The Set List and Guitar Pick

On the top of the first memory box is a baby blue Ernie Ball guitar pick and a 12 song set list written in red ink on a piece of binder paper.

            My first real boyfriend’s name started with an E. We were best friends first, while he dated someone else, who I hated at first, then came to like. After all, eventually we had so much in common. E had a band with two of his friends. They used to practice at one friend’s house on the weekends, in the middle of his huge, housing complex style living room with big bay windows and brand new beige carpet. E played guitar, like every boyfriend does, and his friends played bass and drums. One of the guys’ girlfriend’s name was Crystal, and while I was in the on-again stage of my on-again, off-again relationship with E, she had her quinceanera. Of course she asked the guys to play, and of course they said yes. E was always a Blink 182 fan, so it came as no surprise to me when their set list was as follows:

1.      Feelin’ This

2.      Alien’s Exist

3.      Anthem pt. 2

4.      You’re So Last Summer

5.      Adam’s Song

6.      Letters to God (a Boxcar Racer song, an alternate name for Blink 182)

7.      All The Small Things

8.      I Miss You (acoustic)

9.      All The Small Things

10.  Elevator (Boxcar Racer)

11.  Going Away to College

12.  Dammit

I am pretty sure that Crystal’s ultra-conservative parents cut them off way before “Dammit”. The quinceanera is one of the last real happy moments I can remember from that relationship, and I am slowly realizing that most of my memories are from when we were just friends. The last thing I remember about this night is ripping the set list off the side of one of the amps in the back of E’s big van, still in the midst of youthful bliss.