Rest in Peace, Chester.

“The memories I keep are from a time like then
I put ‘em on paper so I could come back to them
Someday I’m hopin’ to close my eyes and pretend
that this crumpled up paper can be perfect again.”

— Frgt/10 — Linkin Park — Reanimation

I saw the news that Chester Bennington had killed himself and was immediately transported to the house I was an early teen in, sitting on AIM, typing to Nick Miller about something—maybe even about Linkin Park. And then I was on a family vacation in Oregon, where I begged to go to a Sam Goody so I could use my 14th birthday money to buy the new Reanimation album, and listen to it on repeat on my Walkman.

That night I opened Spotify and played through Reanimation, and was thrust down memory lane even further. I saw the lyrics in Nick's insult-to-chicken-scratch scrawl, passed in a note in Mrs. Sowers' English class, probably. I remembered him playing the piano hook from My December on endless loop. And then in my mind I was in my old Honda, Herbie, turning from the 101 onto Encinitas Boulevard. And that time I got back to CLU to an apology from Sam for having accidentally cracked the Reanimation CD in half when he was borrowing my car. 

I thought about the collaboration Chester did with Jay-Z, and how it wasn't my introduction to him (that was Big Pimpin' on the radio, lol) but it was my introduction to how clever he was, and my invitation to explore the rest of his discography that wasn't going to be playing on 93.3 any time soon. I can hope that I would've fallen in love with Hov some other way, but I have Chester to thank for that first deep dive.

When I saw that Chester had killed himself, I realized just how much of my days his voice had accompanied. More than half my life ago, in a much angstier time, Linkin Park put words to feelings I was experiencing and to feelings I didn't know could be experienced. Linkin Park helped my friends and me understand each other more deeply.

The last Linkin Park album I bought was Meteora (2003) so I cannot speak to their evolution as artists or anything like that. But for those formative years of my music-listening life, in particular, I owe a debt of gratitude to Chester and to Mike Shinoda and to Mister Hahn.

I cannot imagine the pain his family and friends are feeling at his death, but I will honor his life by listening to the words he wove together more than a decade ago. I will honor the feelings these words bring back to the surface, and I will reach out to the dear ones I first felt them with.

What do you want?

I don't know that I've ever gone this long without posting something here, especially since I've been incredibly busy with amazing things worth sharing! However, this isn't really going to be much of anything, because I'm just stopping by to post something I wrote months ago that I found on my phone.

I was in Colorado and it was cold and I was missing my people and my places and my life in Berkeley very much. I was trading emails with a dear friend who wrote, rather frankly, "Well, Case, what do you want?" And I didn't respond with these words in that email, but I wrote them in response to that question and just kept them.

I just want to make a venti gin and tonic and get a sunburn in the Dels courtyard while Paul messes around on the guitar and Maria and Gretchen just laugh and laugh until Tony finally comes down the stairs with his kindle and "does homework" alongside us.

I just want to walk to the bus stop and ride to the GTU and scarf Urbann Turbann before the wind cools it off and then jaywalk to Brewed Awakening for not good coffee or pretty good tea but most importantly a place to sit and cram reading before class begins. And then hike up the slope to CDSP, backpack lurching, for another bouncing Jerome Baggett 'Religion and Politics in the United States' lecture.

I just want to swing by Fellini for a beautiful vanilla soy latte even though I'm already late, and then drive up the Grizzly Peak switchbacks because mishing straight up Marin is bad for my car even though it's the only way I'd come close to making it to 8am class, listening to music at full volume, trying to dance myself alive, awake, alert, enthusiastic.

I just want to crack open a Downtown Brown and BBQ in the courtyard until it gets cold enough to go get a sweatshirt but also maybe shoes would have helped in the first place because the asphalt is so rough but it's fine, just hop hop hop.

That's all.

Herbie, the LoveHonda

“I’m from Southern California. There, a car can be a sort of home in itself. You spend hours in it, often doing nothing. Everything you see is curated by its windows, curated by the roads you take it over. Saying goodbye to a car is like saying goodbye to an entire way of seeing the world. I’ll never sit at precisely that angle again. I’ll never look through a mirror quite the same way….On the bus, on the sidewalk, even in my girlfriend’s car, I’m already seeing things differently. I guess that’s how you know it’s over.”
 -- Eric Nusbaum for The Billfold 

I took Herbie in last week to get checked out before our 1000-mile drive back to California from Colorado later this week. There were about $900 worth of things that needed to be dealt with, and I was halfway to crushed before Dad (over the phone with my friend Erik) said to just do some of it and we’d have the dealer back home take a look at the stuff we weren’t sure was necessary.

This was amenable, until this morning when I drove on the 75-mph-speed-limited Interstate 70 and Herbie was out of control. I had other people’s kids in my car and I was afraid for our safety. There was no way Herbie was going to get to California this week without those repairs.

So I called my Dad this afternoon to decide what to do. Safety being his priority, he said to go ahead and call Honda and see about getting Herbie safe to drive back to California. This was amenable, until he also said to start preparing myself to retire Herbie when I get home.

Herbie is a 2001 Accord. I acquired Herbie in 2003 when I began to learn to drive. Herbie is the first and only car that has ever been mine – and 10 years is an incredible run. Herbie and I have been a lot of places. Herbie has driven me to D Street and to Grace Hall and to Holy Hill and to the Rocky Mountains and to everywhere that the last 10 years have taken me. 

Herbie has, pretty much most importantly, proudly proclaimed from his sticker-clad bumper all the things I hold most dear.

As much as I know that cars do not last forever, I was pretty comfortable with the idea that Herbie was somehow just going to keep on keeping on.

I cannot believe that I’m going to drive back to Berkeley next month without Herbie. And I cannot believe that I’m going to move across the country after graduation without Herbie. And I cannot believe that all the nexts are going to happen without Herbie.