In mid-December of 1998, after a last minute announcement of a New Year's Eve show, I booked a mini-vacation to Arizona, dragging along one of my brothers. I had made some new friends online (yes, online - scary!) and they were also traveling to Arizona. I finally met them in person and they were normal. Well, one had some issues but she was just in the group, not someone I would seek out for a friendship.
By the fifth concert of that year, I had met the band and was friendly with the band's crew. It soon became so much more than just "going to a concert." I learned so much about the music industry and all the behind the scenes stuff of a rock show. My 15 year old self thought that all performers traveled like quote unquote rock stars, arriving to the concert venue in stretch limousines, sleeping in fancy hotel suites. It's funny to think about my naivety now. I've seen the cramped sleeping quarters on tour buses, the lack of privacy.
I also learned a lot about myself. I had started dating a guy at the end of my junior year in college. We were on/off and then mainly just good friends during our senior year. And then we graduated and he moved back to New Jersey. I was heartbroken. I had really thought we could make it work, especially without the distraction of college drama, but I knew long distance was deal breaker. We kept in touch, seeing each other here and there. At one point, he told me he was considering moving back to Boston. I got my hopes up and you can guess how this tale ends. He never moves back, and then he finds a new girlfriend in NJ.
But that wasn't the exact end. We still kept in touch and whenever he became frustrated, wanted an easy out from his girlfriend, he would turn to me.
1999 turned into 2000 and I continued to use my vacation time to travel around, making new friends. And I gained confidence in myself. I went from not wanting to be alone to absolutely loving the single life. I could do what I wanted whenever I wanted. I could flirt with anyone. I felt sure that the perfect guy would come along when the time was right (and he did) and I was going to enjoy my life as it was.
But that ex-boyfriend was still in the picture.
I was in Atlantic City for the weekend and we had made plans to met up. He never showed. No phone call or anything. Just a no show. I returned to work on Monday in a calm rage. The old me would have sent an email first thing, but I wasn't the same person. I waited. It took two days and there in my inbox was the email from him. No apology, just a "hey, what's up?" WHAT'S UP? I let him know what was up.
I had always felt like I was second best in that relationship. Even right from the start. Freshman year, he began dating another classmate, also from NJ. I went to a huge college, so even though we were both business majors, we didn't know each other. But friends of mine knew them and told me that they had been a serious couple and she had broken up with him. When we began dating, she always seemed to be around. And he would do stuff for her that would annoy me, like walk her dog or move her car so she wouldn't get a parking ticket. Yes, nice guy stuff but she had broken up with him and for a period of time there, she wasn't taking any classes or working a co-op job. Her rich parents paid her bills and she sat around trying to figure out what she wanted to do. She didn't need someone to walk her dog for her. Stop kissing her butt.
All it took was for me to tell him how he always held the ex up on a pedestal. His response was an incredulous WHAT? He claimed he was always trying to knock her down. We didn't even make it to the present day issue of him running to me to complain about his then girlfriend (now wife, I can FB stalk just like everyone else.) I suspect he was using me to anger her in hopes that she would break up with him and he could walk away clean. His plan, obviously, failed. He never contacted me again after that email exchange. That let me see what our friendship/relationship meant to him. Not much.
I never let anyone treat me like that again.
I learned so much about people in general, relationships, the rock star life. I wish it hadn't taken me so long to figure out my personality type as that explains why I so enjoyed packing up and hitting the road. It broke up the routine, the sameness of everyday. Once I made friends with band crew members, I saw how difficult that kind of life could be. Some of them were married and had kids. They missed out on a lot. There was no such thing as FaceTime in 1999. Some of them had that itch to always be on the move, which is why they stuck to the road.
When you were away from home, away from the office, you were truly away. We all had cell phones back then but they were super expensive to use and mainly sequestered to the bottom of bags, in case of emergency. If you were going to be away from work, you set your email to send an out of office reply and you changed your voicemail to say you would be out of the office and who the caller could contact if he/she could not wait for your return. At most, you would check your VM messages to ensure nothing had blown up in your absence. Otherwise, you were gone. There was a freedom to being on the road.
In 1999 alone, I hiked through the desert in Arizona, explored Philadelphia, gambled in Atlantic City and visited Niagara Falls.
Looking back, I'm so happy I took that time to do something a little crazy because there is absolutely no time for that now. Plus, I'm far too old.
I used to scoff whenever I heard someone say he/she needed to take time away from school or work to find him/herself. I thought it was an excuse to avoid responsibility for being an adult. I get it now, but I do have to point out that I was able to escape and find myself while still successfully working a demanding full time job. Albeit one with 4+ weeks of paid time off.
No regrets.
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