John Lennon "Jealous Guy"

It was 1 in the morning. I was holding the phone a good foot-and-a-half from my face. I could still hear her screaming. Even though we were a good 20 miles apart, my "flight" instinct was kicking in.

We'd gone out once, maybe twice, and she seemed nice enough. This was when I was in my early 20s. In the days when "liking the same music" seemed like a perfectly reasonable foundation to balance a new relationship on.

I remember that one of the first times we spoke, she made a point to note that her favorite songs were never the singles off a record. She didn't like Phish's "Down With Disease" as much as she liked "Wolfman's Brother," off the recently-released "Hoist." And she preferred "Jealous Guy" to "Imagine."

That encompasses the depth of the relationship, up to the point I found myself on the receiving end of a screaming telephone call.

I had just gotten home from work, wrapping up my night shift at the radio station, when the phone rang. Pretty late for a call to my quiet apartment. I hoped no one was dead.

When I realized it was her, I immediately felt this bit of hesitation. Even if you know the person is just getting off work, do you call someone you hardly know, at 1am? I knew that it was something I wouldn't do, and so I felt a little uneasy, right from the get-go.

She suggested I come join her. She'd been hanging out with a few friends, and wanted me to come over.

She was slurring her words.

"No thanks. Not tonight. I just got home from a long day and I'm---"

And that's when she launched into a tirade. First, she was just hot, but she cranked up to a scream pretty quickly. A obscenity-laden stream of consciousness about how I must be some kind of jerk to turn down an invitation to come over and that I was probably lying about being tired and I must be some kind of jerk to turn down an invitation to come over and I must lying about being tired, etc, etc.

At some point, I just kind of interrupted her and said, "I gotta go," and hung up.

I won't say that I had high standards in those years, but I wasn't going to endure someone's bat-shit-drunken-craziness either.


She called the next morning and apologized. I thanked her. She asked if I wanted to get together. I told her I'd pass on that, and that I'd just see her around.


A few days later, I got a note and a cassette tape. The note was a brief and sincere apology. And the tape was a mix of songs we'd talked about, and other favorites of hers. I listened to the tape and enjoyed it. A few days later, I bumped into her. She was contrite, and asked if I wanted to get together. I told her No Thanks.

She looked at me, part wounded, part disbelieving.

"I don't make mixed tapes for just anyone," she said quietly.


It was weird. We both liked "Jealous Guy."

But she couldn't understand how an apology and a mixed tape didn't set things right. And I didn't understand how it possibly ever could.


See the video on Youtube.

Phish "Down With Disease"

The harsh light of day was not forgiving to The Omelet Shoppe.

I was used to coming to the only all-night place in Abingdon after a night out on the town, drinking and listening to music and such. After midnight, before sunrise. At night, the dark hid the dirt. And more importantly, I'm sure the dark (and the drunk) hid how ragged I looked at 3:30am snarfing on an egg sandwich.

But this day, I was here at a time that a big plate of eggs and waffles makes much more sense---brunch.

It was a goodbye breakfast. Goodbye to a girl with whom I'd had a brief, unusual relationship.

Two weeks prior to the breakfast, we'd met and hit it off.

"Figures," she said, "I'm moving in two weeks."

But for young, twenty-something single (and not-uncreative) me, I saw it as an open opportunity.

"Then let's enjoy each other, and skip any of the usual dating B.S."

I realized that we didn't have time, or need, to move cautiously. Or to say "I'll call you" and wait the appropriate number of days so as not to seem too eager. There was no need to present this false-ish "best behavior" version of yourself. Or to not say what was on your mind. It was an opportunity to really let go of the railing and run down the stairs.

There was no need to negotiate, calibrate, or obfuscate. It would be over in two weeks, good, bad or indifferent.

It was good. Skipping the B.S. allowed us to really get to know each other, and be open to each other in a way that other early relationships had never been. She shared much about herself, including her bitterness about her time in Abingdon. The idealism that had brought her to a public service job in the area, had been squashed by insecure bosses and small-minded thinking. And with no sentimental attachment to her time, she had been ready to leave and never look back.

But over breakfast, her car loaded up with all her belongings, ready for the highway, she did have a reason to smile and look in the rearview mirror when she headed up Route 81.

"It's like that Phish song, 'Down With Disease.'"

Uh-oh. I had had a long standing policy against anyone who explained themselves via questionable song lyrics.

What's the line?

"Waiting for the time when I can finally say / That this has all been wonderful but now I'm on my way."

She explained that she had hoped to stick around long enough that some element of her time in town was positive. And now she had.

I liked her philosophy and it made it easier to say goodbye, which we did not long after paying the check.

That was the day I let go of my prejudice against defining yourself through song, that she let go of her prejudice against Abingdon, and that daylight in The Omelet Shoppe was more forgiving that it at first seemed.