Word To The Ys

This weekend we had the pleasure of spending time with some of our favorite people: my two sibling-like friends, Sarah and Charlie, and their spouses.  Four out of the six of us attended college together, and Joe and Angie are nice enough to put up with us when the lame inside jokes inevitably begin.  I guess I don’t think of them as regular inside jokes, because we aren’t setting out to be elitist when it happens, but it is a frequent occurence that references to days of yore are dropped.  Our conversations are naturally peppered with these little nuggets.  There is an amusing phenomenon, though, wherein one of these friends…let’s call him Josh, because that’s his name… is really super-amused by stories from my pre-college years and asks me to tell one every time we’re together without the kids around.  Because let’s face it…I could really stand to let a few more years go by before my kids hear these tales.

So naturally, as I was weaving one of these epic narratives at the dinner table last night, it struck me like a bolt of genius: I should BLOG about these things!  They are sometimes excruciatingly embarrassing, sometimes weird, but almost always funny and a good insight into the person I once was and have since become.  I will call these “The Courtney Chronicles” because I decided that’s what I’d call them.  So there.  And we’re off!

When I was 14 or 15 years old, I had a silly, giggly friend named Erica with whom I was joined at the hip.  Almost literally.  We were constantly together and always giggling.  I’m frankly not sure how my parents or hers stood it.  They all deserve sainthood.  Anyway, we listened to New Kids on the Block, and then this goofball Disney group called The Party, and gradually our tastes matured to Guns’N'Roses, Metallica, and Pearl Jam.  And by ‘matured’ I mean that we became friends with somewhat questionable boys who liked those bands, and we were too embarrassed to continue our teeny-bopper-dom.

Anyway, somewhere on that continuum my parents came home from work and presented me with an obviously home-grown cassette tape.  ‘Our co-worker Jeffrey is a musician,’ they said.  ‘He was selling these and we thought you might like it.  Let us know if your friends want one, too.’  I could tell by the Xeroxed cover (complete with handwritten letters and a fuzzy profile photo) that this was going to be good.  And by good I of course mean very, very bad.  I didn’t listen to it at all until I’d joined forces with Wonder Twin Erica, and as soon as the ‘music’ started to play we were weeping and holding our sides to keep from falling apart.

Oh, man.  Oh man oh man oh man.

It was delightfully terrible.  For two girls who loved nothing more than to laugh at people, Dayo DaVon (Jeffrey’s stage name) was sent from Heaven.  He was not a good singer.  He spent a lot of the 8-song album caterwauling as though in pain.  He also rapped with epic awfulness, and his songs were other-worldly.  I like to give this lyric as an example, from the tragically beautiful Yeh, I Luv U, a song in which he talks about what he could do with a girl he likes: ‘(rapping) We could watch the submarines down by the lake; or we can go by my momma’s and bake a cake.’  After several painful verses we get to the bridge section where Dayo moans tunelessly and then breaks into a rapped list of girls’ names.  Just names and names of…former conquests?  Waitresses at his favorite Denny’s?  I don’t know.  I do know that Maryshon turned him on, and that the funniest-recitation-of-a-name award goes to ‘Ray-gee-nee!’  It’s hard to choose one ‘favorite’ as all 8 songs are so bad they’re awesome, but that one is probably the best on the album. 

Anyway, after listening and laughing our keisters off for hours, do you know what I did?

I’m so embarassed.

I went home, looked my parents square in the eye, and told them I loved it.

I guess it was true in a sense…I did love it, but for all the wrong reasons.  In the meantime, my parents went to work and told this poor guy that my friend and I were really into his music.  We even…dare I admit this?…wrote him a fan letter.  I can’t remember if he ever responded to it.  Meanwhile, we listened to his album daily and sampled it heavily in our ‘Remix Tape’, which was just a bunch of inside jokes strung together for ten minutes of airtime.

One day my mom told me Jeffrey was moving (to Philly? I don’t remember except it was east of here) to try to make a career as a musician.  My stomach dropped.  I was beyond mortified.  He was a good guy and stood for good things: love, racial equality, drug-free living…but he was not a good singer.  I mean, if Simon Cowell ever heard this guy, I can’t even imagine the things he’s say to him.  Dayo DaVon was really not good, and now he was quitting an actual job, moving, and trying to make money doing something for which he had great passion but no talent?  Maybe because we’d said we were such big fans?  Oh. My. Gawd.

Erica and I spent equal time laughing uncomfortably and feeling just awful about the whole thing.  But the worst part came on Jeffrey’s last day of work: my mom called and patched him in.  Now I was on the phone with this guy whose life I had just ruined, who thought I really dug his music and would be sad that he was moving east.  I don’t remember much about that phone call aside from the fiery feel of my face during the brief, friendly conversation and for long after I hung up.  I wanted to stick my head in a snowbank, for many, many reasons. 

I’m so glad I’m not a teenage girl anymore. 

I told my friends that I was going to have to Google ‘ol Dayo and see what became of him; I was really afraid.  His real name is very general so I did not have much luck there, and nothing came up for his stage name.  I can’t help but wonder, and hope that in spite of my girlish, naive cruelty he has had a good life.

And I hope he doesn’t Google his old nom de plume and find this entry.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 1st, 2010 at 1:56 pm and is filed under The Courtney Chronicles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.