Remember Pete Yorn?  He had a catchy hit back in 2001, and a great album, musicforthemorningafter.  Pete weighs heavily in my musical past for two reasons.  First, in the days before iPods, his CD was in heavy rotation on a fabulous road trip my husband and I took that summer, and, second, he was the last show I saw before finding out we were pregnant with our first child.

We saw him at The Showbox in the late fall of 2001.  I love that venue, and it was a fun show – pretty mellow, good people-watching.  What was unique was that it was just the two of us.  Usually we attended shows with other people, but that night was just us.  I wore jeans and sassy boots, and we had a great time. 

On Christmas Day, we found out we were expecting our first child.  (The best Christmas present ever, yes?)  That show became etched in my brain as the last time that we were out on the town just as “us”….not us plus “Lil’ B”, our in utero nickname for our oldest.

I had a vaguely defined goal that I would be a hip pregnant woman, and an even hipper mom.  Nothing would slow me down.   I went to a few mellow concerts while I was pregnant, and I even went to Las Vegas (which really sucks when all you want to do is sleep).   The line was drawn, however, at The Gorge.  I bought tickets for the Sasquatch Festival but ultimately, while six months pregnant, sitting out in the desert heat (in the midst of neighboring herbal fumes) just didn’t seem like a great idea.  Also influencing that decision was the fact that my mother had threatened an intervention –  something along the lines of, “over my dead body are you taking my yet-to-be-born grandchild to that concert in the middle of nowhere”.  My sisters went without me, sold my tickets alongside the road, and I spent the weekend at home, nesting.  It was all OK.

Everyone who is a parent knows how hard it is to remember what it was like before the little ones came into your lives.  In the years since then, we’ve talked about that Pete Yorn show and always say, “wait…..who babysat?”, before realizing that no babysitter was yet needed.

If you know me, then you understand that I am overly sentimental.  Commercials make me cry, and my kids give me sideways glances at sad parts of movies, knowing that I will be crying.  So I am a sucker for this: TONIGHT – two kids, many shows, and a Big Birthday later – Pete Yorn is playing at the Showbox (SoDo location, but still!!).  I am looking forward to a date night out with my husband, and I know that the evening will be filled with nostalgia for me.   I still have the same jeans and sassy boots – although I probably won’t wear them – but I am so happy that, after all these years and through so many changes, my sweetie will still be at my side.