Now and then

While we're talking about now, I have to talk about then.

Then being Austin City Limits Music Festival 2004. I had just returned from Spain and was approaching what I consider one of the most fulfilled, terrifying and exciting times of my life. It was Troy's idea to take a road trip from Missouri to Austin to go to the ACL Fest, the year highlighted by Spoon, Franz Ferdinand, Modest Mouse, Ryan Adams, Antibalis Afrobeat, the Pixies and Los Lonely Boys.

We left Columbia, Mo., after class Thursday afternoon four years ago and drove through the night, arriving at Uncle Tom's house just as he was leaving for work on Friday morning. We slept until he got home, drove with him downtown, renegade parked near Shoal Creek Saloon and walked to Zilker. We did this for three days, and on the third day, after watching Ben Harper close the festival, Troy and I drove through the night in time to make it to Monday morning classes, which neither of us felt like we could afford to miss.

I could regal you with stories -- little ones and big ones -- but mainly ones I know hold deep meaning only to me.

These photos capture that.

It was my first and last full ACL weekend, and tomorrow will be the first time I re-enter those gates. (In the years in between, I've only taken in the artists from the hike-and-bike trail or from friends' nearby houses.)

I will be working for the newspaper. I will have a child at day care (an addition in our lives that I haven't be able to adequately blog about).

I will have a restless heart and an overactive head. You see, some things never really do change.

It's the same, but different.

It is, but it isn't, Troy used to aggravate me by saying.




Not a day goes by that I don't wonder what he would say about my life now.