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It all started when I leapt out of the yellow taxi cab full of excitement. I was ready to rock out at Summer Fest for the third year in a row. Only to realize moments later that I had left the tickets at my house. I felt my heart drop to my stomach, my day had just turned upside down. Since Tommy and I were unable to enter the gates, we got stuck on the side of Nell In the blazing hot sun. It was the middle of the day, about 80 degrees, and lucky me decided to wear a black shirt.
As you can see, a wonderful start to my day, “So much for Summer Fest 2013”. After a few lost calls and several trips to the ticket booth (that was full of people trying to pull up our tickets online, but in the end were no help at all), “Still no progress”. At this point Tommy was pretty upset with me for leaving the tickets at my house, it was going to make us very late to the festival. Luckily, my favorite band, Cold War Kids, was the last act.
The tickets had to get down here in time to see them or I was going to lose After hiking around downtown, and bar hopping for a few hours, it was starting to get late and I was darting to get nervous. Well this resulted in aching feet, sweaty palms, expensive beer, and anxiously lathing for our tickets to arrive. The hot sun was beaming down on me as I saw It starting to set. Eight O’clock comes and finally Bailey arrived with our tickets, Summer Fest 201 3 had Just begun.
Entering a music festival Is like entering an airport, It Is an Incredibly diverse culture. “Now we have the Brow, the divas, the photographers, the comedians, the police, the advertisers, the dude who had a one too many beer, the groupies, the pesters, the rave dancers, the gays, the couples, the obnoxious kids, the film crew, the staff, the people with crazy hair, and even the type of people your parents would tell you to stay away from”, Bailey rambled on as I politely interrupted. But you know what everyone I look at has in common? They are all enjoying the music in their own way with the biggest smile on their face”. Walking into the Lifestyles Community Pavilion, seeing all the free spirits enjoying life around me turned my day right back around. I had finally made It to what I was looking forward to all day, I was about to see Cold War Kids perform live before my eyes. Gazing up at the sky, while lying down on the grassy hill, front and center the stage, all I could see was stars shining bright as ever.
I got caught off guard when I saw a bright light that was not coming from the sky, I got the feel that Cold War Kids was about to perform. I sit up to see strobe lights flashing, vibrant yellow, red, blue, and green light up the stage. The screaming of the fans all around me is music to my ears. Suddenly the strobe lights stop, and the spotlight shines right on Matt as he begins to strum the chords of my all time favorite song. “Wahoo! ” I shouted with excitement.
This was such a beautiful sight, my favorite band in front of me performing live, stars shining above me, and people all around me enjoying themselves. It was awesome to look around and see all happy faces, it gives you that good, fuzzy feeling Inside. Standing on top of the hill, my best friends next to me, dancing around, waving my arms In the air, listening to my favorite song ever, being reformed live In front of my face,l had no worries In the world.
The chorus came up and the tone softened, this is when you could hear the crowd all singing along “l even then it sounds so soothing, this will blow over in time, this will all blow over in time” at the top of their lungs. As Matt stopped to say, “This right here is why I’m here today, to see everyone in this whole venue come in sync and sing along the lyrics to our songs with us, that is truly amazing”; Then continued to burst out in song. I took a look around, and saw nothing but happiness.
Every single person I saw had a smile on their face, and was singing their heart out. People all around me, some dancing, some kissing, some laughing, some Just lying in the grass enjoying the music. Taking it all in, because that is why we were all their, Cold War Kids was able to bring all sorts of different people together for the same reason, music. As Billy Joel would say “l think music in itself is healing. It’s an explosive expression of humanity. It’s something we are all touched by. No matter what culture we’re from, everyone loves music”.