One of the things I certainly miss about Wisconsin;
Nights.
The quite, serene nights of Wisconsin are like nothing I have experienced anywhere else I have ever been. Sure, the summer nights are hot and sticky, but even so, when you're there you realize that its worth the slightly damp feeling.
My trip to Wisconsin in early June reminded me of this fact. While kind of just sitting around at my father's house, I decided to pull my bike out from the top of the garage and go for a bikeride, which is something I have not done in years.
I made my way up the Westwood hill to the path to parker high school. A trip I have done hundreds of times. Going up the hill made me remember how I would walk to school every single day of freshman year. And how every single day, no matter what, I would listen to the song "Glass to the Arson" by Anberlin. Everytime I hear that song nowadays, I am transported back to freshman year;
Its winter out, so I'm wearing my army jacket with blue hoody under, I put my hood up because I know how cold it is out. I get my headphones in my ears, standing on the front step of my mother's house on Waveland ave. I then put on my raccoon mittens, press play and start walking to school, crunching my chuck taylor's in the snow as I walk through the path to my locker.
The next year, my sophmore year was a little different. I had moved to an apartment across town, so walking to school wasn't really an option. Luckily, I had a car! A 1995 Chevy Lumina, it was white and it lacked a front bumper. If anyone from Janesville is reading this, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Even if I was in a car, the winter mornings were still COLD! I had a parking spot in an underground parking structure, so I never had to worry about scraping the frost off my windshield (suck it californians), but even with that, it was still very cold. I would have a jacket and hoody on, hood up of course (it made my hair the way I liked it) and my Old Navy mittens. I would blast the heat and pick my daily driving music, not Anberlin anymore, it would vary by mood. As you would expect with an older car, it would take a bit for the heat to actually kick in and slowly I would take off my mittens, and maybe put my hood down.
For the entire year, I would pick up my buddy Jacob Ruffin and take him to school with me. I would always call him when I got to a certain intersection that we decided upon, and would say "I'm at that one place.". He knew exactly where I was, because this location was far enough away that if my phone call had woken him up, he would have enough time to get ready in time to get in my car when I pulled up. Granted, his house was maybe 3/4 of a mile from school, it was not really out of my way to get him, and it was easier for him, so why not pick up a friend and help out.
Sophmore year wasn't the year of a thousand best friends for me. I had a handful of friends at Parker, but none of them were any that I would spend much time with outside of school. Maybe 3 or 4 nights out of the week, I would go after school sometime to Family Video and get 2 or 3 movies to watch, then camp out in my room and just watch the movies. In retrospect, I really enjoyed that portion of my life. I would also have band practice every so often, and work as well (at Coldstone). Reading it now, you'd think that I was a total shut in. Not true at all. I had actually gotten the lead in one of the plays at school, which was a surprise to me and my mother, so there was something you may not have known about me. 'Fools' by Neil Simon.
Yet another chapter of my life put into words, the very short version of it all.
Subscribe to my blog if you enjoy this, and hopefully you'll all get a chance to know me a little more each entry. In return, I would absolutely love for anyone reading this to send me feedback, email, text message, phone call, anything. Its all appreciated.
You ma-ma-ma-make my happy for reading..
Rocky Morgan
714-717-0681
rockymorgan@gmail.com
www.flickr.com/photos/rockymorgan
www.myspace.com/rockymorgan
