I decided to see the movie The Bourne Ultimatum on its premier day.

It had been a typical day of the summer: cloudless, windless and searing. To escape the heat, I took refuge inside a Starbucks and ordered a hot cup of black coffee and a copy of the local newspaper. This exercise in futility may sound ironic but it’s not. It’s merely idiotic. I nursed my coffee, forwent the newspaper and instead resumed reading a short story in Best American… Mystery 2002.  When it started to get dark, I opened the newspaper and checked the movie schedules in the Arts section.

As I was driving north on Riverside, I noticed a crowd in the parking lot of Badass Coffee House milling about and spilling into the sidewalk. This was striking in a couple of ways.  On the other side of the street, you have the library which is closed and the new college building which is still under construction, so this side of the street was devoid of human activity at that time. On the east side, were the group was, people were hauling large musical instruments, like amplifiers and drums. They were getting ready for a band concert.

I slowed down but didn’t stop and in a short while , I was at Tinseltown lining up for my ticket. The first evening showing, the one I wanted to see,  was sold out. The next one was about two hours away.

Not given a lot of options to while away the first two hours of the early evening, I opted to go in and return to my book at McDonald’s. And more coffee. Less than an hour into my reading, when the book started to become tedious, something snagged my attention and nagged into my consciousness.

I got in the car, rounded the driveway around the building and wheeled out of the parking lot. In minutes, I was on Central Ave. going south and looking for the closed library as a benchmark to let me know when to cross over to Riverside.

I had the whole library parking lot to myself. As soon as I got out of the car, the stream of music hit me. I felt it as much as I heard it. It was loud, fast and hard. Rock. Indie type original pieces. I walked across the street and saw a familiar SUV parked nearby. People are now dancing to the music. Mostly, bouncing on each other to the music. A couple of girls were walking about hawking CDs. I moved into the crowd and closer to the stage, close enough to recognize the musicians. I was right.

Ryan was playing drums and his friend Andrew was on guitar. I didn’t know the kid on bass. That was the first time I saw them in concert.

I watched The Bourne Ultimatum the next day with Shane. He has not seen his brother in concert.

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