It isn't nearly fast enough for you

This should have gone up last Friday when a perfectly timed rainstorm showed up at 2pm, essentially causing an unofficial disaster zone on all highways in the Bay Area. It was so long getting home (an hour and forty-five minutes) that I actually remembered I used to blog out my frustration on getting stuck in traffic on my way to and from work. Doing the digital dust off, I found the evening's inspiration from the live shows of that silly red headed maniac Trey Anastasio and his buddies I was pumping through my headphones.

Last summer, I consciously degenerated back to my college years, getting swept into a tantalizing mid-thirties crisis that hit two of my friends as well. We backed up a tame Shoreline scene with an adventure to the Gorge in East BF, Washington State, right next to the Columbia River. I found the music better and the scene way more frighteningly uncivilized than I remembered. I kept telling myself "people weren't this messed up at the shows I went to in the mid-90s" (they were) otherwise "I wouldn't have stood for crashing in a tent amongst 50,000 hippie idiots" (which, of course, I did). The money moment of show #1 was the dude that projectile vomited over five girls standing next to us just 10 minutes into the show. There are *no* performances -- no *anythings* -- I'm interested in being a part of to be that close to that type of meltdown ever again in my life. I am 100% sure that I am too old for the campout scene. That type of clarity is immensely satisfying. Until I realize I'm still stuck in traffic.

One thing of the many things I had forgotten about being on tour, something I got to re-appreciate, was the broken record aspect of the Phish heads who can't stop going on about how amazing Phish is on every level for every feeling and emotion that exists. Their perfect reflection of the human existence is unbounded, divinely inspired and uniquely presented to each individual in their own way. Provocatively, I'm choosing to test that assumption in the middle of a soul sucking traffic jam. Does the Helping Friendly Book show us some backroads or something? Maybe an Acoustic Army can clear a fucking path for christ's sake? So what does Phish know about getting stuck in traffic? Apparently, quite a bit. Stunned you could called me when I found their commuter wisdom stashed across so many albums and songs. This is top of mind for them. Why -- I don't know. They're just on another level (brah).

This is what happens when you go over an hour on the highway. Just in case you finish reading this post and then wonder did I... yes, I did, in fact, go through all the lyrics to every Phish song ever released to document any allusion that might tie back to my daily plight on the highway. You know what? The phreaks nailed it. They spoke to me once again. They played it for ME, man!!!

I was riding down the road one day and someone hit a possum - Possum

Drive me to firenze - YEM

The tires are the things on your car

That make contact with the road

The car is the thing on the road

That takes you back to your abode - Contact

And we're glad glad glad that you're alive

And we're glad glad glad that you'll arrive - Glide

It isn't nearly fast enough for you

It isn't nearly fast enough for you - Fast enough for you

And I take a wrong turn and I'm on the wrong path

And the people all watching enjoy a good laugh

Embarrassed with failure, I try to reverse

The course that my tread had already traversed - Maze

I'll pick you up at eight as usual, listen for my horn - Horn

Take the highway through the Great Divide - The Wedge

Waiting for the time when I can finally say

That this has all been wonderful but now I'm on my way - Down with Disease

And I was foggy rather groggy, you helped me to my car

The binding belt enclosing me, a Sample in a Jar - Sample in a jar

It's easy sometimes when you just coast along

But like it or not something always seems to go wrong - Birds of a feather

And just like old times, my work here is done. No, you can not have those five minutes back.