Oh R.E.M. - you were there for such a significant portion of my life. They canceled the Fables of the Reconstruction show because of the worst hurricane I lived through. We were without power for ten days, out of school for a week. I went outside in the middle of the eye and it was like stepping inside a Polaroid. It was like the edges were developing but the patch of grass where I stood and looked at the sky was in focus and clear.
The first boy I slept with worked in a record store at a mall and I used his employee discount to buy Green, and it sounded like summer and was back when CDs came in those weird long rectangle boxes.
The song “You Are The Everything” reminded me of being in the backseat of my best friend’s VW Beatle, watching the stars rush by through the windshield with my head tilted back and other band’s music playing loud enough to quiet my mind.
I moved to Athens and met this girl whose mom used to follow Michael Stipe around and pray for him. Which was weird. I liked the way the band members were around: like patron saints of the Colorbox blessing the Sunday brunch at The Grit.
When I was miserable and living in Tennessee I used to listen to (Don’t Go Back To) Rockville as I drove to the job I hated in the town I hated and I’d swear to myself that I wouldn’t stuck there. And I didn’t.
And so, it’s been - what - decades? And in all that time, this is my favorite R.E.M. song.
Because it’s crazy what you could have had.
