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stoney321So, Nine Inch Nails "Closer" just came on my playlist, and oh, how I loved that song when it came out. Which happened to be when I was in college in Utah.
I really struggled when I first moved to Utah in the early 90s because - while I was a devoted Mormon lady - I grew up in the 'mission field.' (Translation: outside of Utah or the suburbs of Phoenix/Boise.) My family was old school LDS, but I was one of the only Mormon kids at my school and I really liked music, regardless of the lyrics being naughty (And sometimes because of the lyrics being naughty.)
SIDE STORY: remind me to tell y'all one time about picking "Father Figure" to dance to with my dad at a church dance, because when I was 14 I was an idiot and didn't know what the song was about. OH MY GOD, I am laughing so hard right now thinking of how that was the most awkward daddy-daughter waltz OF ALL TIME. I was such an idiot child. Hoo boy, that's a great and embarrassing story right there.
BACK TO TRENT REZNOR. Head Like A Hole was my "closing out my senior year of high school" jam, and I've loved him ever since. Words are words, you know? Dirty words, I mean, not like slurs or something. So the song is "I want to fuck you like an animal" and everyone's been copying that video of his ever since because it is AWESOME and yeah. I liked that song.
So I'm in Utah, on a drive through SLC with my BFF Chrissy and our "guy gang," who the two of us were completely in love with. They were not in love with us, they just enjoyed hanging with C and I because we're delightful company. :) We had this big hiking/camping weekend planned in Big Cottonwood Canyon and I had the car we all fit in. So I had it on SLC's awesome radio station (which, isn't that surprising? SLC had AMAZING radio stations) but the song was - of course - edited for the radio.
"I wanna [no sound] you like an animal..." etc. And I'm chair dancing and singing along as I have this car full of boys I'm crushing on, and they all get quiet. After say, the second time the chorus comes around one of them says quietly (but firmly), "Laura? How about we change this, please?" Like, "The power of Christ compels you?"
And I felt such shame in that moment, because I was singing about dirty dirty sex and these boys were all return missionaries and I wanted them to like me, and they clearly did not think I was worthy. And I changed it. UGH.
Another point in time, I was walking with two of these same guys to our Honors Society meeting (like that back door brag I slipped in?) and I had on a pair of jean cut shorts that used to be my old boyfriend's. They were so cool at the time: Girbaud jeans (lol) that he'd drawn all over. He's an amazing pop artist, so they were totally unique, baggy in the best way, and they came to my knees. (This is '92 - '93, btw.) I had a shirt that was fitted with a scoop neck and regular tee shirt sleeves.
Um, I was built like a brick shit-house at the time of this story. 36-25-37, and well-toned from all of the hiking/climbing/etc. that I was doing regularly. I have nice cans. They're not massive like the rest of the women in my family, but it's a good rack. And the shirt was tight. I could breathe, you couldn't track the blood flowing through my veins, nothing like that, but you know - a fitted gee dee shirt with a scoop neck.
And one of the boys refused to look at me as we walked to class. Like all nervous and stuff. And I thought I looked so nice that day with my cute sandals and my head band holding back my sun-kissed and long hair. And finally this boy looked at me, glanced at my chest and snapped his eyes back to the front and said, "Oh, Laura." Like I was naked, or something. Like, how dare I have a woman's body?
(It was really weird in Utah; there were two body types: sturdy or waifish. There was no in between. And I'm Southern. Moreover, I'm Texan. We build girls with butts and boobs down here. And...the men -and some ladies- like it. So while I had low self-esteem, I knew that my body wasn't disgusting, or anything like that.)
For the rest of the time that I lived in Utah, I absolutely struggled to have dates. Ugh, they made me feel so bad about myself, like it was wrong to be happy that I was shaped the way I was.
There's a part of me that wants to take a picture of my boobs in my sexiest bra and spam their facebook walls with them. Hahaha.
Ahem.
In our next installment, I'll tell you all about listening to The Chronic and Snoop Dogg (with Warren G) while living with hippies in the Grand Tetons. :D GOOD TIMES. (Also: screw you and your gee dee balancing sticks and hairy armpits, bitchy girl that always sniffed at me when I was playing this in MY OWN DORM.)
Stories? Oh, I got stories!
I really struggled when I first moved to Utah in the early 90s because - while I was a devoted Mormon lady - I grew up in the 'mission field.' (Translation: outside of Utah or the suburbs of Phoenix/Boise.) My family was old school LDS, but I was one of the only Mormon kids at my school and I really liked music, regardless of the lyrics being naughty (And sometimes because of the lyrics being naughty.)
SIDE STORY: remind me to tell y'all one time about picking "Father Figure" to dance to with my dad at a church dance, because when I was 14 I was an idiot and didn't know what the song was about. OH MY GOD, I am laughing so hard right now thinking of how that was the most awkward daddy-daughter waltz OF ALL TIME. I was such an idiot child. Hoo boy, that's a great and embarrassing story right there.
BACK TO TRENT REZNOR. Head Like A Hole was my "closing out my senior year of high school" jam, and I've loved him ever since. Words are words, you know? Dirty words, I mean, not like slurs or something. So the song is "I want to fuck you like an animal" and everyone's been copying that video of his ever since because it is AWESOME and yeah. I liked that song.
So I'm in Utah, on a drive through SLC with my BFF Chrissy and our "guy gang," who the two of us were completely in love with. They were not in love with us, they just enjoyed hanging with C and I because we're delightful company. :) We had this big hiking/camping weekend planned in Big Cottonwood Canyon and I had the car we all fit in. So I had it on SLC's awesome radio station (which, isn't that surprising? SLC had AMAZING radio stations) but the song was - of course - edited for the radio.
"I wanna [no sound] you like an animal..." etc. And I'm chair dancing and singing along as I have this car full of boys I'm crushing on, and they all get quiet. After say, the second time the chorus comes around one of them says quietly (but firmly), "Laura? How about we change this, please?" Like, "The power of Christ compels you?"
And I felt such shame in that moment, because I was singing about dirty dirty sex and these boys were all return missionaries and I wanted them to like me, and they clearly did not think I was worthy. And I changed it. UGH.
Another point in time, I was walking with two of these same guys to our Honors Society meeting (like that back door brag I slipped in?) and I had on a pair of jean cut shorts that used to be my old boyfriend's. They were so cool at the time: Girbaud jeans (lol) that he'd drawn all over. He's an amazing pop artist, so they were totally unique, baggy in the best way, and they came to my knees. (This is '92 - '93, btw.) I had a shirt that was fitted with a scoop neck and regular tee shirt sleeves.
Um, I was built like a brick shit-house at the time of this story. 36-25-37, and well-toned from all of the hiking/climbing/etc. that I was doing regularly. I have nice cans. They're not massive like the rest of the women in my family, but it's a good rack. And the shirt was tight. I could breathe, you couldn't track the blood flowing through my veins, nothing like that, but you know - a fitted gee dee shirt with a scoop neck.
And one of the boys refused to look at me as we walked to class. Like all nervous and stuff. And I thought I looked so nice that day with my cute sandals and my head band holding back my sun-kissed and long hair. And finally this boy looked at me, glanced at my chest and snapped his eyes back to the front and said, "Oh, Laura." Like I was naked, or something. Like, how dare I have a woman's body?
(It was really weird in Utah; there were two body types: sturdy or waifish. There was no in between. And I'm Southern. Moreover, I'm Texan. We build girls with butts and boobs down here. And...the men -and some ladies- like it. So while I had low self-esteem, I knew that my body wasn't disgusting, or anything like that.)
For the rest of the time that I lived in Utah, I absolutely struggled to have dates. Ugh, they made me feel so bad about myself, like it was wrong to be happy that I was shaped the way I was.
There's a part of me that wants to take a picture of my boobs in my sexiest bra and spam their facebook walls with them. Hahaha.
Ahem.
In our next installment, I'll tell you all about listening to The Chronic and Snoop Dogg (with Warren G) while living with hippies in the Grand Tetons. :D GOOD TIMES. (Also: screw you and your gee dee balancing sticks and hairy armpits, bitchy girl that always sniffed at me when I was playing this in MY OWN DORM.)
Stories? Oh, I got stories!
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no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 05:11 pm (UTC)Ugh, hairy armpits. Lesbian or not, I was just not raised that way.
[1/2]
Date: 2012-08-02 05:24 pm (UTC)We do like meat on bones down here, yes we do. Which I LOVE, TOO. In the words of Patton Oswald, "I don't want to fuck a box kite."
The Tale of Snoop Dogg and The Chronic, by Laura
One of my jobs during the summers when I was in college (for I had many crazy jobs over the years) was working in the Grand Tetons. A professor was a fly-fishing instructor over the summer and got me the job. The BFF also worked there.
I grew up listening to Motown. Staxx Records. Otis. Gladys. Soul Train was on every Saturday in my house. When hip-hop came out in the late 70s/early 80s, I was all over that. I loved everything from the "thinking man's hip hop" to the gangsta rap that was coming out after NWA.
And my college recruited a lot of guys from LA/SoCal for the football and basketball teams. Ahem. That's a story for another day. So there were dudes that grew up in East LA-Compton adjacent that lived in my dorm, and none of the Mormons would talk to them because a) they were black and b) they were possibly gangsters. (LOL.)
I hung out with them, because a) I liked the people I had made friends with and b) they were the only other people that liked that music in Utah. (I had a few guys creep past my dorm one day when I had the door open playing some Easy (motherfuckin') E. Like, they couldn't understand a white mormon girl listening to that. IT IS GOOD, OKAY?)
So the Chronic came out just before Christmas break of '92, and I heard one guy blasting it and was like "WHAT IS THIS MAGIC YOU ARE LISTENING TO?" and he let me make a copy of his CD.
[2/2]
Date: 2012-08-02 05:30 pm (UTC)Of course this led me to Snoop Dogg and the DoggPound, etc. So the next summer (er, '94) was when Snoop's first solo album came out and I was all over that. And then I was in the Tetons, working.
We lived in these employee dorms where everyone lounged in the courtyard playing music (whoever had their radio on just turned it up, and everyone rocked out.) But these are all professional hippies that follow the Dead for a year and sell vegan burritos for gas money, you know. And I like a little of that. I like Neil Young. Etc.
...I just also love me some Warren G. Regulators? MOUNT UP. (lol) So I'm jamming to Snoop in my room with the window open and it's gorgeous outside. I turn it up, because that was how it worked - no one else with their music on, first person to turn it on plays it for all. So I did. And went outside to hang.
And some of the guys were getting into it, because it's AWESOME. (Gettin' funky on the mic like an old batch of collard greens!) And they were probably transfixed by my white ass busting out the rhymes, IDK. But the GIRLS. Oh, they hated it. HATE-D IT. And would constantly say in passive aggressive ways how awful that music was, and who listens to this anyway? (Oh my god, Becky, look at her butt.)
And they'd turn up some fucking Phish or Widespread Panic and stare over at me. BITCH I WILL CUT YOU. IMMA LISTEN TO SOME NATE DOGG, A'IGHT?
I think they may have even said things like, "[Boy's name], come over here and let me braid feathers in your hair," to get them to stop listening to the icky music. "Let's make pulp paper!" Fuck you, hippie. (haha)
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Date: 2012-08-02 06:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 06:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 06:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 07:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 08:31 pm (UTC)Lol, ok, I'm already grown. But still. I love your stories!
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Date: 2012-08-02 08:49 pm (UTC)Anyway, I love your stories.
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Date: 2012-08-02 09:04 pm (UTC)The first time I heard that NIN song was, believe it or not, from a Spike/Angel fanvid. It was an awesome, awesome fanvid, on multiple levels, ahaha.
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Date: 2012-08-02 09:16 pm (UTC)At least you came out the other side with a sense of humor about it.
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Date: 2012-08-02 09:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 09:20 pm (UTC)But I am glad you enjoyed this! Goodness knows I've been cracking up remembering some of these weird stories.
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Date: 2012-08-02 09:26 pm (UTC)THANK YOU FOR CONFIRMING THAT MY BREASTS ARE ADEQUATE TO NICE. I thank you.
OH THAT IS A WONDERFUL VID!! The one
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Date: 2012-08-02 09:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 09:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 10:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-02 10:46 pm (UTC)Kathy and I were once asked to leave a bowling alley for playing "Closer" on the jukebox. Evidently, the management and put the unedited version of "Closer" on the jukebox, but people were too busy playing Travis Tritt to notice, until we came along...
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Date: 2012-08-02 11:09 pm (UTC)AHAHAHAHAHA I LOVE THAT THEY HAD THE UNEDITED VERSION. Oh my god. That's fantastic.
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Date: 2012-08-02 11:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-08-03 03:58 am (UTC)Oh man. My dad can be a dumbass, but he gets points for keeping the waltz chill and not shaming me. HAHAHAHA
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Date: 2012-08-03 07:10 pm (UTC)