Cue a record scratch because Jess and I arrived to the dinner and (1) we had to walk across muddy Jumanji grass that jacked up my stiletto shoes, (2) the attire of most of the dinner attendees could be best described as upscale NASCAR aka pale white men showing off their pale white arms and legs via overpriced tank tops and shorts they were wearing, and (3) Bono couldn’t make it to the dinner. That’s the problem with dressing like a THOT, because life will come through with the record scratch to bring you back down to reality. Imagine if Angelina Jolie got all hot looking to go mack on Brad Pitt at craft services during the shooting of Mr. & Mrs. Smith, but in Brad’s place was a dude named Gerald from accounts receivable. Her whole life could’ve been different; she’d be married to a dude named Gerald and would have two kids instead of the seventeen she has. J/K. She’d just wait until she was on set with Brad and flirt. Back to me. Wasting a heaux outfit sucks and always makes me go, “I shaved above my knees for this?”
There I was at the (RED) dinner with my legs feeling smooth like dolphin skin for no damn reason, but the food was good and the company was even better. Everyone there was smart and working to improve other people’s lives either as their day job with (RED) or on the side when they aren’t in the nine-to-five grind. Shan, who used to do artist management for U2, came over and introduced herself and said that everyone was working together to ensure that Bono and I met at the festival (Wut? People are actually spending their working hours trying to fulfill the teenage dreams of a grown adult?), so in the interim, she would like to invite me to U2’s sound check, which was going on that night and is notoriously private.
“Are you serious George?” I asked. Note: Even when emotionally overwhelmed by information, I still have the presence of mind to slip in a pun. #AlwaysBePunning.
Shan let me know this was 1000 percent a real offer, I said “Yes” immediately, started crying at the table, and Jessica went about the business of canceling the Wonder Woman movie tickets she had bought us. And yes, I know that canceling an empowering lady date because four dudes in a band are playing and fine with you hanging around is basically putting feminism on read receipt after it texts you about attending a meeting for an upcoming rally, but this is my troof, not truth, but troof because I’m ignorant, so the movie would be seen another time.
Now for anyone who hasn’t been to a sound check, only the essentials such as sound and tech folks, etc., are in attendance, and the rest of the venue is completely empty. For nonessentials like me, you’re seated in an area far away from where the musicians can see you; otherwise, it’s slightly college-student-losing-her-virginity-on-Party-of-Five awkward to be sung at in such an intimate setting. So Jess and I (I’m still in my heaux outfit) chilled in the back while U2 ran through the set list for the concert, which was going to be the following night. It was amazing to see a group, forty years in, practicing the way I imagined they did when they started out: just full of passion and leaving it all on the stage. I was in heaven, and even Jessica, who never listens to U2, got into it.
The clock struck 9 P.M., Jess and I were still drunk from the dinner and tired, so we hitched a ride from one of the festival drivers back to the hotel. During the ride, I sent Shan a thank-you text, and she replied:
9:00 PM
Bono says he wants a pic of you in your dress! I told him you dressed up for him
9:07 PM
He wants to meet tomorrow before their show!!!!
Let’s get a couple of things straight:
If you think that upon reading those messages, I screamed as if I just finished the New York Times Sunday crossroad puzzle—a’ight, fine, as if I just finished People magazine’s Sunday crossword puzzle—you are correct.
Bono is not a creep and this is not the start of a story about a trifling extramarital affair between myself and a rock star. GROSS! It’s just that, as Bono later told Shan, it’s only fair that he saw what fancy outfit I was wearing since he sent me flowers. THE MAN REMEMBERED SENDING ME FLOWERS! Sometimes I’ll forget to brush my teeth before I leave home in the morning and ruin several people’s breakfasts with my yuck mouth, yet this man is remembering the one time he sent flowers to someone he’d yet to meet.
Back to the story. Jess and I arrived at the hotel and drunkenly did a photo shoot in the lobby. All my poses were senior-year-of-high-school basic, Jess mostly had the camera out of focus, but among the turds, there were three good pictures, so I fired them off to Shan and went to bed.
The next day was B Day. Jess and I spent the day doing comedy shows in hot-as-a-microwave-bowl-of-Velveeta-mac-and-cheese heat. We were both rocking breathable outfits, she in a jumpsuit, me sporting baggy, horizontal-striped overalls and a paper-thin cotton crop top and Nike Cortezes. I hit that sweet spot in the Venn diagram of “dressing to help a friend move apartments” and “tomboy sexy on the cover of a R&B girl group’s debut album before they realize that showing lots of skin is what will move records.” In short, I could lift a box of books, yet be ready to, in a moment’s notice, drop them on the ground to body-roll to Fifth Harmony #RIP. Despite being satisfied with my look, I knew the outfit lacked that extra oomph. So I THREW ON A VINTAGE 1980S CALVIN KLEIN JEAN JACKET THAT HAD THE COVER OF U2’S FIRST ALBUM HAND-PAINTED ON THE BACK, WHICH I HAD PURCHASED OFF ETSY AFTER LEARNING I WAS GOING TO BONNAROO. Ummmmmm . . .
I know, y’all, I know. The fact that I’m just now remembering this purchase as I’m telling this story means I’ve spent the past sixteen months suppressing this embarrassing memory to the nether regions of my brain alongside everything I learned from high school Spanish class, instructions on how to use my Sonos speaker, and lyrics to “Gangnam Style.” Plus, even though I’m #TeamDontHateOnChildlessPeople, spending money on a semiexpensive jacket warrants me being paraded around a Mommy & Me with Unella from Game of Thrones saying, “Shame,” and ringing a bell behind me. Anyway, I was in full dork mode, so Jess, Chenoa, and I headed over to the band’s trailers backstage before the show kicked off at 9 P.M.
We were escorted inside one of the trailers, which was jam-packed with people. I was simultaneously relieved and crushed. On the one hand, this was going to be a drive-by meeting because there were so many other folks he was going to have talk to, meaning the less time I had with him, the less likely it was that I would say something stupid. On the other, my dreams of this magical hang session with Bono were dashed. I quickly felt silly because the fact that he had asked to meet me should be enough, so I returned to alternating between feeling nauseated and threatening to leave due to nerves.
Just then, someone on his staff came over to me and whispered, “Be quiet, grab my hand, and follow me.”
“Huh?” I said in the voice of a woman in a horror movie who wastes time questioning everything, causing delays that get people killed.
“Shhh and c’mon.”
So I did. I shut my mouth and grabbed this nice British woman’s hand, and Jessica and Chenoa followed us outside. Chance the Rapper stood a few feet away from us, and farther down, there was a little group of people eagerly waiting. After what felt like the first seventeen hours of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, as more pockets of people started to populate the area, I saw a door open at the farthest trailer away from me and out popped a small tuft of grayish-white hair, and I was excited as if I went into Sephora, picked out five beauty products, and the total didn’t come to the cost of Tina Turner’s evening wig collection.
I gasped, “OMG! It’s Adam. Everyone be cool.” Everyone else was already cool.
He quickly breezed past folks, doling out friendly nods, and when I greeted him with a “Hello,” he responded: “Lovely day, isn’t it?” and started heading into the trailer I was standing in front of.
“Who’s that?” Jess asked within earshot.
“That’s Adam Clayton. He’s the bassist. Don’t fuck this up for me!!” I yhisphered aka yell-whis
pered.
We all laughed at how serious I was taking this, and then we saw the Edge come out, chat and take pictures with Chance the Rapper, and mingle with other folks outside. (Not pertinent to the story, but Edge is very cute and I did not get a chance to meet him. I have to believe that will happen another time.)
Anyway, after a few more minutes, I saw him. BONO! He exited the band trailer, and it was like when former president Barack Obama would enter the House Chamber to deliver his State of the Union addresses and was greeting everyone, shaking hands, having mini convos about brunch plans that will absolutely never materialize. Point is, when someone is that magnetic, you can just feel the molecules in the air change; there’s a buzz of excitement and a palpable sense of him drawing everyone’s positive energy towards him, only to amplify it and send it back out to us. It was unreal, unlike anything I had witnessed before, and I was at peak nervousness, but camouflaged it well. Then he was pointed in my direction.
Dressed in all black, Bono sauntered over the way rock stars do and playfully did an MMA bob and weave before wrapping me up in a warm embrace. He proceeded to tell me he was so happy to finally meet me and dropped to his knees and wrapped himself around my legs. On the outside, I was cool as a cuke aka cucumber, yet on the inside, I Crip Walked real quick to the Black Panther Wakanda afterlife because I died, went to heaven, and then remembered that I needed to be alive to finish this encounter with Bon-Bon, so I Crip Walked myself back down to planet Earth and said, “I’m so happy to be meeting you right now.”
He stood up, and I turned around to show off the denim jacket. He seemed impressed and said it was dope like me. Again, on the outside, I’m the coolest cuke at Trader Joe’s. Inside, I’m twerking.
I ripped off the jacket because a gal knows that a photo op is coming up, but Bono had something else in mind: “I have a present for you.”
Me on the outside: “Oh, really? That’s so thoughtful of you.”
Me on the inside, singing: I love, love free shit! Gimme dat T-shirt, I’mma wear it when I do laundry.
He reached for a giant iPad and went, “I made you a painting.”
Me on the outside: “Wait. Wut?”
Me on the inside: My deceased hymen makes contact, says, “This is what we’ve always wanted. I’m proud of you, boo-boo,” and then started playing Vitamin C’s “Graduation (Friends Forever).”
Y’all, the dude straight up took one of the pictures I sent him and did a mixed-media painting that included him respectfully AF drawing within and around my Afro to accentuate my black excellence and writing out lyrics to a soon-to-be-released song because he thought they would resonate with me. Attention to famous dudes I meet in the future: This is what you’re required to do if you ever ask for a picture from me. Don’t look at the photo and then J off onto some three-hundred-count bedding. You team up with Black History Month and say, “We about to fuck up her June, too,” and turn me into a Basquiat painting that looks like it could sell for $2.2 mil.
In all seriousness, I was completely floored because no one has ever turned me into artwork. Bono promised he would send it to me (he did), and I, surprisingly, kept my composure, telling him how much his music and philanthropy have meant to me over the years. He said some lovely compliments back about my work, blah blah blah, and we posed for a picture side by side, like bros on a guys’ night out. While awesome, I felt like I was too stiff and asked if he would be down to take some fun photos.
“Sure! What do you want to do?” Bon-Bon asked.
Uhhhhhhh, I thought. “Uhhhhh,” I said.
He started taking off his scarf and said, “I like me at your feet.” Then, he bent the knee Jon Snow style—yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaas!—and directed another mini photo shoot, which resulted in the following picture that will be used for my future wedding invitations, pregnancy announcements, evites to my annual Oscar parties, mug shots if I were ever smart enough to learn about stocks and then be arrested for insider trading, and at my funeral:
This is the cover to the erotic U2 fan fiction I’m writing entitled Uno, Dos, Tres, Clitorce.
A’ight, so Broadway musicals like Hamilton have intermissions so the performers can rest their voices, and the audience can stretch their legs, buy T-shirt merch they’ll never wear but give as a last-minute office Secret Santa gift, and use the restroom. Well, while my recount of how I met one of my heroes is nothing like a Tony-Award-winning musical that changed pop culture, mainly because the people in Ham had to dance, sing, and act for two and a half hours whereas I’m telling you about Bono while I’m sans pants and wrapped in a comforter on my couch, I still do feel as though I’m Hamilton adjacent and thus worthy of taking a breather. Please note: I’m only Hamilton adjacent in terms of existing in the space-time continuum as the musical. This is, at best, very, very circumstantial evidence that would get me cussed out by The People’s Court judge, followed by a ruling against my favor, in which I would have to pay Lin-Manuel Miranda & Co. for emotional distress and wasting three and a half minutes of their lunch break for this case to be tried in court. Welp, after writing this out, I guess we can all agree I haven’t really earned an intermish, so I should, as the Brits say, “crack on,” and tell you about the other time I got to chill with Bono.
Side B: Bon-Bon and I Are Totally Friends (Lol, We’re Not)
But wouldn’t it be cute if he and I were? Like some of my other friends and I, we could grab meals, have inside jokes, and get our hair done together. But because he’s white, his hair appointment would be about twenty minutes while mine would last the entirety of a Presidents’ Day weekend mattress sale at Macy’s. Anyway! This story takes place a few days before the Fourth of July in Cleveland, Ohio, where all my family still lives.
As per usual, I had been working nonstop but wanted to spend some quality time with the fam and, yes, my vacation to Da Cleve just so happened to coincide with when U2 was coming to town last year. LOL. Who am I kidding? Flying home to see U2 in Cleveland was intentional as hell. In fact, when I was getting ready to buy tickets months prior to the show, I made the rounds, asking everyone in my family if they wanted to go. My parents immediately yet politely declined. They’re not concert people, and I don’t think they quite understand my love of the band. I mean, they get that I’m ride-or-die for them, but they don’t understand how it happened. You know how a person can be born with red hair even though no one else in the immediate family is a redhead and it’s all because the red-hair gene can skip a generaysh? Well, it’s not like Grandma Bertha Robinson (not her real name, obvs) stopped leading choir rehearsal of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” aka the Black National Anthem to blast U2’s post-punk debut album, Boy. No one in my family listens to U2, and none of the friends I had growing up did either. Yet my parents support me spending my hard-earned and leftover cashola on harmless activities such as U2 concerts.
As for my brother? He finds my dorky love of the band comical, but not enough to part ways with his hard-earned cash just to watch me sing along to Bono for two-plus hours. That left my sister-in-law, Liz, and she was down! She digs a few of their albums and had always wanted to see them live. But between you and me, she was going to be seven months preggers with her second child at the time of the concert, so I think she also viewed it as one of her last times to “turn up” before Baby #2 arrived. I mean, if Cardi B could proudly dance her behind off during her Coachella performance while being around six months pregnant, then there was no stopping Liz from doing the Tootsie Roll during “Beautiful Day.” Plus, I’d already seen them five times during The Joshua Tree tour, so it was kind of nice to end my run with U2 at home in Cleveland with a family member. Aww!
But also I need some responsibilities or to start a soup kitchen so I’m not spending my free time and money following around a band and being the most hands-off groupie.
Normally, groupies follow around bands or solo acts in hopes of smashing or getting autographs,
but I’m content with just showing up, wearing a tasteful sweetheart-neckline tank top from Madewell, drinking sparkling water, and giving thumbs-ups to divorced dads in the audience who also know the lyrics to U2’s deep-cut tracks. Sensual seductress I am not. But that doesn’t matter to me. I had that fateful and once-in-a-lifetime meeting with Bono at Bonnaroo a month before the Cleveland concert, so in the words of Kenny Rogers, “You gotta know when to fold ’em,” which I did and moved on with my life. The Cleveland show was just to be some sister time, and thankfully, unlike the New Jersey debacle with Michelle (more on that later), the trip Liz and I took to FirstEnergy Stadium was uneventful.
No heavy traffic. No circling a parking lot forever just to find a spot. We simply left my parents’ and got downtown shockingly early, so we killed some time at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. If you’ve never been, it’s kind of like when someone was a high school star athlete in their hometown and they kept all their memorabilia at their house in order to relive their glory days with whoever visits. It’s like that except it’s a beautifully constructed museum, containing artifacts from legends, and not an upstairs attic with exposed fiberglass and broken dreams. #OopsThatGotSad.
After chilling at the museum for a bit, Liz and I went over to the stadium, got our passes, and chilled in the VIP lounge (Liz and I were on the “Friends and Family of U2” list), snacking away and having girl talk. About fifteen minutes later, I received a text from someone on #TeamU2:
Everything's Trash, But It's Okay Page 17
