Probably Less Human then Human

Sometime in the mid-90s, I became entranced -- for the first and last time -- by White Zombie, more specifically, one particular White Zombie song, "More Human Than Human."

And somehow -- my boyfriend -- who we shall call B -- acquired free tickets to a White Zombie concert at the Nissan Pavilion in Manassas, which required we ride on a local radio station bus to the event with other ticket winners.

My boyfriend had a friend who listened to his radio all day long and had become the master of speed dialing. He was almost always able to win concert tickets by being caller No. 9 or No. 7 or whatever the number you needed to be. And that's how we acquired the tickets. He actually won twice for this concert, and since you can't win twice, he gave B's name for the second set.

B and I boarded the radio station bus at the Arboretum. C and his wife, J, were leaving later and driving themselves.

Much to my surprise, as soon as the bus pulled away from the Arboretum, all the bongs came out. I thought pot was illegal. The bus proceeded to Manassas in an internal fog, and we were late getting into the Nissan because the bus driver got so lost, we ended up in Washington for awhile. Must have been the fumes.

The amphitheater was packed; the bands were loud, and by the time White Zombie came on, I was exhausted from the crowd, the fights breaking out, the noise, the vomiting, everything. And we hadn't even been there very long. I vaguely recall White Zombie had a scary and profane stage set that upset my Baptist/Catholic sensibilities. I am thinking it must have been Christ on the Cross imagery that was blasphemously displayed. I have blacked that memory out. In any case, as soon as they finished "More Human Than Human," I was ready to go. It started raining as we retreated to the bus.

Back in the bus, it was almost as bad as the amphitheater. Refugees who were already too drunk, too sick, and too beaten up had already returned to the bus to continue being drunk, sick and angry. Some of them hadn't even made it to White Zombie. Just as we settled in our seats in this Hell Bus of vomit, I spotted C and J walking through the parking lot. We scrambled off the bus. There was much rejoicing, as we had not known they had won more tickets and were going to be there. They offered us a ride back to Richmond. By now, it was raining hard.

So off we went down the highway, and just like in the bus, the bongs came out and I found myself once again encased in fog and everyone except me was pretty mellow. I was particularly unmellow because it was dark and raining furiously. Visibility was zero. J was driving. I was terrified.

As the rain came down harder, C would give J words of encouragement about what a great driving job she was doing, and reward her with a nip off a flask he pulled out from under his jacket. So now I was hurtling through the rainy night in a carload of people who were stoned and drinking. And I was pretty sure when we collided with whatever we were bound to collide with and die, I'd be the only one who would feel it. It sucks being the sober one.

But that night, we did not. We were delivered back to the Arboretum where I retrieved my car and went home and lived to tell this tale.

I don't think about it much anymore, but it was one of the few adventures of my life since I tend not to walk on the wild side. I pace through life with training wheels and a helmet -- not that this trip to see White Zombie was even all that wild.

But tonight, someone on my Facebook feed posted a Morphine video, which made me go to iTunes to look up Morphine, since it seemed there was a long-forgotten song of theirs I really liked at one time, and iTunes suggested I might like Les Claypool, too, which I sort of do, so I clicked on "Winona's Big Brown Beaver" just to hear it again. Then iTunes suggested I might like White Zombie, and all this memory, so long buried, rushed back.