Young Man Walking With his Head Between a Set of Headphones in a Small Town

I thought about this a couple days ago when I was home for a brief visit, and after a nice evening walk, I felt inspired.

It's easy to take for granted the ability to walk. Think about it.

It's also easy to take how we walk for granted. One of my favorite pastimes used to be walking outside at night while listening to music. These days, I don't do it very often, as for obvious reasons, I won't do it in the city. As much as I enjoy walking freely without listening to music, sometimes it's better with music...

There's the audio sensation: some albums just sound better through headphones. If they're high enough quality headphones, you'll hear things you don't hear through a stereo. You'll notice more subtle differences, more layers of music, the tightness of those layers, and wonder how they all manage to stay together...

And then there's an indescribable sensation. This is by no means a "great album" by most standards, but "Dosage" by Collective Soul (you thought I was going to write about Pearl Jam, didn't you?), if listened through headphones on a warm, breezy nighttime walk, takes me places...places far beyond the small town I used to frequent. I sometimes would get this strange feeling like I was walking through a movie about my life (maybe it's a bit arrogant to assume anyone would make a movie about me, but whatever), perhaps to a soundtrack. Sometimes I'd be imagining seeing the band live. And other times, I was just thinking about anything but where I was, what I was listening to or what I was doing. Lost.

And then there's the complete opposite side, walking without headphones, and being completely aware of your surroundings (or at least trying to be). The smell of smoke from the hookah bar down the street, a light breeze flowing through the trees in the park, the sounds of dog tags jingling from both sides of the street, your eyes constantly adjusting to the changing light temperatures with each house you pass...it's quite the different animal, especially if you're in a forest.

Maybe it's for the better that I'm "forced" to be aware of my surroundings. I could go into depth and get all philosophical about zoning out, not wanting to be aware, etc, but not tonight. At any rate, walking is kinda awesome. It was a great way to end an otherwise "blah" Monday.

It's A Small World After All

It never ceases to amaze me how often I seem to encounter seemingly improbable connections. Take last night for example. I went to see my friend's band and ran into another friend. Doesn't sound that crazy, right? Let me back track...

In 2012, I met up with a friend in Washington, DC to see her friend Andrew's band. Long story short, I struck up a friendship with Andrew, and we jammed a few times before I moved out of the DC area. He eventually switched bands, I went to see them play a few times (including Portland, OR. I'm a dedicated fan. Hah) and became friends with the band.

Flash forward to last night. They came up to Philly to play a show no more than a half mile from my house. I was standing against the wall near the stage waiting for them to play, when I heard someone say "Ewok??"

My head snapped around. It was dark, so I couldn't really see who it was at first. How strange. I didn't know any of my friends I had invited from Philly were actually going to this show. Stranger than that, "Ewok" was my nickname in college, and I almost never see anyone from college these days...

Turns out it was this dude named Walters who I had met...I don't know, 10 years ago? Maybe longer? And of course, we met through yet another mutual friend.

So I asked, "What in the hell are you doing here?" Granted, I love Caustic Casanova (the band that we both came to see) but I didn't think they had much of a following in Philadelphia outside of a few friends and family. Apparently, Walters knows the bassist from way back when - they met through MySpace (haha) - and their bands used to trade shows between Philly and DC. What are the odds?

Just another reminder that the world is, in fact, very small, and we are all connected.

Oh, and the show was great, too. Thanks CC!