Music Matters: How a Bluegrass Festival Helped Me Remember the Truth
It was kind of a fluke that I ended up at the bluegrass festival yesterday. It was slow at the shop and I knew Katherine and Lindsey could handle it without me. I left work around 3. It’s weird for me to free at 3 o’clock on a Saturday so I thought I’d make it even weirder and called my friend Joanna to tell her I was stopping by.
Joanna’s always up for live music and her plans for the rest of the day included going to the Green Mountain Bluegrass Festival. She had gone the night before and said it was really cool. She had texted me earlier nudging me to go after work. Given a full day at the bra shop, I might have just blown the bluegrass off like I do to so many other Friday and Saturday night invitations. (I’m tired!) After a series of outfit changes, I festivized my “work clothes” to a little bit of bluegrass hipness thanks to Joanna’s closet and by rolling up my Eileen Fisher trousers to mid-calf.
We rolled into Riley Rink in Joanna’s Subaru and saw parked cars lining the long drive. Nice cars mixed with a few hippie types like one old school sedan that had a big white lovely flower painted on it. Joanna knew the parking ropes and we ended up in a close-to-the-action lot where the attendant remembered her from the night before thanks to the “Bill Murray is My Spirit Animal” sticker on the back driver’s side window. This story is all true, by the way.
The wet mushy ground situation got to me early – like the second I stepped out of the car – but I remembered that the “biblical” rain the night before was a truly insane weather event. Kudos to my friend Craig for that bible-based adjective as it helped me deal with the instant mush in my flip-flops. Before I knew it, my wet feet had me inside the fenced-in field of a venue. A really good-sized stage was set up off to the right with hundreds of rows of fans in their beach chairs paying attention to the band. The beer tent anchored the line of food trucks. Joanna told me our friend Lauren was tending bar. We started making our way across the muddy tundra.
People were having a good time. I scanned the rows and rows of beach chairs from behind and saw a little bit of everything as evidence. There were those who were really into the music looking intently at the stage. Others laughing and going on in conversation. Looked like they were telling stories. Others keeping eyes focused on the kids teetering nearby. It was a total music festival scene. I looked around at the mountains surrounding us. Ha – the sky might be gray today, but still…Vermont is the most glorious place on earth. There could have been more dancing, but hey given the ground conditions, this lack of dancing was totally acceptable.
We bumped into a girl that goes to school with Joanna’s daughter and soon her cool Dad Brooks joined us. They were wearing muck boots. They knew the drill after being here the night before. I felt the dampness under my heels and toes and it was clear to me that I had never been so jealous in my life. Brooks went on and on about a band named Twisted Pine who played the Dance Tent on Thursday. (Dancing!) “So good. Really good.” he claimed. Brooks has been there all weekend working Töst Beverage to the festival crowd. I’m already a fan having poured it for customers on occasion at the shop. He also gave us the heads up that the dumpling truck was the “real deal” and that the Broccoli booth was surprisingly good. I trust him. His wife is a Japanese chef.
A quick “Hi” in the beverage tent to Lauren and Cori and we then cruised the trucks. I wanted a piece of Mach’s Pizza. We Pawlet people always do. I spotted Deanna Mach, my neighbor down the road, rolling out dough in front of her wood-fire oven. She hooked us up with slices of beet and kate. Freakin’ great. My buddy Wayne popped his head out of the Better Buzz truck. Was too late for coffee for me, but I always love seeing Wayne and Amy’s hot pink coffee truck. The guy at the dumpling joint that Brooks had pointed out was super nice. I was bummed to learn that all the dumplings had meat in them. He worked me hard to try the vegan coconut rice topped with assorted pickled things. Holy shit. Delicious.
Meanwhile the band(s) played on and we bumped into more people we knew – a couple of who also mentioned Twisted Pine: Rachel, Christine, Greg, Chip, Gavin, Tom in the distance holding court, Mark and Margaret, and we finally hooked up with Zander who we were supposed to hook up with in the first place. For some reason bumping into Bill and Angie made me want to start dancing a little. A couple of teenagers came over hustling Töst with sampler shots. The skies brightened and I really started to get into this bluegrass beautiful music thing.
As a Manchester business-owner, I totally missed the boat on being a sponsor or somehow helping to promote or be part of the Green Mountain Bluegrass Festival. I know better than anyone what music can do. It makes memories. What a cool event to host in Manchester.
This morning I woke up thinking about music…remembering how I pulled albums lovingly out of the sleeves by myself, remembered how I witnessed Rance Allen in the gospel tent at Jazz Festival a few years ago with some fun Philly friends, remembered concerts and songs and times in my life where music made things hurt more and then made things feel so much better. Music helps me dream of places I’ve been and places I’ve yet to go. I love music.
My iTunes library led me to Corrine Baily Ray and Richard Ashcroft this morning. “Girl Put Your Records On”…”A Song For the Lovers”… I had a great night. I’m having a great morning. Music matters. Thank you for a good time, Green Mountain Bluegrass Festival. Count me in as a sponsor next year. I gave my business card to the volunteer at the ticket booth who said he was a friend of the organizers. Bras and Bluegrass? Bluegrass and Bras?
xo – Joy
