#45 With the move north looming large in my very near future, I settled in to try and wrap up as many loose ends as I could. During the previous 4 years, I did everything I could to remain irresponsible. I had wracked up a moderate amount of credit card debt which I ignored until the debt collectors started calling... at work. As well, I had come face to face with the man over my failure to go to court and pay my fines. For a guy that was turning 24 in less a year, I was a financial mess. My last year in Eugene, I worked hard to pay off debts without accruing any more. We cut our cable off, we turned the thermostat down, and I put my tip money towards paying off bills. The one thing I was certain of, I didnt want to move back in with my parents. I loved them, but I was too old for that. I also knew I didnt want the old debts haunting me when I landed in a new city, so I tried my hardest to make sure I paid stuff off while staying out of my parents house. Even though things were winding down with the band in Eugene, I still played and hung out with the guys. Most of my money went to keeping a roof over my head, gas in my motorcycle, and the debt collectors off my back, so a lot of the time I had just enough to eat and survive on. I still wasnt good with my money, but I was getting better, even though that often meant forgoing a good time. On a cool night in October, Rob and I were leaving band practice and heading our separate ways, when he turned and asked if I was going to see The Ramones and Social Distortion in Portland. Being that I was between paychecks and had no credit to rely upon to carry me over, I had to decline. As the date neared, though, Rob asked me a few more times if I wanted to go. Even though I had no money, Rob offered to loan me $20 so I could get a ticket at the door. The Ramones were enough reason to go to the show, but with the addition of Social Distortion to the bill, not being there would be like missing out on George Foreman and Muhammad Ali beating on each other for the Heavyweight Championship title. I would be a fool not to at least try to get into the show. As we piled in Robs mid 70s Chevy sedan and made the run to Portland for the show, Carl did what Carl normally did and tagged along. Neither of us had tickets and we only had the twenty dollar bill that Rob loaned me to get it to cover us if we did. Carl and I were pretty firmly entrenched in each others pockets by that time, and I didnt want either of us to be stuck outside while the other watched the show, so we resigned ourselves to doing whatever we could to get in. Upon arrival at the Roseland Theater, though, we found a line wrapping around the building and a sign in the window with the words SOLD OUT next to the flyer advertising the show. Rob and his friend made their way to the line for people with tickets, while Carl and I walked back and forth asking people if they had any spare tickets, and if so, would they sell us two for the price of one and a half. With $20 for the two of us, it was highly unlikely that we would get in, but it was worth a shot. Before long, though, we realized that we had made the trip to Portland for nothing. It was cold, rainy and we were stuck outside a club 120 miles from home. Carl and I gave up on getting in and wandered down the side street next to the Roseland while discussing our options. We had $24 dollars between us. Since these were the days where cell phones were limited to the rich and/or important, we knew we would need to make our way back to the club before the show let out so we could get a ride back to Eugene. The idea of standing outside the club in the rain was not terribly appealing. We had visited Portland but we werent familiar with Portland, so we really didnt know where to go or what to do. So, we stood outside and smoked and swore at the ground while debating on what to do next. As we were standing there, a little greaser dude walked up to Carl, gave him a big hug and said, Dude! How the hell are you!. The guy was about 53, wearing a leather biker jacket, white t-shirt, rolled up Levis jeans, engineer boots, and sporting a greasy pompadour that looked like it was stolen from Elvis head, deep inside his grave. He knew Carl and he was convinced that he knew me as well. The problem was, neither of us knew him. He bummed a smoke and we stood outside the side door of the club while listening to him tell us how long it had been since he saw us and asking us where we lived in Los Angeles. I didnt have the heart to lie, so I kept telling him we were from Eugene and had never lived in L.A. or even California, for that matter; but, he swore up and down that he knew us from somewhere. He was cool enough and we were bored, so it was nice to have someone else to talk to besides each other. We chatted through a couple of smokes, and then finally he said he had to get back inside. As he headed back in, he stopped at the top of the stairs and asked if we were going in. We told him we didnt have tickets. He looked puzzled for a second and said, hold on, and disappeared back inside the Roseland. Carl and I shrugged our shoulders and lit another smoke, but before we took our first drag, the dude came back out and yelled at us to join him at the top of the stairs. As we hit the side door, he told the bouncer to add us to the guest list and to stamp our hands. It probably took me a full 15 seconds to process that we were about to walk into the show of my life without spending a dime of the $24 bucks we had pooled together. The door person stamped our hands and we were inside. We. Were. INSIDE! The show was great. I wasnt a big fan of the opening band, but when Social Distortion took the stage, I was elated. The little rockabilly guy made his way to us and drug us into the pit to slam dance with the crowd. We danced our asses off for the 45 minute set, and when Social D stepped off stage, we drug him straight to the bar and bought him a beer. He asked if we were having fun and I asked him how much we owed him... he laughed and said, one dollar. Give me one dollar. Carl handed him a dollar. He tore it in half, laughed and said, heres your ticket stub! I still have my half of that dollar. By the end of that night, fortune had smiled upon Carl and I, and we had not only seen The Ramones, but also Social Distortion. To cap it off, the little rockabilly guy asked us to come hang out with Mike Ness and the band at the Blue Moon Tavern in NW Portland. Unfortunately, we didnt live in Portland yet, and we had no money and no way to get back to Eugene. As we met up with Rob and his buddy, we told them how we had gotten into the show and asked Rob to drive us to the bar so we could meet the band. Rob declined, though, as his buddy was hanging on Robs shoulder with a broken foot from the mosh pit. Carl and I may have been fortunate enough to get into the show for nothing, but we were to be denied the opportunity to hang out with one of the heavy weights of the punk rock scene. Its probably for the better, though, seeing that after we bought beers in the club, we were left with little more than pocket change and half of a torn dollar bill each. Story of My Life - Social Distortion youtube/watch?v=oh8zcbC_Dcw
Posted on: Mon, 17 Nov 2014 20:17:11 +0000
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