1988-1994

The house where I grew up in my hometown of Aurora bordered right on the city of Twinsburg, so much so that once you turned the corner on the street where I grew up, you had crossed over into the village of Reminderville, where (according to Wikipedia) 83% of the area is part Twinsburg City School District. When I was very young, I was not allowed to go into that area, which was divided by a marina which had a small beach and a playground at the end of our block, so I didn’t give it much thought for a while. I recall my older sister once making a remark about how the ice cream man was probably scared to come to our block because “Those kids would probably throw a bomb in his truck” if he chose to leave their neighborhood. I never thought about the kids that lived there being different from us, or even had a concept of who they might be.

One late summer day I was at the marina with my friend Kenny, and we were building a sand castle by the lake. We were minding our business when this gruff, portly boy began to cave in our sand castle with his feet. I yelled at him to stop, but he kept on doing it. As I started to rise to my feet to challenge him, he reared back and punched me in the face. I had never been punched in the face before, I was only in fourth grade, and this action seemed so adult. He hit me in the face a second time, and my glasses went flying off. At this age, I only knew how to do the “let’s try and maybe wrestle the other guy to the ground?” move, and so I tried that against him, but he seemed to get the better of me with that, too. I found out later this kid was only in second grade, but I think he was a little taller than me and definitely more beefy. 

After this pummeling, I walked home with Kenny crying and defeated, and I told my dad about the whole thing while blubbering through tears. My dad walked with us back to the marina to confront the kid, and made us both laugh by stomping and “making muscles” when we left. I’m not sure what exactly he would have done to resolve the issur, but by the time we made it back to the marina he had left. That Monday at school I told my friend Doug that my face was sore because this second grade boy punched me, and I really don’t know why I chose to offer that information. He didn’t seem to believe me, in a weird way. Kenny and I both saw the boy again at the marina a couple months later, and he had a pair of nunchucks that he was playing around with, hitting the playground equipment and almost daring Kenny and I to get hit with them. He bizarrely claimed that it couldn't hurt that much, because the nunchucks might as well be “made of ice.” 

I would see this same boy again at times over the next several years, and I always quietly wondered if he (or any of the Twinsburg other boys) were able to tell us apart or cared enough to remember us from one encounter to the next. There’s a season 6 episode of the Simpsons called “Lemon of Troy” where the boys of Springfield were engaged in a bitter battle with the boys of the bordering town, Shelbyville. The boys in Shelbyville (Twinsburg) are bigger, badder, dumber, and more homely than the boys in Springfield (Aurora), and I’ve always told Mary Alice that this is a mirror image of what it was like. In the still frame here, Bart has just triumphantly reveals to a Shelbyville boy (who is basically the Shelbyville version of him) among some other townies that he’s “Bart Simpson,” which draws blank stares from the group. It’s only after he tells them he’s from Springfield that they want to beat him up, and I always suspected the Twinsburg boys were the same kind of self-absorbed toughs who didn’t know or remember us from anyone else, they only knew to be physically aggressive once they realized we were from the other block up the hill.

One evening my family and I came home after being out all day and saw that the basketball hoop in our driveway was all bent and mangled. This was particularly upsetting to me, as I was really into playing basketball at the time, and had dreams of being the next Mark Price. A few days later my friend Louie told me that he and my friend Aaron had witnessed what happened from down the street; Aaron’s bedroom window had a view of my driveway, and he said that they both watched a boy he knew from Twinsburg (where he had once lived) named Justin hanging from/pulling on our hoop in an attempt to break it, along with a few other boys. I decided to overlook the fact that Louie and Aaron were bigger than the kids they were watching and might have thought to go stop it, because at least I had an ID on the culprits responsible. I had never even heard of this kid, but Louie and I were on the same baseball team, and lo and behold a short time later we played against a Twinsburg team that Justin was on. 

On the night of the game, I was playing second base in the field, and at one point I had an opportunity to face the kid while he was standing on the second base bag. I was still a little guy in the 8th grade at this point, but had suffered enough abuse in life that I was becoming a real hothead and wasn’t too worried about consequences. I said to Justin something to the effect of, “So, destroy any basketball hoops lately?” He looked at me with dead eyes and said “Yuuuup!” Then I followed with something like, “And you broke my basketball hoop?” He turned to me again and gave another “Yuuuup!” After the game, I hatched a plan - if you know anything about youth sports, at the end of each game they have the kids line up and high five each other while robotically saying “Good game, good game, good game…” When I passed Justin in the line, instead of high fiving him I gave him a shove. He stopped in his tracks and turned around looking confused, saying “Who you pushin’?!” I began to wonder if he knew what the hell I was even talking about when I had confronted him. It seemed par for the course for the Twinsburg boys, just to brainlessly act and react without any thought. The coach on their team bellowed something like “COME ON GUYS, NONE OF THAT!”, and I seem to recall the guys on my team being happy for me that I least got a shove in. 

I was still upset that Justin had gotten away with breaking something so important to me, so Louie hatched a plan where I would call his house and menace him. When I called, his mother answered the phone, and asked who was calling. I paused, and replied “Some kid.” She angrily demanded “Some kid WHO?,” and I blurted out “SOME KID WHO JUSTIN BROKE DOWN A BASKETBALL HOOP OF!” I then told her everything I knew he’d done, and she started yelling out to him for answers from the phone. I heard some murmured whimpering from him in the background, and she assured me she’d take care of it. Looking back, it absolutely reminds me of the part in The Christmas Story where Ralphie falsely tells his mother that Schwartz taught him the F-word, and then you hear Schwartz crying and getting smacked over the phone when Ralphie's mom calls Schwartz’s mom to tell on him.

They weren’t all bad times; One summer afternoon in around the same time period, the toughest boy in my grade at Aurora (who could have easily taken any one of their guys) was playing baseball with me and my friends at the marina, when a Twinsburg boy came by riding his skateboard, which prompted our version of Nelson the bully to yell out, “So what’s this kid gonna do, kick all of our asses?!” We all laughed confidently behind our fearless leader, as the kid passed without a word. It was a nice position to be in for once, because it felt like it was me and my friends who were always outnumbered and getting bullied by them. For example, there was a time when I was at the marina tossing around a football with my friends Scott and Bob, and we were greeted by five Twinsburg boys who asked us if we wanted to play a game. Instead of doing a four on four game, they insisted that the five of them play the three of us. After a brief time of getting obnoxiously mauled by them, Scott suggested the next time we have the ball we just take it and walk away without saying anything. Once we did, they started after us, calling us names. This one boy ran up to me to douse me with a full bottle of water, and he either missed me on purpose in order just to be threatening, or had terrible aim at point blank distance - I wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter, because it was pretty typical of them to seem completely deranged.

You’d think eventually they’d have grown out of it, but they never seemed to. In the Summer of ‘94 I had purple/red-ish dyed hair à la that one era of Kurt Cobain, and one afternoon I was walking in the Twinsburg area with my friend Mikey, when we heard heckles coming from a nearby yard. They were coming from a boy I was familiar with, who I had watched grow up and go through different phases of his life. He had gone from being kind of a geeky glasses guy, then had an alternative rock look, and was now a tough guy wearing a gold necklace and a white v-neck undershirt. He was standing on his porch with two other giggling oafs. “Hey!” he called out to me, “Nice hair! I used to have hair like that, but I never went out in public!” I had remembered when his hair was like that, and wondered to myself why he'd chosen to have hair like that if he didn’t want it to be seen in public. I could also tell that, as usual, based on how he was addressing me that he had no idea who I was, despite my having seen him around my entire life. He yelled more and asked me “Who my fat ass friend was,” and since we were outnumbered and outmuscled, we had no choice but to keep walking.

Later that Fall, I was riding the school bus in the morning and the driver asked me if I knew a kid from Twinsburg named (using his initials only) named M.B. I knew the name sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. She told me that he had been killed in a car accident the previous night a couple miles from my house. Louie was also on the same bus route, and when he got on the bus he confirmed that M.B. was the porch heckler. I couldn’t believe it, I had just seen him that Summer in my driver’s ed class, where once again, I don’t think he recognized me. When I got to school, I found Mikey smoking pot behind a tree and I told him what had happened to M.B., and he said something like “Sweet! That’s so awesome.” I honestly felt upset by the news; Unlike Mikey,  I had watched this guy grow up and now he was gone. I found out that he had been driving like a maniac with a passenger I knew (from Aurora, ironically) who was also a total dickhead, blew through a four way stop and got slammed into by an oncoming car on his side (passenger survived). Even though I felt rattled by what had happened, I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a fitting end to the rivalry seeing that we were now on the verge of adulthood, and hopefully this would teach all those jerks a some kind of lesson about karma. (Never mind that I almost died in an accident months later). I know that sounds a little inhumane, but I was 16, and I’m certainly not using his full name in case anyone in his family ever Googles it.  I recall seeing a memorial plaque for him where it said something like “Sweet Loving Angel,” and I remember thinking that they couldn’t have known him that well.

Excited to announce that we have a salubrious and sudorific concert film that was created by our friend/filmmaker Dylan Mars Greenberg. As you can see by the title card, it was shot in Brooklyn, this past June 19th. It starts with a short interview of us, and then to the show. So check it out for a few or more, I'm sure you will adore and not find a bore, snore, or chore.

Mary Alice is leafing through old photos for reasons we’ll get to in due time, but we came across this one from 1997 of a man who we dubbed “the jerk” who was walking around Sea World with sunglasses and green suit when she visited my hometown for the first time.

This one photo does not do this guy justice for how weird he was acting, at one point culminating in his looking back to check out a woman who passed by him which caused him to walk face first into a bush. It was like we were watching a TV show, and to this day I don’t know how he could be such a miracle.

I had a dream last night that I was on a quiz show with Barack Obama and Bill O’Reilly. They were to face off against each other to determine who knew more about politics, and I was to team up with O’Reilly. I wondered why I was invited to be there, because while I have a decent knowledge of politics, I should certainly not be on a quiz show about it. There was also cooking involved, and Obama was spilling sugar everywhere. He was casually swearing and wearing street clothes, joking that he didn’t have to worry about such things anymore.

Michelle Obama was the host of the show, and one of the questions was “What was my father’s name?,” and none of the contestants knew. Michelle had tears running down her face, saying that she had been married seven times, and I wondered how she had time for that. I was in the midst of admitting to everyone that I didn’t know we could use our phones to look up the answers, and then we switched locales to my old middle school.

I was talking to my teacher Mr. Miller about how even though I was a college graduate, I could never figure out how to finish high school, and I wasn’t going to worry anymore about going back. We decided to take a group picture with all the middle school students on the top of a hill, and I noticed a pair of my sunglasses was lying on the hill. I then accused a man and a woman who passed by behind us in a truck of stealing it from me. It turned out that the dealership had my truck all along.

Fall 1994

Solon, Ohio

After my Summer at Sea World, I'm not sure why I chose to pursue a job at the Solon Kmart (pictured here, 1978) other than for the kitsch value of it. Much like Sea World, I had spent a good portion of my youth there so it was familiar. When I was younger I'd often go shopping there with my mom, and around this period of my life I was successfully stealing cigarettes from the store while on those same (less frequent) shopping trips, so I knew they were trusting. Lastly, this girl at school I liked whose mom worked there approached me and told me she had heard I applied for a job, so it was all around in my best interest. 

I seem to recall it starting well enough, but they were on to me and my smirk pretty quick. I didn't set out to get fired in a few days, one thing just led to another. (Besides, my getting fired stories are always solid). I was assigned to be a cashier along with several other new young hires, and we started doing training, with the signature red vest and everything. We were asked to take turns and rotate with each other to train on the register, simulating employee and customer transactions. We were encouraged as the "employees" to compliment the purchases of the "customers" at the register, and to say things like "Hey, this is a nice (fill in the blank)." At one point this boy was playing the part of cashier, and softly muttered to whoever was playing the customer, "Nice shirt," and it was charmingly hilarious. Of course, that meant I had to up the stakes a little. When it came to my turn to be the customer, I made a finger gun point at the boy and shouted "THIS IS A STICK UP!!!," which elicited roars of laughter from the children and left the trainers unimpressed.

When it came to my first (and I believe final day) of actually being on the job, I worked at a register while being shadowed by one of the trainers. I remember it being a little rocky, because this was when people were still writing out checks, and they had to be called-in and/or stamped in one of those plastic check sliding deals. I remember a customer telling me with a smile "You're doing great, Pete!," which was the last good thing that happened there.

During the initial training, they had told the trainees that there was a method to collecting the cash from the register at the end of a shift, which involved putting it in a bag and securely storing it, and I thought I remembered that the bag was stored under the register that was being used. This is where the innocent version of me comes to the surface, because this is the type of thing that I still get easily confused by. If I'm shown something completely new, I need a little time before I can mentally grasp it, because I tend to either space out or panic and overthink things. Whatever I did with the bag at the end of my shift was wrong, and I guarantee you they thought I was plotting to steal the money.

At the end of the work day, I was called up into the supervisor lady's office, and she told me they were firing me. I was genuinely shocked, because I didn't think I did anything that bad. She told me that I didn't handle the money correctly, they didn't like my sticking up the register, and I think generally found me obnoxious. She gave me plastic bag of two work days worth of payment, and asked that I be on my way. I walked down the stairs from her office, and I felt that I had to retaliate in some manner. There was a paper employee schedule hanging off a binder attached to a wall, and I smacked it with my hand, knocking one piece of paper off of the binder. Within seconds, I heard the "BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!!!" sound of the supervisor running down the stairs, almost as if she was already expecting to have to further confront me. She yelled at me about what I had done, and I told her it was an accident and that I just bumped into the binder. She told me she was going to call security and have them escort me out, but I ended up being able to walk out on my own. She followed me the whole way, shouting that I was never to come back to the store again, and while I told my friends later I responded with "Fuck your fucking store!" or something, I think I just said "Whatever" and stormed out.

I had gotten dropped off there by my mom, so I took it upon myself to walk straight from Kmart, over the nearby railroad tracks, and down a hill to Burger King where two of my best friends worked to apply for a job. It was honestly where I should have gone in the first place, I'm not sure what the hesitation was about. I also don't recall how I explained to my mom that she was to now pick me up from Burger King. I worked there for a span of three years before I left for Hawaii.

One last Kmart note - I had unknowingly taken one of the red Kmart vests with me, and I was asked to return it to the store. I think at one point I had intended to, but I ended up throwing it out of the car window while driving. I looked back it in the rearview mirror, lying on the road as rain fell.

My flight out of Seattle is delayed, so I thought I’d take this time to review the Singles soundtrack song by song, as I listened to it most days I was here in the name of being festive. Please enjoy this visual of the dearly departed longbox.

1. “Would?” - Alice In Chains - Obviously one of the most kickass songs ever.

2. “Breath” - Pearl Jam - I feel that this is one of their better songs. For me, this band has always had the disadvantage of not being Nirvana, but I actually think the “Seattle sound” title is better suited to them, at least from a marketing perspective.

3. “Seasons” - Chris Cornell - I actually always preferred it when Chris Cornell sang lower, like a lot of the songs on Soundgarden’s “Superunknown” album. Other people disagree, but it’s honestly why I never liked Soundgarden, because it just sounds too much like 80’s metal to me.

4. “Dyslexic Heart” - Paul Westerberg - A lot of people shit on this era of Paul as it seems a million miles from The Replacements, but I associate both of his songs from the soundtrack so much with the movie that it doesn’t matter to me.

5. “The Battle of Evermore” - The Lovemongers - This band is essentially Heart, and they’re covering a Led Zeppelin song. I’m not really a fan of either band, but this song has a cool and mysterious feel to it.

6. “Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns” - Mother Love Bone - I don’t mean to speak ill of someone who died so young, but the people who thought Andrew Wood/MLB would be “it” were completely insane. Kurt was always going to lead the revolution. This band just sounds like a slightly artsier continuation of the hair metal that came before it, the kids would have never gone for it.

7. “Birth Ritual” - Soundgarden - You know how I feel about Soundgarden, and the chorus doesn’t sound like he’s saying “Ritual,” it sounds like he’s trying to say “Situation” but stops at “Situa.”

8. “State of Love and Trust” - Pearl Jam - Another banger, quite frankly. And it always makes me think of the part in the movie where Kyra Sedgwick finds out that exchange student guy is a dirty dog.

9. “Overblown” - Mudhoney - Before Nirvana retroactively bankrolled Sub Pop, they were counting on Mudhoney’s “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge” to be their salvation. Get real, Jon and Bruce.

10. “Waiting For Somebody” - Paul Westerberg - If you can’t manage to enjoy this song during the opening credits, there’s no hope for you.

11. “May This Be Love” - The Jimi Hendrix Experience - I always liked this song despite never having explored Jimi Hendrix in any serious manner.

12. “Nearly Lost You” - Screaming Trees - Hell yeah buddy.

13. “Drown” - Smashing Pumpkins - This band has no business being on this soundtrack and was likely included because Nirvana declined. Billy Corgan is a fartface.

Overall, I give the soundtrack a rating of 103.

I had a dream last night that we were at this enormous house warming party for a couple, and people we knew had even flown in for it. There was one room where people were doing karaoke, another room where people were playing Twister, and a group of people outside in a pool.

The booze was flowing like crazy, people were already passed out early. I got up to sing “Interstate Love Song,” but the speed of the song and the words on the screen were all off. I went in to the Twister room to meet someone I knew had flown in but I had never met before, and she was about one foot tall. She introduced me to her boyfriend, who was around the same height.

We decided to leave after just having a few drinks, and the next morning a newspaper ran a story about the party, and the headline read “Two people killed, good.”

Summer 1994
Aurora, Ohio

I remember it all starting with my dad growling at me, "We expect you to get a job this Summer," as if I wasn't already looking forward to finally having money of my own. I believe my first stop was to apply at McDonald's, the very same one that had built just a few years earlier by a vague process where the townsfolk were advised to "Put a yellow ribbon on your mailbox if you want a McDonald's in town." It may or may not have already been a done deal until my initial interview. I sat down at a booth and interviewed with this girl who told me that boys had to make sure their hair was cut above their ears. I told her it wasn't gonna happen.

I had made a point to recently become a freak, a grunge dude, a punk rocker, an "alternative guy," or whatever mixture of weirdo label we could never really collectively decide on in the early 90's. Kurt Cobain had just died a couple months prior, and I was already in the process of growing my hair like his, come hell or high water. She laughed and said something along the lines of "I know it's kind of taboo to ask," and I still don't really know what she meant by that. She also inquired if "I was in a band or something?," and I shyly told her yes, because in my mind going to my friend's house and randomly wailing on an electric guitar through a tiny amp meant I was in a band.

I don't recall where else I applied if anywhere, and I think I might have gotten the tip about a Sea World mass hiring from somewhere, so I ended up in some building filling out an application alongside a bunch of other kids. (This is where I pause and let you soak in the fact that I grew up right behind a Sea World. I suppose it was always my destiny to work there; we went there countless times when I was growing up, and on Summer nights would often perch ourselves by the window and watch their nightly fireworks display over the lake. And get this, we also had an amusement park called Geauga Lake right up the road from that. It's one of those times where I have to lament the fact that growing up was so difficult, because on paper this all sounds pretty magical).

I do recall when hired that they also had a "boys cut their hair" policy, but I thought the hell with it, I'll just take the job and then refuse if anyone ever asked. I figured if worse came to worse, I could tuck it away in the crummy Sea World trucker hat we were given to wear. I was officially hired as a dishwasher in an Italian restaurant called Mama Rosa's, but they weren't going to open until a couple weeks into the season, so I was assigned odd jobs around the park until then. The first job I was given was to prepare food in their employee commissary. I made friends with this boy I was working next to, and since I had recently decided I was now a smoker, I asked him for a cigarette. I learned a valuable lesson that day that if you put a cigarette in your pants pocket, it will break.

The next job I was given was scooping ice cream, which was extremely hard work. This was before the days where they had those heated spoons to assist with scooping, and digging into the ice cream was like trying to penetrate hardened cement. I honestly wasn't strong enough to consistently create sizeable scoops for the cones, so a lot of people got screwed over. Time seemed to move at a blindingly fast rate, and I ended up with a lot of bruising on my arms. I do remember a mom telling her kid to "Tell the guy what you want," referring to me, and that was the first time I'd of ever been referred to like that, and it was pretty cool.  

Once my job at Mama Rosa's began, I discovered I would be washing dishes alongside a couple of guys I knew from school, Chris H. (who I knew especially) and Chris G., who was a grade behind me. There was also a young looking and stout boy named Eddie, some additional auxiliary characters I'll skip over, and Bill, our 18-year old supervisor (for more on Bill, click here). I shortly realized after starting that this job was very hard work, and time moved very slow. The dishes would be bussed from the tables in the dining room, then given to us to clean in a steamy back room. First we'd rinse the dishes with a spray valve, pile them onto a rack, then send them on track through this large industrial washer. Once the dishes came out the other end, they were blazing fucking hot, and I took to eventually wearing rubber gloves to handle them. Bill had worked there three Summers already, and had somewhat proudly declared to all of us that in that time he had lost some feeling in the tips of fingers from handling the hot dishes, and I wanted no part of that.

In addition to the main dishwashing area, we also had "pots and pans" handwashing duty, where if one was assigned to they disappeared for hours at a time. I also was introduced to the concept of a "wet dry vacuum," which smelled terrible. I would use it to clean the floor when I was on closing shift, sometimes until 12 or 1 AM. I realized long after the fact that I would often be working an illegal shift for a 16-year old, often more than 8 hours per day or 40 hours per week. One day I worked a 12 hour shift, noon to midnight. They asked a lot for $4.65 an hour.

I got into the habit of singing loudly while I worked out of sheer boredom. Word got out that I could sing, and this dopey kind of tough guy waiter asked me to demonstrate for him. I sang a few bars of Teenage Fanclub's "Mad Dog 20/20" while he stood looking at me, and when I was done turned to someone and said "Can he sing?" in a manner indicating that I hadn't just sung in front of his face. We eventually managed to get a CD player back there, and Chris H. brought in The Crow soundtrack. I found myself singing with great expression Nine Inch Nails' cover of "Dead Souls" by Joy Division out loud after just one listen, which Chris H. pointed out was a bit odd. I agreed that it felt awkward, and wondered to myself how many times does one need to hear a song before they can rightfully sing it out loud? 

Chris G. would consistently crack me up. He was so strangely funny for a 16-year old, and would make these bizarre quips throughout the day. It's not like he was an underdog either, he was a good looking guy and a great soccer player, but he also wasn't the upper crust of popular. He would obsess over Julio Iglesias, and would randomly ask the waitresses if they liked Scott Baio. I can honestly say this was a precursor to the concept of "Sitcom-Core," because one day we found ourselves laughing hysterically while both asking the waitresses "Would you let Charles be in Charge of you?" (to which one enthusiastically replied "OH yeah.") One night recently Mary Alice and I had both had a few, and it suddenly became the most important thing in the world to try and locate Chris G. We found a Facebook profile that could be a possibility, and so I messaged this person, but to this date the message has not been viewed. I will make an addendum to this story if this ever changes.

Despite the long hours we all put in, it was amazing that we got anything done. We'd fuck off for what seemed like hours at a time. We naturally would spray each other with the sink valve when given an opportunity, and eventually it broke from all of our abuse. We invented the "glove bomb," which involved filling a rubber glove with dish soap and throwing it at someone. Sometimes the waiters would steal food from the kitchen and bring it in this secret utility room that was behind ours, and eventually we started doing it too. At one point I just said fuck it, and started stealing beers from the restaurant cooler in broad daylight. I remember standing near the front of the secret room downing a beer while a waiter walked past me laughing. I was a pretty skinny kid back then, so quickly drinking two bottles of beer got me drunk for the very first time.

The debauchery didn't end at work. I went to my first rock concert that Summer, and I had to lie to my parents to get there. I told them I had the day off from work, and was going to the aforementioned Geauga Lake with a friend that day. There was a comedy of errors that made my lies fall apart. First, they had said when we started at Sea World that if we ever felt like "We needed a day to ourselves," or something generic along those lines, that we could take the day off. When I called in to the restaurant that morning, I told the girl who answered "Um, I need, I feel like need to take a day," and she interrupted me and said "You're sick?," and I said yes, and she laughed and said "Sounds good." Whoever I spoke to didn't tell my supervisors until much later that day, so they called my house leaving messages asking where I was, which my parents heard. Second, a person who was supposed to be a part of the lying cover up made the error of calling my house and said that they were my friend who my parents had just seen with me, and when confronted he hung up on them.

The lineup for the show included L7, Violent Femmes, Candlebox, Material Issue, Sons Of Elvis, Gigolo Aunts, Machines Of Loving Grace, The Judybats, The Clarks, and Hot Tin Roof (possibly more, but that's all the info I'm seeing). I was skinny and small enough to easily be passed around, so I'd stand outside the mosh pits (which seems absurd considering most of the bands listed) and give bigger guys the thumbs up, like "pick me up and pass me around the place," which they gladly did. I ran into some people from work there, including a couple of cute waitresses who were high or drunk or something, because they kept asking me if I was 18, and I stupidly said I wasn't. They asked me to headbang and I sheepishly obliged, and they were like "WOOOO!" I later found out that the singer of Candlebox (who was headlining and my friends and I made a point to miss) was trying to hook up with one of the waitresses and invited her to do coke with them backstage (she declined), and when I heard that I was so scandalized, like I knew a sinister dark secret about this famous band.

During Machines Of Loving Grace the sky opened up and a huge downpour began, and my friends and I took shelter in various tents at the fairground (One of my favorite stories/memories from one of tents is documented here). After a significant delay, they started up the music again, and we all ended up soaked head to toe in mud. We were exhausted and decided we'd had enough, and left during Violent Femmes. I knew I needed to somehow explain to my parents how I ended up covered with mud, and I figured I would tell them we someone had a mud fight at the amusement park. When I got home, my parents already knew everything, and were quite upset with me. For what it's worth, I did hear later that my mom called the mom of my "alibi" friend (who was perfectly ok with him going to the concert), and started an angry rant when she found out what was happening, to which my friend's mom told her "Well, maybe if you loosened up your rules a little, he wouldn't rebel as much," which amazingly got through to her. The next day at work, one of my supervisors approached me and asked "Are you feeling better?," and in the middle of my reply laughed and said "YEAH, RIGHT, how was the concert?" 

Again I say, the debauchery didn't end at work. One of the restaurant managers threw a party at their house, with the caveat that "the 16-year olds couldn't drink" because she had thrown a party the previous Summer where the 16-year old employees had gotten busted by their parents. We badgered and pleaded with her until she eventually gave in, declaring "Ok FINE, the 16 year olds can drink, just DON'T GET CAUGHT!" I played pool at the party while smoking and wearing a Nirvana t-shirt; I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, I looked so cool. I think I had three beers plus some sips of Zima, and I was pretty sauced. Someone put on heavy music and this girl started a "mosh pit," and sent me drunkenly over a couch. I got a ride home along with Bill from another girl, who was absurdly lecturing me about my getting drunk, saying "What are you going to do, have Bill carry you home the rest of your life?" I got home, and somehow did not get caught.

As the Summer wound down, I determined that despite this time of reckless fun I would not be returning next year. The job didn't pay a whole lot, and was pretty backbreaking work. I started to abuse the luxury of my not returning along with some other employees who did not plan to return, like taking excess or multiple breaks to the commissary (where I have a specific memory of hearing on the TV that investigators had found a "bloody glove" at OJ Simpson's house). On one occasion, one of the managers asked me where I had been after taking a second break, then immediately followed before I could answer "You don't care, do you," then turned away. That one stuck with me. I didn't want to be a jerk and make people sad, I just found it funny to suddenly be able run amuck at the park. I quit one week before the end of Summer because I wanted some time for myself. During that week, I went back to Sea World as a visitor, and walked in to the employee area in street clothes just to be obnoxious. I was told amidst some laughter that I couldn't be back there, and that was that.

There's so much more I could say, but probably not enough room on the internet to say it. I left some things out from this time because they're a little too painful, like getting in way more trouble than I mention here, involving the police and such. But since I put that stuff aside, all this really made me happy to revisit. I feel very lucky to be able to retell these tales. Sea World is now long gone, and no I didn't see Blackfish, I don't need to be reminded that keeping a killer whale captive was weird and wrong. Besides, we were just washing dishes. I hope one of my old co-workers stumbles across this one day. Long live the Mama Rosa's dishwashing crew of '94.