A Love Story.

voltee ♦ November 13, 2010 ♦ 4 Comments

Item: Pants Color/Fabric: Olive, leather Designer: The Gap Years Owned: 10
Sometimes there are secrets to be told. Sometimes people do ridiculous things, and then repeat them. For years. Sometimes you can’t wear leather pants on your own. Sometimes love just isn’t enough.
This is a story about how I am a huge nerd. It’s not a fact that I discuss, willingly, often. It does tend to come up if the conversation turns to birds. Or Bono. Especially Bono.
I have been clinically obsessed with the band U2 since I was 12 years old. It all began in the seventh grade as a ploy to try to befriend the coolest girl in school, Natalie. She was crazy about the Achtung Baby album. So I ordered it from my father’s Columbia House CD Club (remember those?).
To this day I still believe that is the best album of all time. I have worn out three cds of it. It’s not really normal.
I remember trying to win tickets on the radio to see their concert in 1992, and crying because I didn’t. And so the first time I saw a U2 concert was in 1997, and we had the very worst seats anyone could imagine. But I couldn’t have cared less. I was finally under the same roof as Bono!
When I went to college, conquered the internet, and started to make a small, spendable, salary, my obsession escalated. Soon I belonged to multiple U2 Fan Clubs. I began buying collector’s items, such as their first single, released the year I was born, on Ebay. I could even download rare and unreleased songs on the internet!
I spent a great deal of time planning how I would be close enough to touch Bono at their next concert. He would pull me on stage and dance with me. I would need to buy leather pants!
I found these pants at the Gap, and thought they might make me a rock star. Or, at least, irresistible to a rock star. I felt like a bad ass, and they fit me perfectly. Plus, I got them for over $100 off! Now here’s the extra-nerdy part; I bought Nate a matching pair in brown.
And by the time U2’s next concerts came around, in 2001, I had dragged my sister into my world of obsession. We were going to see them in Cleveland, and also Detroit. Both times, I wore the leather pants. The first time, I also wore these shoes:

Yes, indeed. Rock star, for sure! I mean, they have a hole in them! And there’s zebra involved!
Sometimes you have to fall down to learn.
At both concerts, we waited in line, for hours, in coldness, and rain, and unforgiving concrete. Here is what I looked like:

I just have no words. Except that I must really love you all a lot to share that. And that I had a much cooler lime green shirt with zippers under that one a radio station gave me for warmth.
I know I have some even better pictures, of me and Kelly and the cornrows we put on her head while waiting. Of the Detroit show, where Nate and I wore matching leather pants, and I made Nate wear another rock star cliche, the cowboy hat. I can’t find those pictures, though, so you get me and my Gatorade.
In the end, the waiting was entirely worth it. We made it into the first row at both concerts, and once the music began, I forgot all about my fatigue and danced like the world was ending. We were so close that I could look into Bono’s mouth and read the designer label on his shoes (Prada). So close that U2’s guitarist, The Edge, shook our hands. It was almost perfection!
Except that Bono did not ask me to dance. There was a moment, when I was really getting down with my bad self, that this guy next to me tried to get the security guard to lift me on stage. Do you know what he said? That I was too tall! Stupid rock star zebra shoes.
Yes, Bono is very short, and slightly insecure about it. He doesn’t ask tall girls to dance. And so, over the next almost-decade, I’ve seen them five more times, and always worn flat shoes.
But still Bono has not asked me to dance with him. And after almost 20 years of devotion, it’s still my heart’s desire. Someday, it will happen! It simply must.
The best thing about those concerts in 2001 was the bond my sister and I found then. We became closer than we’d ever been, and had such adventures! I wish we could go back and do it all over again! Some of the magic has died, though. We’re adults now. It’s hard to get up at 5am and camp out on cold concrete now. Our bones protest.
At least I still have the leather pants. Not that I can wear them, though. They were in a flood, and the leather has tightened and there is some mold. I used to think the distressed leather made them more rock-ish. But the fact is they still no longer fit me. It’s time, isn’t it?

**These are going.  They will never fit again.  Anyone want to give them the TLC they need and deserve?  They are still pretty badass.