The wall had my back, as I kicked the toe of my pink Cons into the floor and contemplated how it was I got here. It started with a bout of "drink and mail." Far more dangerous than "drink and dial," which only embarrasses you with friends and ex-lovers. "Drink and mail" can embarrass you with complete strangers, including pop culture idols whose shrine you worship at.
I had always believed I had the perfect pick up line for Dave Grohl. Then one lonely Saturday night, I let Jose Cuervo talk me into e-mailing it to the Foo Fighters home page. "In an alternate reality, on the way home from work I screwed my courage to the sticking point, and stopped into the Satyricon, and you bought me a beer, because drummers dig me." I followed this opening line with a rambling description of that reality, complete with a major brawl between Courtney Love and I.
The resulting reply was a history lesson, on Scream, Bleach, and his invitation to join Nirvana in 1990. Feeling stung by the tone of the e-mail, which I imagined to be penned by some pimply faced intern, and sarcasm being my nature, I hit reply and wrote "Just my luck, I would have screwed Pete and not Ringo."
I thought that would be the end of it, but the next day I got another e-mail praising the creativity, if not the historical veracity or grammatical correctness, of the scenario, "Especially, the cat fight. Do you think Linda and Yoko ever pulled each others hair?" A flirty correspondence sprung up, then tickets and this invitation by FedEx. And here I stood, feeling ill at ease, waiting.
And then he appeared, looking like my idealized high school boyfriend, the scruffy face, the hair just asking to have fingers run through it, black T-shirt and lived in Levi's. I smiled my mood lightening. I watched him make the rounds, laughing with friends, giving hugs to women, lighting up a cigarette as two men cornered him and engaged him in serious conversation, slowly working his way over to collect two beers and make his way to where I stood.
Offering one to me he said, "So drummers dig you, huh?"
Accepting the beer, I grinned and said, "Yeah, you tell me why."
We talked for a minute about everything and nothing in particular; he took a drag off his cigarette, and gave a nod of acknowledgement to a group across the room. "Hang around for a bit, I want to talk to you again." And he was off.
I finished my beer, and drank another. He'd been working the room for about an hour, and suddenly looked trapped. I decided to make this an opportunity to reinsert myself into our conversation. I grabbed two beers and made my way over to him. He saw me coming and drained the bottle he had been nursing. I handed him a new one and pulled out my lighter to light the cigarette he placed between his lips.
"...what about Metallica?" the other party was asking.
Without looking at the other party, I ran my fingers through Dave's hair and said "Metallica are a bunch of whiny pussies that ruined Napster for everyone."
Dave laughed and said, "That's why drummers dig you. Do you want to go someplace a little more private?"
"Only since I got here," I replied. "Excuse us." I smiled at the other man as Dave led me off. "So where are we going? Up to your room and we can compare tattoos? Or the nearest broom closet?"