The 7-5-7

The following is an excerpt from an email I sent to my friend, Tara after she told me about hearing Phil Colins on the radio and thinking of me. I hate Phil Colins.

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T,

How ironic (yet not surprising) that my often-proclaimed disdain for Phil Colins now has me eternally linked to him in your mind. Oy Vey. I've heard this from others as well. In a similar fashion, I think of Nina whenever I hear Seal crooning about being kissed by a rose from the grave because of her eye-rolling and groaning at the sound of his voice. To answer your question, I might be in nova that weekend. Turns out there are 3 events that may merit my appearance. I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I am slipping into VB mode after being here all summer. Here is an explanation of said "mode" :

One begins to evaluate all travels away from VB through the lens of 1. having to drive through the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel (known as "The Tunnel" or the "HRBT" here in the tidewater area) and 2. whether or not one will miss out on good beach days while away. This is especially true of weekends away from VB. As the summer nears a close, the intensity of squeezing in as many good beach days as possibly heightens, thereby making the incidence of leaving the beach less and less likely.
When I lived in Loudoun I was very irritated at those in VB mode, forgetting what it was like to slip into the natural state of mind involving something akin to belief that the world itself does revolved around Virginia Beach. Obviously this is an absurd notion, what with the cheesiness of the tourist portion of Virginia Beach, but to a local, born and bred, this notion does not seem absurd, but in fact an obvious truth.
And just to further prove my point of VB mode and its infectious qualities, I would like to point out that my best friend now refuses to drive to see me at my new residence because it is too far away from the beach, though it a VB address. I now live a googlemaps-proclaimed 25 mins from her 71st street abode. My one assumed selling point (my "ace in the hole" if you will) the proximity of my place to Chipotle, even fell flat as I attempted to entice her to come out this way for a visit. And I can't say that I blame her. I get it. And don't even think of using Town Center as a motivator: this newly-developed VB phenom holds no sway over Mariah. The irony here is that Mariah is off to Cape Town for the rest of her life and when she lived in Pretoria last year, she drove to/from the Shoshenguve township all the time. This further illustrates that when one lives elsewhere, driving is not typically so big an issue as when one returns to Virginia Beach. Although, maybe in her case as well as mine it has something to do with the fact that we drove at least 40.6 miles roundtrip, 5 days a week to and from school for nine years of our lives; sometimes making that drive twice a day.
But I digress. I still stand by my often-stated disdain for Phil Colins' music. I've said it before and I'll say it again, it was the summer after 7th grade that did me in. I watched VH1 all summer long and I watched one-too-many Phil Colins videos; forever the vision blazed into my mind is one of Phil dressed in sequins as a televangelist in a sparkly suit crooning, "Do as I say don't do as I do." For whatever reason that was the nail in the coffin for this 13 year-old music video fan. Citing a completely opposite personal VH1 reaction, that summer sealed my love-affair with Jon Secada's music. Even now I can picture his olive skin and sunglasses as he walked along a pier whaling "I'm Free" - what a guy, that Jon Secada. Not surprisingly, Jon also helped me with my grades. I took his CD into Spanish class for extra credit the following years - 2 tracks in spanish at the end.. Gracias, Juan.