For me the mosh pit meant the music of the 90's, the music symbolic of the sonic thrashing pain of a generation violently standing up to the abuse of the music industry and society at large. I found solace in the mosh pit where I also found personal growing pains both literal and symbolic. It was a visceral place where we sweated, struggled, and grew.

Attracted by engulfing sounds and sonic tidal waves I'd listen to songs only at home on huge speakers my dad made. There were times where I'd sleep in a cocoon of sound by bands like The Smashing Pumpkins, Soul Asylum, The Toadies, Tool, Soundgarden, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Kyuss, Nine Inch Nails, The Beastie Boys, and Dinosaur Jr. There were many times that I would kick a hand woven sack of beans in a fevered fit of hacky sack prowess to this kind of music. The hacky sack was like practice for the mosh pit where you'd have to be aware like a juggler so you didn't end up with broken bones. Simply put the mosh pit was a place where I could dance to music of the subculture. It was like having physical proof of sounds that few people knew of. It was comforting to get shoved and thrashed by strangers all driven mad by songs that you'd only heard on compact disc or on college radio.

Looking back on it moshing wasn't all heavy metal music and it wasn't at all about groping women in the chaos. It was a place to let go, to bond with friends and to howl along with songs you paid for with allowance money, birthday money, money from Grandma, money from working at fast food restaurants, any money you could get your hands on because it was about adding experience to the audio without actually being in the band. It was like a modern day sacrificial rite of passage where by eight dollar increments I wasted all of my cash on used cds and feeling like I belonged.

Growing through adolescence is not easy and I have several mosh pit related stories to describe the sensitivity of growing pains that accompanied it. The first mosh pit I'd ever been in was for a band called Soul Asylum who was riding on the popularity of a single called, "Someone to Shove," and when they played it live people shoved. I had no intention of being in a mosh pit until this point in high school. I stomped around with everybody else though and felt that adrenaline pounding through me and discovered a sense of resilience and toughness that I hadn't had before.

Like most emotions this feeling was only a feeling because I chipped a tooth and

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