Austin City Limits

I got to make a spontaneous decision last Thursday. At about mid afternoon my friend Josh Baer wrote me a instant mesange to the tune of "I've got a VIP ticket to Austin City Limits wiht your name on it. Come down, use my miles, and let's see some music." I was on a plane about 14 hours later. To make the decision was the hardest part, and also the easiest. It meant canceling some plans that I was really looking forward to, including camping at the beach, and playing 4 square, and of course, Jojo's first house party at her new house. But I went. What the hell.

The music floats across the landscape of Austin’s Zilger park like moonlight on a cloudless night. It pervades everything about the place including all the people. You can’t even really know what hits you as you enter somewhere in the middle, but music is coming from all sides. You can pick up a beat melding with vocals and a melody but no way to know if it’s all from one stage or it’s pieces your ear decides to hear amalgamated from unknown numbers of sources. The music makes you and you make the music, just by walking by. Being inside is like any other festival... Too dusty or too muddy, too many people or not enough, or if you’re like me, it’s all perfect because it is and so are you. What I mean is it’s all about you, not the festival. You make the experience what it is. If Jojo could have been there with me it would have been a dance party across the face of Austin with a spirited zest and a flavor of tempeh in your nostrils. I wish she could have been here too. And I didn’t let wishes or thoughts of the future interfere with my experience.