pre bonnaroo

South Carolina is not like Arizona. It’s humid, not dry. They have bingo Tuesday nights at a bar, we have Tuesday booze day at ours. They are dry in stock; we have an abundance of green. The backyards of houses are forests, not rocks with cactus.

Me, my roommate Dana, and our friend Katie went on the adventure of a lifetime. We flew to South Carolina to stay with Dana’s cousin, Ashley, who just graduated from Clemson University. We partied with her a night in South Carolina before driving to Manchester, Tennessee. Katie and I weren’t interested in bingo, we were interested in Karaoke, “the way you make me feel” by MJ, obviously. We had a row of boys dancing in front of us; it was like we started a movement just by lip singing.

the first day

The next night at midnight we drove to Tennessee, 5 hours through the dark of night. At the butt crack of dawn, and I'm talking early, we met people at a gas station near Bonnaroo to go in together. Nemo, Kirsten, Brooklyn, Victor, Lauren, Matt, her uncle Eddy, his girlfriend, the list goes on. Some people that met us were people Dana and her family had met the year before and kept a friendship. That’s how bonnaroo is.

From there the trip started. From the gas station we formed a line of cars. Riding slowly, everyone cranking their music up, drinking beers outside of their car windows, in the streets, throwing Frisbees, meeting the people in other cars. Wow, it wasn’t even 6 am and we were on our 3^rd beer and 2^nd puff.

We drove in, set up our tents, changed clothes, made a bloody mary, and Dana, Katie and I went off.

It is 700 acres of dirt roads and grass and sun and heat. Wonderful people, smiling, laughing, hugging, and high fiving. Bonnaroo is 700 acres of land and within it is Centeroo, where the magic of the bands happen. Inside centeroo are 5 tents, tons of food stands, a big mushroom fountain, fields of grass, water stations, nasty ol, but bless their hearts, Porto potties, a water slide and slip n slide! I don’t know how or when we met her, this hoola hooping beautiful spirit in the body of a not even 18 year old blonde cutie named Brandi. Well Katie fell obsessed with her, we were all on top of the clouds and hoola hooped around listening to live music. Brandi came to Bonnaroo by herself. She had one little tent for herself and she was ready to go with the wonderful flow.

My eyes kept wandering and exploring the entire time. The place looks different every day and every night. It changes somehow and you find new things. After the first day we were pooped. Knocked out by 12. The music, however, didn’t stop until 4am.

the second day

You can’t sleep once the sun comes up. Your tent becomes a sauna, with no air coming in except hot heat. Of course your not rested, you just slept on the ground, with a tarp over it and got woken up by the heat. I could not stand it in the tent that morning, I pushed myself out like I was suffocating and literally fell out. I had to lay down in the shade. I was having the time of my life and excited to get the day started again. Bloody mary's, some hits, bathing suits and shorts and we were off again. It did take us a little longer to get ourselves going but once we did, we were so happy. We met our friends from Arizona at bonnaroo and we had such a fun day. My body never felt so at home and my mind never felt like smiling more and my eyes never felt like opening that wide before. The music takes you over and your love takes over too. It’s a great thing to experience. During the day we sat in a shady patch of grass. Dana, Katie, Al, Joe, Dan, and me. We were joined by a few other people hiding from the sun, just laying enjoying everything. It was perfect. I got up and swayed with my bare feet in the grass. The others talked. Some packed bowls, some listened. I sat on someone shoulders for Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros. Oh my word was that a great show. They are great.

Hats off to Nas and Damien Marley. That was one of the best shows I have ever been to in my life. Not only because I absolutely love both of those men and their music, but because of the atmosphere as well. We were in the middle of the action, at the peak of our highs, and so was every single person around us for as far as I could see. I had to go on shoulders again, I felt like a bird, that freaking unbelievable view that is so exclusive, I guess just for girls that ask guys for favors. I almost blew my vocal chord when “Welcome to Jammrock” started and “could you be loved.” Everything you wish for happens. I was so hot, I had a beer handed to me, I just yelled out “can I go on someone shoulders?” and bam, a cute guy taps me on the shoulder.

Then we saw She and Him. Zooey Deschanel is so cute, she was wearing a white dress and jumped up and down with her tambourine. She surprised me though, she has such a beautiful voice and she can belch. She sang, “I put a spell on you” as her last song and it was breathtaking.

Next we ran to see George Banks! Stave Martin was performing! He is a part of a bluegrass band called Steve Martin & The Steep Canyon Rangers. I could not take my eyes off of him in his white suit and his funny little stories. He said that one day his wife made him read a book of poetry. He thought it was bad poetry, but it might make a good country song. So he wrote one himself.

That night seeing the Flaming lips perform “do you realize??” was one of the best, goosbumpy moments ever. It is such an inspiring song and he sings it so well. And the lights, they know how to put on a light show that’s for sure.

That night, as tired as I was, as much as I had to sit down, I went to see The Black Keys, and I never looked back. They blew my mind and I wasn’t even in the center of the action. See them, enough said.

Dana and I lost Katie in the crowd, we dragged ourselves to our tent, about a 25 minute walk away down the center of the main street. There were so many tents around and people and shop that took your mind off the walk.

But when we got there, Katie was sound asleep in the tent, go figure.

the third day

Again, we were woken up by not being able to take a refreshing breath, not even 1/3 rested, and ready to go it again. This time, we took our time in the morning. I tried to find a shady spot to sleep, but the grass was bumpy and rough and it was too hot. Eating a little helped but it was nearly impossible. Drinking helped. Changed into a bathing suit top and shorts and we went to Centeroo yet again. This time the morning started with Rebelution. They are one of my favorite bands because their music has such power to make you get up and sing and dance. It has such a great beat its like hip reggae. I love it and so did tons of people in that field. This time I lost Dana and Katie. It was sad for a half hour with out my girls and I knew I couldn’t trip because I would be sad so I decided to cool off at the giant mushroom fountain. I found Alex, I found Dana, there was Katie on a table yelling “marina ballerina.” And just like that I went from not having the greatest time to having the greatest time.

Kate, Dana, and I went to see Big Sam's Funky Nation. Never heard of them before but we were dancing funky style the whole show. The Avett brothers blew me away. Not only are their lyrics great, they jam the shit out of their instruments. Standing listening to them I saw a very old woman wearing a Woodstock shirt that said then and now with a list of artists from then and now. I told her I liked her shirt, she told me that she was at the original Woodstock, the one in the summer of 69, 3 days of peace, love, and music. That was something amazing.

Jeff Beck is one of the greatest guitar players of our time, wow he’s great. My right eye felt like it was about to tear open, I later found out I had pink eye, but I still could not have loved that concert more that I did. His guitar lulls your nerves. Of course we got passed some joints there.

Steve Wonder.

Nobody was set to play during Stevie Wonder. He is a legend. He is someone to be respected to the upmost. We definitely got in front for that show. Stevie Wonder was singing to us, LIVE! Right in front of my eyes.

Jay-Z.

Black album. Back at em. Best rapper alive. Ask about him.

Yup, I had pink eye. I spent 2 hours awake after the show and after Dana and Katie had gone to sleep for them to tell me they had no medicine for me. I would have to leave Bonnaroo grounds, go to wallgreens and fill my prescription. Cool.

the fourth day

I was woken up by the heat, yes, but mostly because of fear. Fear that my eye would fall off. So I quickly put on some clothes, a hat, a pair of sunglasses, got the prescription for my eye medication that they gave me last night and walked to the info desk to get directions to wall greens.

The lady gave me a face, “honey, wall greens is far. You have to leave Bonnaroo.”

I had no choice. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to come stocked with medicine for an infection that spreads like crazy, especially if you’re making a town of 100,000 people? I wish Bonnaroo had thought of that before putting a giant fountain that everyone showers in in the middle of centeroo. But hey, like everything, you have to take what shit you have. So I started walking. Half hour. My eye was hurting so bad, like a sharp piece of glass was in it and tearing it apart. I knew I had a long way to go. Then a tuck stopped next to me. Nice man drove me to the exit. There I asked a police man how to get to wallgreens,

“I have pink eye and I need medicine.”

He asked one of those people who buy and sell tickets to drive me. I got on the back of his tractor and we drove to his car. Then Matt drove us out of Bonnaroo, into town, to wallgreens to find it closed, and then he drove me to the rite aid pharmacy and waited for me to come out 30 minutes later with my medicine. It was his 23^rd birthday too.

He drove me back but dropped me off at the entrance because he had to work. I hitched back with 2 other people before getting dropped off some place familiar. I got back to my tent 2 hours later to find the gang exactly how I left them, almost dead looking. An hour later we were up and ready to start our final day. This time we were dragging our feet. Dana, Katie, and I slept everywhere we went that day. We went to the Budweiser tent where they sprayed you with a hose and had misting fans. They had tents where we took a nap on the ground and met 2 really cute guys. We walked to the ford factory. It was a room of salvation. It had air conditioning, couches, TVs, radios, carpet, we passed out for like 2 hours there and sat on the couch for another hour. Finally we got energy back to see Dave Mathews band. Boy did we get energy.

Before Dave, we asked some guys for weed, then some guys who had weed came up to us and we all sat down in the middle of the field and had a friendly smoke sesh. Right in the middle of the crowd like it was no big deal. It struck me and it pains me to think that people would look at us and say we were criminals, we are dangerous druggies doing illegal things. But look around, the reason these wonderful music festivals exist is to keep those bad people out and so we can live in a land that is how we want, that is peace and love and harmony.

The next day, concaved and nearly dehydrated, we said our goodbyes to our friends. We rode 5 hours back to South Carolina. The next day, we flew back to phoenix. The next day I’m sitting in my room in Tucson writing all about Bonnaroo.

I’m sure there are things I have missed here and I’m sure I will write stories about this one time and that one dude for weeks but for now, this is what I could come up with about my time at bonnaroo.

It was paradise in mud. It was a vacation in dirt. It is necessary for every loving soul to recharge and keep on loving.