Old Blog 3: It Only Took 12 Freaking Years

I have written three fan letters in my lifetime. Wait, let me qualify “fan”, I have written three letters to musicians/bands in my lifetime. Sure, I’ve written a letter or two to Santa (of whom I was BIG fan) giving him the score, as I saw it; my naughty vs. my nice doings and what I deemed was owed me come Christmas. No, what I’m talking about with these three is pure idolatry - the kind that would get you smote in the bible- of the music of a band. Had the first one not been well received, maybe the other two would never have been written. The first was to Pavement after meeting them the first time. When they rolled into town the NEXT time, they did so with the windows of the van rolled down shouting at me and Jess, “We got your letter!”. They asked where Ypsilanti was (they read the return address!) and not only let us catch soundcheck, we caught a solar eclipse in which we compiled and stacked everyone’s sunglasses to look through one at a time so as to NOT burn any retinas. Celestial phenomenon all because of our letter!!

So after living with the Silver Jews “Starlite Walker” for awhile, I fell asleep one night and had the best dream I can remember. The dream went like this:

The Jews were playing in town at a bar I had never been to before. I saddled up to the bar waiting for the show to start when who walks in? My recently departed grandma Dot. She’s glowing and has her angel wings already and is being lead to me by my cousins Amber and Julie (both underage but under the guardianship of an angel, no one is carded). Grandma Dot saddled up to the bar next to me and started telling me all about dying and heaven: who she spent her days with, what they did all day in heaven. I was so happy to see her as I was unable to get back to Alaska for her illness or funeral and carried a heavy, waking heart about it. My sleeping heart beat fast from the pure joy of seeing she had wings and was well again. I had so many questions but I could see over her shoulder the Jews were setting up. My mind raced, if I took my eyes off Grandma Dot, would she disappear? If I missed Jews, would they come through again? Grandma, always intuitive, noticed my dilemma and suggested we move it to the swingset and continue the conversation WHILE we watched the Jews. How cool is my grandma? Willing to swing while watching the silver jews. How cool was this bar? A swingset front and center? Grandma struggled to get her wings through the chains but once settled we watched the Jews, continued the talk of heavenly days and as we swung. I woke up with the lightest heart I ever had and immediately put pen to paper to tell DC Berman of my dream and ask them to come through town.

I can’t tell you the content of that letter. Not because it’s private but because I simply don’t remember. I can tell you that shortly there after, I got a 3”x5” lined index card in mail that read something to the effect:

“Dr. Pepper plays a big role in our lives, too. We will not tour as I would just as soon run for public office. DC Berman.”

The Dr. Pepper bit has stumped me for years. What would I have said about Dr. Pepper?! In a smote inspiring fan letter? Dr. Pepper?!

Anyway. Here it is, 12 years later and I still have never seen the Jews. Never have I been to a club with a swingset and that was the one and only time angel Grandma Dot has visited me. BUT on April 14^th at the Double Door in Chicago, I will finally see the Jews. That’s right. FINALLY. Wonder if grandma will make an appearance even if only to sit on my shoulder and watch.