by Crystal Achey

Created on: May 13, 2008   Last Updated: February 23, 2009

Happenstance, A True Story. (And Yes All the Names Have Been Changed to Protect the Guilty)

1. "These Are The Contents Of My Head" ~ Annie Lennox

It all began at Camp Pendleton, Marine Corp. Base, California, circa 1968. All the boys had crew cuts, button shirts and collars. The girls wore plaid, big collared dresses and pig tails. There we were, on a merry-go-round, the kind "they" had back in the days when all the schools and parks had burning hot metal equipment and we played things like,"That Don't Hurt". We were spinning, heads tilting to the sky and our hair dragging along the sand.

I always imagine that part in a movie. The camera shows a shot of a blue sky filled with fluffy clouds. Then the shot changes... hovering above two children on a merry go round. The camera zooms in close on a boy and a girl spinning round and round with the kind of abandon you can only have as a child. . .

I am the little girl and the boy, my first crush. His name: Rory. We were simpatico. In the sea of crew cuts, I only had eyes for the boy with long curly black hair, blue eyes and long eyelashes like little fairy hammocks. I never lost my lifelong lust for long haired boys and rock n' roll. Eventually, one of us moved to another military base and we never saw each other again.

2. "Running As Fast As I Can To The Middle Of Nowhere." ~ Pink

I'm 21 and I'm on the road with my first true love, on a shitty little "tour to nowhere", with an 80s cover band, in the middle of Alamogordo, Texas... a town most famous for dry oil wells and atomic testing. We were five years into our relationship, when the tides turned, forcing me to make one of the hardest decisions of my life. We loved each other, but weren't in love. So I packed my bags, hopped the next bus to Arizona with twenty bucks and no clue as to what was going to happen next.

3. "And Now For Something Completely Different." ~ Monty Python

It's the 80s most of the dates are a blur, but the stories are true.

I step off the stinky Grayhound after a 12 hour trip into the 108 degree Phoenix heat. I'm heartbroken. I've got no money. I'm 22, my hair is big and I'm way over my head. I'm living on Top Ramen, Aqua Net and sleeping on a friends couch. A friend got me a job at an answering service during the week and I spent my weekends at Rockers, the biggest rock club in Arizona, at 31st Ave and Indian School. Back then, all you needed for a night out was ten bucks, twenty belts and forty bracelets, shaving cream was used as mousse and tips

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