how i reeled in a thrasher with a plastic guitar hero hook
i think the only video game systems ive ever played were Atari, Nintendo, and xbox. That’s how i remember hearing them discussed. Just Nintendo as opposed to Sega. i really dont know. and i never cared until 2007.
when everyone knows the rules, the fun is in how we break them
randomwhere
so it’s completely ironic and a little downright hilarious that the first of the “guitar hero” style games debuted in 2007. The year Russell and i met. The tip-of-the-27 hat wasnt missed.
I fell in love with guitar hero the same year that i almost convinced myself i should settle for the boyfriend who showed me how to play the game that let anyone feel like a musician in a touring rock band.
i vaguely remember feeling like a jerk, when i meant to come off as cute, poking fun at russell with my pointer finger. slurring the words to tell him i expected him to know how to play. then i laid belly up across his lap to bump the fake 6-string away as i sang, “they dont love you like i love you” with my vocal cords vibrating below his chin. he could smell the pheromones under the alcohol.
“Maps” will forever summon to my mind the memory of that moment in time.
i didnt take any pictures when we first began dating. the image above, of me and a friend playing the game, was taken at the E. Cherokee Drive house in 2009, when she visited to attend our wedding.
About a year before that, i didnt have a mobile phone. Russell got the idea to set me up with a phone and a plan after he rescued me from a fender bender.
What better way to say i love you?
A cellular plan is a more romantic gesture to move a new relationship forward than a key to the apartment. Cell service is a gift that says, “i want you to be able to reach me in an emergency” and not, “hey, uh, if you’re not busy next weekend, could you, uh, come by and feed my fish?”
Minor damage to my tire after a car rear-ended my car prevented me from getting back to russell’s house, less than a mile away. I pulled into a school parking lot to call him, and used the office phone of the elementary school that our two children would later attend.
we had only just started dating, but i assumed he liked me enough to come get me. i used the same ten-digit phone number that i call now … when i lock my keys in the car or otherwise need immediate assistance correcting my mistakes. he didn’t answer after my accident that afternoon because he was teaching a student and didn’t recognize the number i was calling from. So, i called the front desk of the music store. Ben knew me. I worked there, too.
Russell ran out of his lesson and met the tow truck driver at the school because i had walked home and opened a bottle of hard cider.
“The trooper” is still my ring tone 15 years later, and i always reach to see who’s calling when i hear it.
