coachella

May 03, 2004
2.05p

coachella was.

there is so much more than that of course, but really no way to tell it. you had to be there to know. there is one person in this whole world who understands fully what it was like for me. nobody else ever will. i can try, but there is just no way to tell it and that is that.

but i could write about the first morning, how it was already so sunny and sweaty oven hot in the morning, and we found a spot with shade and a little breeze, under a tree near the water. and nobody was there and we shared music, one earphone each and we sat and drank coffee and watched the world. and i had one of those really rare moments where i wasn't thinking about anything that came before or after, i just was. i was right there and there was nothing else i wanted.

right now what i want is to scream and cry and run and howl. sad and dangerous, i want to say how beauty is terrible, how it hurts. how it is sad and can swallow you and make you a hard dry little seed.

but something happens with seeds...they are possibility.

there was the time when i lost the other three, or they lost me. and i saw one show by myself and an important one was coming next. i mean, it mattered to be with them for it. and how i knew we would find each other, i knew i didn't even have to try. i felt i shouldn't try. and so i stood and i condensed forward when the between sets shuffle happened, and i was sad i wasn't with her then. and i heard my name. i heard someone yelling "AMY!!" and then i heard lots of people yelling it at the same time. and turned around and luke was up on someone's shoulders, waving and looking around. and i shouted "luke! luke!" but he couldnt' hear me and someone said "wave your hat around" so i did but he was getting down already. and i thought maybe i won't be able to get there but then i thought fuck it and i went to try. and i pushed through and then suddenly there they were and someone yelled "here's amy!" and all around people clapped and they were cheering because i was there, because my friends found me.

this weekend was built from music

sunburned exhausted and choked with dust and somehow i do not belong here

i could say how amazing this band or that was, ultimately that's what the weekend was for. but what surprised me is how it became so much more than that, and the other stuff is what sticks now. layers of love and spirituality and meaning sort of fed by the music, and feeding into the music, but also separate, transcendent

how we stood on a little hill on the way out of the last show, the last night. turned around to see thousands and thousands of people streaming towards and around us in the desert night. and how she threw out her arms and yelled "come to me, my people!" and we laughed and laughed, and said we would lead them from the desert into the promised land. and i said "everyone go that way. okay?" and pointed the way that everyone was already going. the way out. the way home.