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Into the vacuum of my disinterest, music rushed to fill the void. It cracked a fissure, splintered a vein through the already precarious and widening rift between my mother and me; it would become a chasm that threatened to swallow us whole.
Nothing was as vital as music, the only comfort for my existential dread. I spent my days downloading songs one at a time off LimeWire and getting into heated discussions on AIM about whether the Foo Fighters’ acoustic version of “Everlong” was better than the original. I pocketed my allowance and lunch money to spend exclusively on CDs from House of Records, analyzing lyrics in the liner notes, obsessing over interviews with the champions of Pacific Northwest indie rock, memorizing the rosters of labels like K Records and Kill Rock Stars, and plotting which concerts I’d attend.
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