friend spotted the blonde from across the way and wanted to say hi”. Now before this, the only time I have ever been hit on is on the rail trail, when an old man said to my pregnant self, are you still with the father, to which I responded yes and he responded let me know for next time. Super sweet right ? Romantic? So the fact that this young gent, had traveled across this nasty field to say hello to a mom, was way out of my spectrum. He chatted with me for a few minutes, and I nodded awkwardly, looking I’m sure more like Napolean Dynamite than any kind of sex pot. Then all of a sudden, the one guy said, “they are married let’s bounce.” I stood rooted to the spot, holding my wedding ring. Thinking, what the f just happened? Is this even real? It was a huge, ego boost for moi and literally I don’t care if he had some kind of Mom fantasy, I don’t care if he had just finished watching that Sharon Stone movie, I don’t even care if it was a dare. Summer. Night . Made. Now not five minutes later, the next event began to unfold. I saw a young woman, in front of me begin to look , how should we put this delicately, black out drunk I guess is the only way to paint a full picture. She was singing Kick the Dust Up wrong you guys. I’m not being judgmental here, but she was at a Luke concert, in a group of people singing Jay Z, when it was Kick the Dusty Up. Her boyfriend (or was he a hook up? Thats what the cool kids say right?) was attempting to hold her up with his left hand, while balancing his thirty dollar beer with his others. My friend Shawnna turned to me and said “bitch is going down”. And she always knows, my girl does, she really has the foresight for things like this and just like that, the wobbly woman vomited beer chunks all over the soiled ground and fell to her knees. At this point in time, several men came out of the bushes, like they were in an Ocean’s 11 scene and immediately came to her aid, giving her water, holding her up, asking if she was okay. She said something about it being her first night away from her baby. Awww I thought, then the boyfriend said the baby was only a week and a half old, so my awww turned to ugggghhh, cause someone better check on that kid Am I right? Hopefully Bonnie and Clyde had a jacked up sitter. Now I knew a Bangor concert was for a different breed of cat, because the people beside this vomiting woman, barely reacted when she puked all across their sandals. I mean they didn’t shake it off, they didn’t look disturbed, they just kept up their hip swayin, like God had intended I suppose. As the last song was announced, Shawnna, Becky, Beck, and Becka headed toward the exit gate. On our way out, I turned to look at the row of porta potties looking less than pristine as one might expect at the end of a concert. Outside of one of the port-a-potties was another young gal who was being covered by a blanket by a security guard. Two seconds earlier, the girl had exited the port-a-potty without having the where with all to lift up her undies or her skinny jeans. She had then slumped to her side, bare buns naked, and laid right there in the fecal spattered mud. The security guard was the kindest, most gentlemanly like gentleman I have ever seen with someone. He was covering her up, he was giving her a chair to sit in , he was letting her tell him about the guy that had just broken up with her. How much do these angels get paid? I then turned to my best friend since seventh grade and I said what would you do if that was me? Face down in the mud? She immediately responded with, oh you wouldn’t be like that, I would get your pants up. And that reader, is one of the aha moments I want you to take away from this post. Not only should you go out on the town if we ever can again, but you should only enjoy time with a friend who is willing to pull your pants up when you exit the shitter so schammered you don’t know your name. I don’t think I have ever loved her more. I hope this story made you chuckle, I know it is detour from a lot of my teaching posts, but it is a humanizing post nonetheless. Be silly, embrace fun and new at the same time, and above all, wear what is calling to you in your closet.