There’s always a certain aroma that greets you at Red Rocks. And that aroma is sweat because we’re all out of shape. Unless it’s a Slightly Stoopid show. Then the aroma is weed.
And sweat.
As the smells of weed and sweat invade your nostrils, the sound of panting invades your ears. Because we’re all out of shape. And the panting is joined by visuals of pit stains and sweat marks. Because we’re all out of shape.
Did I mention we’re all out of shape? We’re all fat.
But it’s a unique and beautiful way to enter a concert. Beautiful like Denm, Iya Terra, Soja, and Slightly Stoopid. They managed to transform Red Rocks into a place where your worries disappeared and not just because you’re really really high. I didn’t care about whether I would have enough clients to pay rent. I didn’t care about whether my car would run out of oil, or if I would make it home after the show. I didn’t care that before the show I had a Little Debbie snack cake even though I’m on a diet. I did say we ALL were fat.
But I didn’t care about any of that.
They collectively transformed Red Rocks into a place where our differences were overshadowed by our commonalities. Where people wearing gay rainbows were able to dance and sing with people proudly advertising their whereabouts on January 6th. It didn’t matter if you were gay, thought gay people should be eradicated from existence, a fur trapper, a dad, a man who was a dad but shouldn’t have been, a man who was a mom, a kid, a short person, a tall person – it didn’t matter! Because for these brief hours, we were all simply people.
And if you didn’t identify as a people, the good news is I don’t think that mattered. Not at this show where everyone was family.
The stage was overcome by brothers from many different mothers, and the crowd was overcome by families who didn’t know each other’s names. But that’s ok. Because the music was good, the people were welcoming, and the weed was flowing like wine.
Leaving the show was a teary punch to my gut. Within the rocks, my worries and stresses were lost in orbit. And I knew that, as soon as I crossed the threshold of “no re-entry”, those worries and stresses would crater back down into my life. I didn’t want to leave and go back to my shitty excuse for an existence. I wanted to stay with my briefly newfound purpose.
Actually, you know what? My life is fucking awesome. Shout out to my life.
Happy fucking birthday Donna!
