Wading in the Velvet Sea

Thanks to The Girl’s mom, we had tickets to see John Williams conduct the Boston Pops at Tanglewood last Saturday night. Tanglewood is just about at the New York border in western Massachusetts, so I knew we had quite the driving excursion ahead of us. But it was alright: I scanned the program online and found out that he would be conducting the main theme from “Superman”. I was prepared to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Or at least deal with a mind-numbingly dull ride on the Mass Pike heading west.

Williams was there for “Film Night”, a yearly program in which he conducts famous pieces of music from movie history (including, of course, a good dollop of his own work). The nice little letter we got in the mail informed us that 15,000 people would be descending upon Lenox for this concert. I think this letter said something about “Be sure to allow a little extra time for arrival.” What they should have done is place an asterisk next to this sentence and then, near the bottom, in six-point font, included the following disclaimer: “Prepare for a world of pain, bitches.”

The Pike itself wasn’t too awful, albeit dull as can be. It’s just trees for hours on end. Occasionally, a Mobil station invades your view. That’s about it. For the last 70 miles or so, they don’t even have lighting along the side of the road. It’s as if the state got bored somewhere past Route 84 and called it a day. So, it’s an hour or what life must have been like for the settlers. Assuming the settlers rode a ’98 Camry on paved roads. With an iPod hooked up to the car stereo playing The Killers. And a bag of Doritos in the backseat. I assume the settlers had these sorts of things.

So, a little more than 2 hours after leaving the apartment, we found ourselves one mile from Exit 2: Lee. “Entering Lee” is a pretty amusing sign. The “Entering Dennis” one down on the Cape is even more amusing, but I’m digressing here. Less amusing than the signs was the line of traffic I saw up ahead. Not terribly surprising, and I was decently happy that it only had formed now, so all in all I was psychologically prepared. Or so I thought.

Turns out this line moved about as fast as my grandmother in an Ironman Triathlon. That is to say, slow. Nothing against Nana or nothing, but let’s just say her spry days are a tad bit on the “over” side of things. And I think she’d agree. And then ask for some more ice in her zinfandel. Throw in that fact that every other car was a 12-mile a gallon SUV populated by privileged people. By “privileged” I mean that I could most likely go up to them, knock on the window, ask for some Grey Poupon, and probably have my request fulfilled. Course, then I’d coat their gas-guzzler in the mustard, but still.

After about 30 minutes, we finally got within view of the toll booth. Turns out, this exit served both east and west traffic, so two highways converged onto 2 toll booths. Faaantastic planning. 45 minutes of saying things like “Oh don’t you dare cut me off oh screw you idiot woman I curse the day your father’s condom broke and yielded you nine months later as the result of that ill-fitting latex” only involving the “F” word a lot. I’m a firm believer in that whole “when there’s traffic like this, alternating who goes makes everything run smoother”, but apparently this bit of folklore/common freakin’ sense does not apply to Lee. Lee don’t play dat. Lee plays “I will run you over and dance on your corpse as I pee on your dead body”. Not fun.

Once getting through the tolls, we now had a 4-mile trek through the backroads of Lee. Needless to say, this way was fraught with peril. Indiana Jones had an easier time obtaining the Holy Grail they we did getting to Tanglewood. Then again, I did feel bad for the locals: imagine having your population swell by 400% so some rich peeps can listen to the main theme from “The Magnificent Seven”. How we didn’t get egged, I’ll never know. I’m sure from an aerial view the whole thing looked like the final shot from “Field of Dreams”, with the seemingly never-ending stream of cars in the middle of absolutely nowhere.

Finally get to the ground about 90 minutes after approaching the toll booth. I could have watched the entirety of “Red Eye” and gotten popcorn beforehand to boot in that time. We get to the grounds and set up the picnic we brought. Chicken, pasta, grapes, the head of the soccer mom I killed two miles out from the concert…good meal. I felt pretty sophisticated when we left, since The Girl has a pretty sweet picnic basket. But oh no, on all sides were we trumped with the presentations that would rival old imperial marches. I saw candles. Table settings. A family of six rode in atop an elephant. One group of four had a chandelier above their cherry-oak table. From my one vantage point, I saw at least twelve setups that were nicer than the average dining room in a Somerville 3BR. Just amazing.

The 90-minute delay didn’t affect our ability to see the show, since we had reserved seats. The orchestra started tuning maybe 15 minutes after we sat down, prompting my first faux-ignorant statement of the night: “Jesus, these guys sound horrible.” In a recurring theme of the evening, The Girl was not amused. That being said, she was much more tolerant of this than one recurring statement I made (unironically) after a good piece. If you were near us throughout the night, you often heard, “You can’t say ‘woohoo’ to an orchestra!!!!” Oops. My bad. But dude, freakin’ “Superman” theme! Woohoo! See? I can’t help it.

I found out something interesting during the first part of the program: good violin music makes The Girl cry. I’m not above using this fact in the future. As in, she’ll come home one night, and be mad about something I’ve done. Maybe I ended up on a “Girls Gone Wild” video. I dunno. Something innocuous that she’ll blow up way past all forms of proportion. And she’ll be yelling and frothing. I know now that all I need to do is play the theme from the film “Laura” and within 30 seconds, she’ll not only not be yelling but will be asking for a hug, which of course as a sensitive boyfriend I can easily provide.

After intermission came something I knew was coming hit like a thunderstorm: the man, the myth, the legend, the Groban. Yup, Josh Groban busted out five songs in the second part of the program. And as he hit the stage for the first time, what seemed like 5,000 glowsticks were also busted out. I guess this is a Groban thing. Maybe the fan club packet comes with one of these things. I don’t know. I’m neither a thirteen year-old girl nor the mother of a thirteen-year old girl. I’m not in Groban’s demo. I guess I can sleep well knowing that if this singing thing doesn’t work out, he’ll have a built-in audience at the ice capades.

I won’t get into the traffic jam on the way home. Read the above laments, and simply reverse them (and add in my rage to learn the sox lost 12-8 to the Tigers). By the time I hit the Pike, it was after midnight, so I broke out the secret weapon: a can of Red Bull. Ever car should have a compartment that says, “In Case of Emergency, Break Open” and have a can in. Good lord, this stuff lives up to its reputation. I never felt drowsy once during the ride home. In fact, it worked so well that I still felt wide awake six hours later when the sun came up on a day I was supposed to go to my cousin’s wedding shower in New Hampshire. Naturally, to combat the severe exhaustion from my less than 3-hours eventual sleep, I had another Red Bull.

Scary product. Like I’ve said before, this shit should not be over-the-counter. Potent stuff and you could get hooked pretty quick. Normally, the first hit of crack is free. Red Bull doesn’t even have the common decency to do THAT. Luckily, it tastes like a combination of urine and abject hatred so it’s not like I’ll be jonesin’ for the taste of it. Still, it’s two days later and I think my heart rate has finally dipped below 120 as a resting pulse. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Maybe Groban’s dreamy voice had a bit to do with the faster pulse, but I’m pretty sure it was at least 86% the fault of Red Bull.

All in all a good night, but I’m fairly sure I’ll wait for the players to return to Symphony Hall in downtown Boston before revisiting their company. Less traffic, less hassle, less need to all but inject my heart with pure adrenaline to ensure I make it home alive. And hopefully, less glowsticks. One can hope.