It wasn’t always like this, buying sleeping pills in bulk, getting judgmental smirks at the wholesale store. Life used to be quite lovely. Before the tour, before the suites, I swore we were happy.  Things were much simpler without money, we had the luxury of time.  Time to be together creating.

I felt like Etsy had freed me from the bonds of corporate America and I consumed myself with creating pieces of art from other people’s cast offs. I felt like a treasure hunter, enduring the musk and cat air of thrift stores, finding dusty objects that I could make shiny. I guess you could call this my job, it afforded me a simple enough lifestyle.

My boyfriend’s band was gaining local love and had graduated from restaurant gigs to playing actual bars. The smell of fried foods was replaced by cloves and cigarettes.  It got to the point where I could guess the bar he played by the smell of his t-shirt.  For a while it was a fun game, until hints of perfume came into play.

I didn’t know Jace before the band, but according to old high school friends he was a music nerd who kept to himself, which is a far departure from today’s version.  At a time were pop music flooded the airwaves, Jace was squirreling away vinyl as if it was the musical apocalypse impending.  His record collection takes up an entire room, and is so eclectic that anyone from grungers to grannies would find something to rock out to.  It was that record collection that really sealed the deal between us.  If a guy you meet at the library asks you if you want to see their record collection, you should be leery. This is the kind of offer most perverts make before they hide you away in a dog cage.  Knowing all this, I said yes.  Of course on the way, I texted my friend the address of the home she might find my dead body.

Once I pulled up to his house and entered his musical enclave, my jaw literally hit the floor, I tripped and landed chin first.  He likes to tell this story to every single person who asks “so how did you guys meet”.  Sometimes he conveniently leaves out that it began at the public library, I guess he doesn’t want people to know what a nerd he is.  I think the beginning of the story changes according to his audience, sometimes it’s a coffee shop, sometimes it’s the beach.  I never really cared to correct him, but every once in a while when he is being a bit too pompous, I do. That was sort of my first hint that the man who said he did not care what people thought of him, really did.  Hypocrisy is a cancer that tends to destroy a relationship.

So, yes, we met at the library.  Being too frugal to actually purchase books, I resorted to borrowing them.  I felt as if art should be free to the masses anyways, so what if you had to endure the previous handlers highlighter markings.  I actually found it kind of nice to have another person call out the parts of story that resonated with them.  It made me feel justified when it resonated with me as well and I knew there was another kindred soul out there.  Jace was probably that kindred soul, since what attracted me to him wasn’t his good looks, but his stack of books.  They were the exact same books I checked out a month back.  I thought it was too weird to go unnoticed.  I wasn’t the type to just walk up to a complete stranger and make a remark, but someone else must be notified when there is a change in the Matrix.

When I first plopped down next to him, he kind of had this self-assured smirk, like holy shit this girl is about to hit on me.  Which I guess was partially true.  Once I sat down, I was actually kind of embarrassed to even speak, but I told him that I checked out those exact same three books last month.  I think he still thought this was some kind of line, so I felt like I had to recap them all to prove my point.  I probably didn’t need to, I think he thought it was more interesting that I was sitting there talking to him then us reading the same books.  After I turned our first encounter into some kind of one man book club, I think the weirdness finally registered with him.  I must have appeared to be someone so desperate for destiny to intervene, that I would hunt down any instance I thought it was occurring and force the situation.  Jace’s interest was peaked, so much so that he invited me over to check out his record collection.  I thought that surely anyone who read Ishmael couldn’t possibly be an ax murderer.

So this chance encounter at the library led to my life going further down a rabbit hole I might had never discovered with out him.  The record collection viewing led to a date, the date led to a kiss, the kiss led to sex, the sex led to a relationship and the relationship led to cohabitation.  The traditional love story line.  Jace was also a packaged deal, he came with his very own partridge family.  Not only do you date the man, but you also date the band.  Once you’re properly vetted through this group you are either spit out the other end and labeled a Yoko, or you are fused into them as some kind of pseudo family member. Thankfully I became the later, otherwise I’m sure there would be no story to tell.