Eli Porter and my quarter life crisis (part 3)

Let me start out by stating that I have been in the midst of a quarter life crisis more or less for the past five years. Without going into detail (it's really not that interesting), my current state of mind is somewhere in the third phase of said QLC, the previous two phases bearing their own distinct questions about existence with brief periods of contentment in between.

So it was a nice break from the norm to go see my friend's band, Eli Porter , play a gig at the High Dive in Seattle last weekend. By my estimation, it had been a good two months since I'd touched a drop of alcohol, and about two years since I'd seen any live shows (a travesty on both counts). They played a great show, complete with glow sticks, balloons, and various light-up apparel (and really great music, too!).

Being out of the game for so long made me appreciate both sides of the nightlife coin. For one, there is something inherent about dive bars that makes it acceptable to dance when I have no business doing so. It's one of the only viable excuses I have to let loose and have fun and forget my annoying self-consciousness for a while. But even better than pretending to be a 21-year-old, drinking to oblivion, making eyes at boys, praying that someone will ask for my number by the end of the night, I found myself perfectly happy to be 25 and taken. Despite my nostalgia for my college days, it was a lot more satisfying to be able to dance around and be silly without worrying about who was or was not checking me out. It was easier to talk to the lead singer about the set without feeling like I would come across as a little college girl pseudo-groupie. At the end of the night, after a respectable two beers, I rode home with my married friends, and we talked about the music instead of the drama of who-checked-out-who. And I think for the first time since my last birthday, I didn't mourn 21, but celebrated 25.