.Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space.
The Year was 1998. we lived in a 2 bedroom apartment as a direct consequence of my father getting his 43rd DUI and us losing the 5 bedroom house with a pool and huge yards, because he had to go to jail. I slept in one room, and my sister slept in the master bedroom with my parents. she slept in the bed with my mother and my dad slept on the floor on an unrolled sleeping bag. I will never forget that place for as long as I live.
in the tiny living room there were two couches and a giant tube TV that didn't work, with a smaller tube TV on top of it (we were Mexican after all). the area was crap. I remember hearing a kid get shot to death at the bus stop outside and one night I swear I heard a bullet whiz by my window. later I my life, when I joined the Marines, I would hear that sound again and remember that place. that heinous, heinous place.
one day, I remember I was watching TV when this commercial for the New Beetle came on. The VW Beetle had been redesigned and was making its big comeback around that time. this is the commercial that I saw...
I heard that melody and I was gone forever.
I have a severe fondness for music and when I hear a song like I did that day, I get goose bumps and chills run up my back. I light up from the inside.
this is the light of my soul.
I watched that 30 second clip and then lost it forever.
at this time in life there was no google. yahoo was useless (much like now) and videos on the internet were a pipe dream. in fact, internet porn consisted of pictures that took a good 20 seconds sometimes just to load ONE. I couldn't exactly Shazaam it, or type in the words to ask jeeves because finding lyrics on the internet was an exercise in patience. we may not have even had our first computer yet.
so I lost it.
But I never forgot that melody. and those beeps. but mostly the melody. and those words...
I will love you 'till I die, and I will love you all the time.
those words and melody haunted my waking hours. I wrote poems around that melody and even incorporated those words into one of my poems named after an irish girl I never knew.
the first concert I ever went to was Marilyn Manson & Hole. i'm not really sure how sam and i got tickets to that show, but I do remember walking into the Pond of Anaheim and seeing the masses of freaks. and the stage. the stage that was not too far from where we were sitting.
we got there early because we were dropped off and therefore didn't have to deal with parking at all. when we sat down there was still a lot of time to go. at some concerts, they play music before and in between acts. since we were there so early, no one had performed yet.
the pond and all of it's red seats were slowly filling and the beatles were playing in the arena, since manson is a beatles fan. then this beautiful song came on over the speakers. A female voice whispered...
ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space...
Then I heard the melody... and those beeps. I knew it was my song from that commercial I had seen. what fucking luck I had! the song I was chasing after was playing over the P.A. in the same arena where I was about to see Marilyn manson. I sat there and smiled my big ass dopey smile while my heart reached out to the universe like the wind reaches out to the last leaves of fall. I was filled with that old feeling of tingles and excitement that I had first felt by myself in my living room. only now I was surrounded by thousands of people. but in that moment I could hear only my heartbeat and that beautiful song.
the concert ended. high school ended. my youth ended. and I flew off to japan and left my girlfriend behind. I spent many days alone and wondered what all my friends were up to. having normal lives where parties were attended, good times were had, jobs and school were started and dropped also, much like the casual acquaintances I had collected during school. I held my youth in my hand like a dandelion flower seed, and when I tried to shield it from the wind I realized that I had been hiding a dandelion that wasn't much more than a stem and the dying dreams I had left in garden grove. in California.
it was during a specifically shitty time in my life when I met this guy Isaac Angers.
when I got to japan everything that could have gone wrong, did. my parents were getting a divorce, my grandpa died, my girlfriend of two-and-a-half -years broke up with me, and to top it off I get sent away on guard duty to augment the base guards post 9/11. I was forced to move across the base into some shit building with some guys I didn't know at all. my schedule was 24 hrs on, 24hrs off. wake-up time was 4AM. life sucked.
my room mate was this fat turd from intelligence battalion that ended up hurting his foot bad enough that they had to send a replacement for him. it was very important to get a replacement because we had to spend 7 months augmenting this camp guard. it was the shittiest time I had spent in the marines so far. however, my new room mate was angers, and he was a cool guy. we got along and eventually a few of us guys became good friends. it was with these guys that I bought my 1st semi-professional camera and developed my love of photography.
me and angers would walk down to the video store no our days off and rent movies because what the fuck else were we gonna do on our little time off? we rented indiscriminately. anything was fair game. after all, we were rich.
one day we rented a movie called Vanilla Sky. now, the movie isn't the best movie I've ever watched, or even close to it. the only reason I even ended up buying it was because of the following.
I was laying in my small bed directly across from anger's side of the room watching the movie play from my portable DVD player through my TV. it was dark and we were watching movies to pass the dreadful time before we had to wake up and walk to the armory (which was in the opposite direction of the guard shack) and stand out in the sun for 24 hrs.
the movie progressed and eventually there comes a scene where everything is going as wrong as it gets. the main character realizes something is not right at all and starts yelling for tech support. at the end of the building, an elevator opens. he gets inside where man begins to explain to him what is going on.
he explains that it is all a dream he is currently living (while in a suspended state) called the lucid dream, and that at one point earlier in time he had actually died. he says that his friend threw a three day memorial in his honor. the scene pans out and shows a sweep of old pictures and mementos, and people standing around talking to each other. then, the girl he never had peeks into the door way. her eyes red, wearing the same big ugly coat she had on the night they met in that same house.... and in the background a song lifts from the scene.
and that familiar beep.
at this point I am sitting up fully, eyes open and ears pricked up. I can feel that tingling race up my back into my head, and I can feel my heart beat. I was so excited that I didn't really remember the rest of the movie, but I had it. I had found it. or better yet, it had found me. by some random act of the universe the song had finally found me. I may have even written about it in a journal I always keep. I waited until the song credits rolled and I paused it so I could write down my songs name. the credit said:
the next day that I had time off I walked the mile or so down to the internet café and paid the 10 bucks per hour to use the internet. that's just how things were at the time. I opened up whatever music downloading software was installed on that particular PC and typed in the name. after the 10 or fifteen minutes it took to download the song had passed I eagerly took the old crust headphones that were supplied by the café and listened to my song. I listened to that song and I may have even welled up. I don't remember the exact moment since it was about 10 years ago and my mind tends to wander. but I do remember I had to bring a blank CD because USB drives were expensive back then. I put my song on that disc and took it home. I had it now. it was mine.
I loved that song like people love their dogs. I hoped it would never get old. I hoped it would always hold a warm reception for me, and even warmer memories. As the years passed that song shaped much of my life and played secretly behind my eyes as things went wrong or went well. I even started a video using that song (that I never finished). I kept it with me and put it on every mp3 player I ever owned. I often imagined that song playing at my funeral or viewing or whatever thing people wanna do with my corpse after I am dead.
the years passed and I got out of the marines, and kept some of those friends with me through life. one of those friends was randy, a guy I met by getting into a fight with him during some bullshit we had to do in the marines. we stayed friends and kept in contact since he lived in San Diego and I lived in Orange County. for one of his birthdays I decided to make him a grand scale video using his old videos and some of mine and my giant collection of pictures. the video turned out to be something on the plus side of 20 minutes. the plan was to drive up there for his birthday party and present him this video, then get drunk. well, it was already dark and I was still finishing the video because I am king procrastinator. I texted him saying I was gonna be late because I was working on his gift. he replied that I didn't have to bring a gift and that I should just get there.
when I finally finished I gathered my shit and drove the drive down to La Mesa. I remember on the way there I was driving that lonely stretch near camp Pendleton where the stars shine brighter, and I thought that I wanted to meet a girl at a party and talk all night without any weird need to get laid or without ruining things by trying to kiss or anything. I wanted to fall in love. you know, like in the movies.
when i got there i the house was fairly packed and randy greeted me with a beer. since i had arrived late it was my mission to catch up. I told randy that I had brought a video to show everyone so everyone sat down to watch. the video played and everyone laughed and awe'd and seemed to enjoy it, especially randy. it was about him after all. after the video ended we all continued drinking and doing what people do at parties. we took turns taking bonged beers from "the violator" (a double beer bong i had built especially for the occasion), had shots and cake, and even enjoyed each others company for a while.
i didn't know it, but randy was trying to get this girl to show up. she was one of his friends that i would later find out had almost met me several times in our short time knowing randy. he finally convinced her to show up and i didn't really pay too much attention to her until someone forced her to play guitar, it might have been randy himself. that sounds like some thing he would do. she played guitar and i was stuck watching her. i couldn't stop looking at her. i felt like an ass.
i was fairly drunk by this time and so was randy. when randy gets drunk he turns into cupid and tries to hook everyone up. it was my (unwanted) turn. i never asked randy to hook me up with anyone. it just turns out that he tried to hook me up with a girl that jeremiah had brought which he was in love with but had zero interest in him. i had gotten wind of this and decided to sit next to Erwin across the room. Erwin was talking to Ashley about some bullshit i don't remember and trying to get her phone number. i was interjecting a few words here and there but not really talking directly with her. i was still fairly drunk at this point or else i wouldn't be talking to her. (just one important fact here... without alcohol, i never would have met Ashley or talked to her or anything) I knew that this girl was going to come in and try to talk to me but i had no intent of hooking up with her. i don't do that.
so i sat down next to Ashley and asked her to pretend like we were talking. and every time this girl walks in to try and talk to me, to pretend that we are laughing and having a wildly entertaining conversation. my plan worked and eventually me and Ashley were having a conversation. one that she thought didn't matter because she didn't plan on seeing me again. but i was slowly falling in love that night with the girl that i am still in love with today as i write this. with alcohol as my courage, we talked all night and had some adventures that are left for the story of how we met.
i am not really sure of the timeline (you know, cause i was drunk) but i think randy showed Ashley the video at some point after everyone else had watched it, because she had arrived late. this time it was just us 3. after the video ended randy said something i'll never forget. he said that it kind of sucks that no one will ever make something like that for me. and i know he didn't mean it maliciously but it sounded like that. the way i took it was to mean that i am the only one that chronicles our lives with videos and pictures because it's important to me. i stood there and thought about that and even though i didn't know it, Ashley was also thinking about that...the girl that i had just met and ended up talking to all night.
the party ended, the night became light, the hangovers were had, i asked Ashley to come out with us and she said no.
years later, after we had gotten together she would give me a present. a rather unexpected present. it was wrapped in this wrapping that still hangs on my wall to this day. inside was a disc. i played the disc and this is what played...
I cried. I guess that makes me a water element. ha.
I cried because it was thoughtful. because it was our story. because it was my song. it was everything. and done with no pictures of me, or videos. it was brilliant. I loved it so much that I made an immediate copy of it and kept the original in a case. I watch the copy whenever I watch it. it is still hard for me to accept that someone cares this deeply for me and I have trouble expressing myself to others, but things like this say what I can never say.
time passed, days became memories, and lives became dreams. One day I was looking around on livenation when I saw that Spiritualized was performing in at the wiltern in los angeles. now, you would think that I would jump on the opportunity to go see them, but I was never really a fan of their other music. I never really listened to the other albums or other songs even. so I sat for a while. I read reviews for them and people seemed to really enjoy their shows. so one day I decided that I would spend the money and buy the damn tickets.
I told Ashley we were going to see spiritualized and I think the day of the show was one where she had to work or something like that. it was decided that I would go ahead and wait in line while she arrived whenever she could.
I really wanted her to be there with me.
I spent more time than I wanted to sitting in traffic on the way there, and when I finally got into the line after paying the shitty 20 bucks for parking, there were more people in front of me than I desired... but I was there. I was ready.
I don't really get excited for concerts. not until it's actually time to see the performers. and this time I was waiting for Ashley, hoping that she would get there in time to not have to find me inside somewhere.
she got there and we went inside. the show was amazing. the visuals were very fitting to the music and the sounds was great. I had my recorder with me and a copy of the setlist on my phone so I knew when my song would be playing. the moment came and I started my recorder. in the video you can hear me tell ashley to "listen for the sound." (of the woman's voice to signal the start of the song)
I was laying in my small bed directly across from anger's side of the room watching the movie play from my portable DVD player through my TV. it was dark and we were watching movies to pass the dreadful time before we had to wake up and walk to the armory (which was in the opposite direction of the guard shack) and stand out in the sun for 24 hrs.
the movie progressed and eventually there comes a scene where everything is going as wrong as it gets. the main character realizes something is not right at all and starts yelling for tech support. at the end of the building, an elevator opens. he gets inside where man begins to explain to him what is going on.
he explains that it is all a dream he is currently living (while in a suspended state) called the lucid dream, and that at one point earlier in time he had actually died. he says that his friend threw a three day memorial in his honor. the scene pans out and shows a sweep of old pictures and mementos, and people standing around talking to each other. then, the girl he never had peeks into the door way. her eyes red, wearing the same big ugly coat she had on the night they met in that same house.... and in the background a song lifts from the scene.
and that familiar beep.
at this point I am sitting up fully, eyes open and ears pricked up. I can feel that tingling race up my back into my head, and I can feel my heart beat. I was so excited that I didn't really remember the rest of the movie, but I had it. I had found it. or better yet, it had found me. by some random act of the universe the song had finally found me. I may have even written about it in a journal I always keep. I waited until the song credits rolled and I paused it so I could write down my songs name. the credit said:
Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
Performed by Spiritualized
the next day that I had time off I walked the mile or so down to the internet café and paid the 10 bucks per hour to use the internet. that's just how things were at the time. I opened up whatever music downloading software was installed on that particular PC and typed in the name. after the 10 or fifteen minutes it took to download the song had passed I eagerly took the old crust headphones that were supplied by the café and listened to my song. I listened to that song and I may have even welled up. I don't remember the exact moment since it was about 10 years ago and my mind tends to wander. but I do remember I had to bring a blank CD because USB drives were expensive back then. I put my song on that disc and took it home. I had it now. it was mine.
I loved that song like people love their dogs. I hoped it would never get old. I hoped it would always hold a warm reception for me, and even warmer memories. As the years passed that song shaped much of my life and played secretly behind my eyes as things went wrong or went well. I even started a video using that song (that I never finished). I kept it with me and put it on every mp3 player I ever owned. I often imagined that song playing at my funeral or viewing or whatever thing people wanna do with my corpse after I am dead.
the years passed and I got out of the marines, and kept some of those friends with me through life. one of those friends was randy, a guy I met by getting into a fight with him during some bullshit we had to do in the marines. we stayed friends and kept in contact since he lived in San Diego and I lived in Orange County. for one of his birthdays I decided to make him a grand scale video using his old videos and some of mine and my giant collection of pictures. the video turned out to be something on the plus side of 20 minutes. the plan was to drive up there for his birthday party and present him this video, then get drunk. well, it was already dark and I was still finishing the video because I am king procrastinator. I texted him saying I was gonna be late because I was working on his gift. he replied that I didn't have to bring a gift and that I should just get there.
when I finally finished I gathered my shit and drove the drive down to La Mesa. I remember on the way there I was driving that lonely stretch near camp Pendleton where the stars shine brighter, and I thought that I wanted to meet a girl at a party and talk all night without any weird need to get laid or without ruining things by trying to kiss or anything. I wanted to fall in love. you know, like in the movies.
when i got there i the house was fairly packed and randy greeted me with a beer. since i had arrived late it was my mission to catch up. I told randy that I had brought a video to show everyone so everyone sat down to watch. the video played and everyone laughed and awe'd and seemed to enjoy it, especially randy. it was about him after all. after the video ended we all continued drinking and doing what people do at parties. we took turns taking bonged beers from "the violator" (a double beer bong i had built especially for the occasion), had shots and cake, and even enjoyed each others company for a while.
i didn't know it, but randy was trying to get this girl to show up. she was one of his friends that i would later find out had almost met me several times in our short time knowing randy. he finally convinced her to show up and i didn't really pay too much attention to her until someone forced her to play guitar, it might have been randy himself. that sounds like some thing he would do. she played guitar and i was stuck watching her. i couldn't stop looking at her. i felt like an ass.
i was fairly drunk by this time and so was randy. when randy gets drunk he turns into cupid and tries to hook everyone up. it was my (unwanted) turn. i never asked randy to hook me up with anyone. it just turns out that he tried to hook me up with a girl that jeremiah had brought which he was in love with but had zero interest in him. i had gotten wind of this and decided to sit next to Erwin across the room. Erwin was talking to Ashley about some bullshit i don't remember and trying to get her phone number. i was interjecting a few words here and there but not really talking directly with her. i was still fairly drunk at this point or else i wouldn't be talking to her. (just one important fact here... without alcohol, i never would have met Ashley or talked to her or anything) I knew that this girl was going to come in and try to talk to me but i had no intent of hooking up with her. i don't do that.
so i sat down next to Ashley and asked her to pretend like we were talking. and every time this girl walks in to try and talk to me, to pretend that we are laughing and having a wildly entertaining conversation. my plan worked and eventually me and Ashley were having a conversation. one that she thought didn't matter because she didn't plan on seeing me again. but i was slowly falling in love that night with the girl that i am still in love with today as i write this. with alcohol as my courage, we talked all night and had some adventures that are left for the story of how we met.
i am not really sure of the timeline (you know, cause i was drunk) but i think randy showed Ashley the video at some point after everyone else had watched it, because she had arrived late. this time it was just us 3. after the video ended randy said something i'll never forget. he said that it kind of sucks that no one will ever make something like that for me. and i know he didn't mean it maliciously but it sounded like that. the way i took it was to mean that i am the only one that chronicles our lives with videos and pictures because it's important to me. i stood there and thought about that and even though i didn't know it, Ashley was also thinking about that...the girl that i had just met and ended up talking to all night.
the party ended, the night became light, the hangovers were had, i asked Ashley to come out with us and she said no.
years later, after we had gotten together she would give me a present. a rather unexpected present. it was wrapped in this wrapping that still hangs on my wall to this day. inside was a disc. i played the disc and this is what played...
I cried. I guess that makes me a water element. ha.
I cried because it was thoughtful. because it was our story. because it was my song. it was everything. and done with no pictures of me, or videos. it was brilliant. I loved it so much that I made an immediate copy of it and kept the original in a case. I watch the copy whenever I watch it. it is still hard for me to accept that someone cares this deeply for me and I have trouble expressing myself to others, but things like this say what I can never say.
time passed, days became memories, and lives became dreams. One day I was looking around on livenation when I saw that Spiritualized was performing in at the wiltern in los angeles. now, you would think that I would jump on the opportunity to go see them, but I was never really a fan of their other music. I never really listened to the other albums or other songs even. so I sat for a while. I read reviews for them and people seemed to really enjoy their shows. so one day I decided that I would spend the money and buy the damn tickets.
I told Ashley we were going to see spiritualized and I think the day of the show was one where she had to work or something like that. it was decided that I would go ahead and wait in line while she arrived whenever she could.
I really wanted her to be there with me.
I spent more time than I wanted to sitting in traffic on the way there, and when I finally got into the line after paying the shitty 20 bucks for parking, there were more people in front of me than I desired... but I was there. I was ready.
I don't really get excited for concerts. not until it's actually time to see the performers. and this time I was waiting for Ashley, hoping that she would get there in time to not have to find me inside somewhere.
she got there and we went inside. the show was amazing. the visuals were very fitting to the music and the sounds was great. I had my recorder with me and a copy of the setlist on my phone so I knew when my song would be playing. the moment came and I started my recorder. in the video you can hear me tell ashley to "listen for the sound." (of the woman's voice to signal the start of the song)
even watching the video now I can feel my eyes getting shiny. I was there, holding ashley in my arms, listening to the song I would gladly have paid 300 dollars to hear in person. it was a huge moment for me. I shivered and tried my hardest not to lose it. but this was different. it was a lifetimes worth of emotions and catastrophic losses, smiles, dreams, loves, hopes, wishes and those little notes I have scribbled into my notebooks over the years all riding on a simple chord progression with some angels singing behind it. I smiled and I could feel tears running down my face. i was among hundreds of people, but I was watching the band in an embrace with my love and no one else was around as the room spun slowly and I held on to the person I love and I told her everything i have ever wanted to say without saying anything at all.
all I want in life's a little bit of love to take the pain away
a giant step each day
I will love you 'till I die
and I will love you all the time
everything happens today
and we're out here to stay
and I don't know where we are all going to.
there was a lull in the music and the crowd swayed in time with the beat. then it all came back even louder and stronger as the crowd cheered and those words swept through my blood and pumped into my heart while I imagined what it would be like to have people that interested in something I had created. that was the best night I have ever had.
the show ended and the people streamed out with their memories still fresh in their mouths, the lights came up, the cars filled and then disappeared and I went home.
time moved forward and like always, my grip wasn't strong enough to keep it still. then time stopped.
something that should have been great news happened and it wasn't great news at all. the decision was made and after coming back from the doctors office we picked up the pills at the pharmacy across the street. it was that easy. we went home and got ready. while Ashley was in the bathroom I got out that video she had made me. I put it in the DVD player and waited. after what seemed like forever she came out. and we opened the packaging.
we sat on the bed and silently, I started the movie.
it played.
I reached for the remote to turn it up. I turned it up almost as loud as it gets and we sat there holding each other, looking at the TV but not really seeing anything but the blurriness that comes from trying hard to hide tears. I loved her and I wanted her to know that. that no matter what happened, I loved her.
the video with the song played, and we both cried. holding each other and thinking terrible things. not too long ago we were in the wiltern, holding each other, listening to the same song and feeling amazing. this time the tone was much different. there was no joy, no happiness, no hopes, just secrets and closed doors.
the song ended and she took those pills and put them in the sides of her mouth and I watched my love start to cry. I felt like dying.
I had to be strong and tell her that she had to stop or else the medication wouldn't work.
this was it. there was no turning back now. this was the worst day of my life.
I never told anyone this, but I played the video...the song, so that if by chance what people say is true, that you would hear something beautiful before you left this world. before you died at my hands. i'm sorry. i'm so sorry. I don't even know what to say. i just wanted you to hear my favorite song.
So that's the story of my favorite song. i'm sure I have forgotten some things but I get emotional and I have to stop while I regain my thoughts. sometimes the song comes on in my car and I still feel that feeling I felt all those years ago when I heard it for the first time on a silly car commercial as a young boy. maybe one day the song will play at my funeral and the story will be continued by someone else. i'm an asshole, but I love you. all of you.
.thank you.
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