Ooooh, babe!
Well, I found out today that the Stadium Tour I’ve had tickets to since early January 2020 has been postponed again. Until 30 June 2022. It’s a heck of a billing: Motley Crue (who, truthfully, I couldn’t care less about); Def Leppard (who, truthfully, I’m dying to see and have now had tix to see three times and it has yet to pan out); Poison (remember, I was supposed to see Bret Michaels on the 80’s Cruise in 2020 and he backed out literally at the last minute because of covid); and Joan Jett (hello, who is one of the most bad-assed women in all of rock and roll EVER). We didn’t have phenomenal seats, but it was a Stadium Tour. Part of the glory was just being there, right? Our tickets were in the Section 101 (I think), Row N, Seats 13 and 15. In the Nissan Stadium, where the Tennessee Titans play football for the NFL, it could have been a lot worse. We also had a parking pass secured in the Stadium’s Parking Garage. In all, we have over $500 tied up in this concert. And it’s on a credit card, accruing interest.
I had mixed feelings about the show and was actually considering doing a blog post about the mixed emotions of it all, but talked myself out of it. A blog about lip gloss was okay, I decided, but not mixed emotions about my first concert experience in our brave new post-vaccination covid world. I don’t understand my logic, either, lol! So, now that I’m writing a blog post about the event being postponed again, I’ll go ahead and explore my emotional conundrums.
I love music. You guys know how I love music! And three of these acts have been on my list for a long time. (Remember, back in 1987, I watched “Pour Some Sugar On Me” on MTV so much that my sister Sarah was probably the only 3-year-old in America who could sing the chorus! I’ve been waiting for Def Leppard for a long time!) And I want normalcy again. Whatever normalcy will be now. And maybe that is part of it. Maybe I’m unsure about what will be “normal.” Because we haven’t all had the same experiences over the past fourteen months. In Tennessee, we never really experienced a true lock-down like a lot of other places did. I hear my friend in New York City talk even recently about making reservations to attend church and realize that we have had it radically differently here than a lot of other places. I have a friend in Canada who is on total lockdown in her province of Ontario – she, for one, is very excited that this Stadium Tour has been rescheduled for next year, because she has tickets to see it in Detroit and likely would not have been able to get across the border to see it later this Summer. Here in our part of Tennessee, and I’m presuming in much or most of the rest of the state, as well, we had a few weeks of seclusion. A few weeks where we got take-away service only from restaurants and it was tough to get in to see a doctor. And dentists and hairdressers and spas were closed. There were no clothing stores open except for Walmart or Target – places that had groceries, as well. But within a couple of months, Tennessee started opening back up. Russ and I started going to restaurants again – and eating outside – as early as a year ago. We’ve been good; we’ve been safe; we’ve social-distanced ourselves; we’ve worn our masks. Although he worked with covid patients every day for a while, so he was exposed to it constantly – all the more reason for us to do what we were supposed to, wearing masks, good hygiene, social-distancing…
I’ve been in a few “group” settings in the past fourteen months. I’ve been to three funerals. We went to the movies at Christmas, but I didn’t consider that a “group” outing in all honesty – the restaurant where we had dinner was far busier than the movie theater. I have been shopping in a few stores since Christmas. No huge crowds. Until a couple of weeks ago, when I went with a friend to the Johnson City Mall, however, there was nowhere where I felt “crowded.” The Food Court there had no semblance of social-distancing. It was a frenzied free-for-all. Initially, I thought nothing of it. Then my friend spoke up about it. And it hit me. And I started to panic a little…
Then I said to myself, “And you think that you’re ready to be in a stadium full of thousands of loud rock and roll fans, a lot of whom probably have not done all the right things, haven’t practiced social-distancing, haven’t been vaccinated, and certainly aren’t going to wear masks during an hours-long concert comprised of four ‘hard rock’ acts?” No. I wasn’t ready. That day in the Food Court proved to me that I couldn’t even wrap my head around a Stadium Tour. There were logistics about everything that I couldn’t imagine, everyday things, not just the concert stuff. But as the days went by, I made my peace with it. With it being just over a month from now, I’d accepted it. I was going to be surrounded by people and I was going to have to take a lot of extra medication to get through the experience. I was going to let the music (and the Clonazapam) carry me through.
But today, I saw my Canadian friend’s announcement about her show on Facebook. I investigated and learned that the whole Tour had been postponed another year. Another year and surely the world will be back to normal. I mean, I have two cruises booked for next year before this concert is slated to happen. Cruises are crowded. One of them is an 80’s Cruise – concerts nightly! And I think that I will be fine with that. I have another concert scheduled at the Roanoke Civic Center in August – much smaller than a Stadium Tour. I don’t spring into a panic attack when I think of it. And maybe it will or won’t happen. I thought that this one was a definite go and today the rug was pulled out from under us. I hope that James Taylor and Jackson Browne get to do their show in August, though, and that I will be there. I have another “warm-up” event sooner than that, the Van Gogh Experience in Charlotte next month with two girlfriends. I know that it is being billed as a social-distanced and safe event, but it’s probably more people than I’ve come across in a typical restaurant in the past fourteen months, too. I have confidence that we will navigate it fine.
I talked it over with Russ. Another year is a long time to wait. It’s a long time to keep tickets on a credit card when we’re trying to pay off some bills. I sent a request to Ticketmaster for a refund. Maybe something will change between now and then and I will get tickets again. But for now, Section 101 (I think that’s right), Row N, Seats 13 and 15, at the Nissan Stadium in Nashville are available, if you want them.
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