Today I went to the Epicure Cafe in fairfax for the first time with my old friend, Mark Nufable. The mission was to experience my first open mic night as well as to see him perform for the first time. To describe the place and its patrons I told him I had two adjectives - “eclectic and impoverished”. I am, of course, kidding! Everyone there was very welcoming to the performers and were all very ready to clap and support them. I had a lot of respect for the different kinds of artists who had the courage to play. Call me a wimp but I feel like that just takes balls. My frankness aside for more frankness, I felt quite out of place at first. Rewind my life half a year ago and I was fully immersed in the art school at George Mason - these people would have been no different than the people I saw lurking our halls every day. But working with the guys at REI for these past months and, I suppose, just spending my days working and training I felt like I was surrounded by a bunch of hippies that all needed money for new clothes and ear lobe reconstruction. Before you all hate me the point I am trying to get to is this: I realized that I needed to simply dive in. I needed to let loose and just let myself be absorbed into the moment and place that I was existing in at the time. I had to remind myself how much I loved music and how passion is the same for everyone. Now there were still some electronic performances I still couldn’t get my head around but all in all I was extremely glad I came. In my opinion, Mark killed it during his performance. I grew up with this guy, he taught me to break dance and DDR in elementary school, and now he was teaching me to really go after my love of music. I’m no way a good singer, but tonight definitely inspired me to take up my guitar again and really start to practice.

Thank you for the experience brother, I can’t wait to meet you out west.

Chris