Some times.

The summer after Grade 10, my family and I went to visit my great-uncle and great-aunt in northern California. We ended up all getting colds, and spent a few days recuperating in their home. For some reason, I only brought one tape with me – Elastica’s first album. I listened to it over and over until I grew to hate it. After that, I listened to talk radio at night. It was so quiet outside, a deep, unsettling quiet. I can still remember the low, almost monotone radio voices. I listened through headphones, so they were right there in my head, sounding so eerie in the dark.

(I don’t hate that Elastica album anymore, by the way. In fact, I find it comforting. It reminds me of those closed-in few days where there was no outside world at all.)

Somewhere around Grade 11, one of my friends loved this band. I remember listening to this song in his car once, very loudly, when we were on our way to some Swiss restaurant with some friends, though I don’t think we planned on going there. I think we were just hungry and happened upon a place and were intrigued by the concept of ordering fondue in a restaurant. Since we were ignorant teenagers new to the world of fondue, we ordered too much and sheepishly asked for it to go at the end of our meal. We were presented with a large plastic ice cream tub of melted cheese. In the car, laughing our heads off at how ridiculous we were, we had the bright idea to leave the tub on someone’s doorstep in the wealthy neighbourhood. In that naive, almost pure black-and-white thinking of high school, we thought it would be a funny prank to play on someone rich. This song always makes me think of that day, embarrassing and good for many reasons.