Take me out of the crowd

It happened one oppressively hot and muggy afternoon; August 15, 1991 to be exact. This was the day of the onset Enochlophobia, though fear is a misnomer. Loathing would be more like it.

If you were living anywhere near New York City on that date and had even the slightest affection for 60's and 70's era rock, and just love the idea of famous artists reuniting for an epic event, well then, you were there. Central Park, the Great Lawn, sometime in the late afternoon, on that otherwise unremarkable Thursday, you were one of three quarters of a million people who swarmed into the belly of the Big Apple to watch Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel get together to recreate their particular brand of culturally evocative folk rock.

Seven hundred and fifty thousand people, in one place, in the middle of August, sweatin' to the oldies.

At the time, I was living in Manhattan, taking one of my famous "breaks" from college. My meager pay garnered from MetroSports Magazine and my free rent on a broken, leaky, dilapidated house boat resting precariously on the Hudson River adjacent to the 79th Street Boat Basin proved to be a financial situation that was just barely adequate for the nine months I spent on that lovely island. At the time, I was a newly minted 21-year old quasi-alcoholic in training, and an event as magnanimous as a free concert by a musical legend was not to be missed.

In addition, the aforementioned Rhymin' Simon had released the immensely popular and, at the time, original Graceland just a few years earlier, and was enjoying perhaps his largest surge in popularity that he had enjoyed over his multi-decade career. So when he announced that not only would he be bestowing his musical prowess on us lowly citizens for free, but that his longtime, red afro-sporting, Beeker-resembling, former musical partner with the most un-rockinin' rock name ever would be joining him onstage, well, that was an event not to be missed by anyone who had ever owned a stereo with the words "High Fidelity" etched upon it. I was so there.

After work (it was a Thursday, after all, and sports never sleep), I took the C Train north to 72nd street and proceeded to walk amongst the dope dealers, the ex-hippies, the drunken frat boys from New Jersey and all the rest of the smelly din who descended upon that park that summer afternoon. As I followed the general flow of the crowd, guided by the muddled sounds of amplified music of the concert already well underway, the absolute mass of humanity appeared suddenly like a blurry valley of moving intoxication. And to this amazing, truly awesome sight, I uttered the following words:

"Oh shit."

There was no way; I mean absolutely no way to enter the mob, peaceful though it was. Nearly a million people crammed into the space of a handful of softball fields is an intimidating sight. The very idea of attempting to penetrate the multitude brought about mental flashes of elbows to my face, angry stares and the type of verbal assaults that only highly trained New Yorkers can deliver (though I wonder how many actual Manhattanites were there - most of them are either too smart or too jaded for that type of mega-event). There had to be another way in.

I circumvented the crowd as best I could, opting instead for a flanking entrance instead of the frontal assault. This was the first indication, though I did not know it then, that I was developing a passionate distaste for large, perspirant gatherings. I desperately wanted to be front row center and felt determined to get there, despite the throng. But it was clearly fruitless by the time I arrived. I was stuck in the middle with them; the lame-o's who lacked the balls to "go for it."

Herein lies the rub. Any large cultural congregation, specifically massive outdoor rock concerts, is a recipe for pure hell. By the time I had entered the crowd, I was so far back that actually seeing the famous musicians was utterly impossible. Art's crimson, unkempt hairdo appeared as a distant constellation, dying in the corner of the sky - no jumbotrons existed in those days of miracles and wonder, so the celebrities were depressingly remote. And the music, despite enough amplifiers to blast a hole clear through to China, sounded hollow, echoed and dissonant. In short, as a concert, it sucked.

It became clear, then, that one does not go to such shows for the music. Attendance at these events is for one purpose only: to say you were there. And at that time in my life, I needed to say I was there, in order to have a good story to tell at some unspecified later date (I guess that date turned out to be August 9, 2007). The thought of being in Manhattan at that time and not going to the Paul Simon concert was too much to bear. I had to go epic, and the more epic, the better.

As it turned out, I made my way into the center of the colossal horde -much to the distress of those who had long ago staked their claim to a spot - and settled upon a spot near some guy who openly possessed the nectar of the Gods in the form of not too terribly warm light beer. I desperately wanted what wares he peddled, and I gladly forked over my hard earned money for several of the 12 ounce goblets.

And then, after "Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes" and about six other songs, I really, REALLY had to pee. I mean it was the kind of pee that smothered all other thoughts, the kind that grabbed a hold of you and said "Your bladder will explode in five minutes" and the countdown in your head starts like the end of an old James Bond movie.

Normally, in chaotic situations like that when I have to go that badly, I'll go just about anywhere. But there was nowhere to go. I was probably as close to the precise epicenter of all those people as anyone. Where does one pee in such a place? Anywhere you'd let it flow, you'd either be urinating on the back of someone's leg or in their general standing area, and that's just not cool.

And what about the other 749,999 folks, I wondered? Surely they had to relieve themselves at some point. They couldn't all be wearing diapers - the NASA diaper lady thing hadn't happened yet, and people stupid enough to crowd into a park during a heat wave with 750,000 other people ... well, they just aren't that smart to think of that ahead of time, myself included. I wish I had.

So, I sauntered my way out of the mass of humanity as quickly as the mass would allow - about 20 minutes of pure pee pressing agony - and found a bush on the outskirts of the Great Lawn. Ahhhhhhhh ...ohhhhhh ...myyyyyy ...Gooooooodddd. Upon turning around, I realized that, as much as I wanted to return to keep the epic thing going, it was not going to happen. The fear of another bowel saga was too much to bear.

I've since come to believe in a simple mantra: crowds are stupid.

I was reminded of this at a recent trip to see the training camp of my beloved Redskins. While not nearly on the scale of the Simon show, there were still several thousand fans on hand to witness that last camp date which was open to the public. Being Fan Appreciation Day, plus the addition of 100 degree heat, I was quickly thrown back to that fateful afternoon in Manhattan.

In every crowd such as that, idiots abound. There's the "I've got to make an inappropriate comment every 30 seconds" guy who causes much nervous laughter; there's the "I started drinking at noon, and now I've lost every ounce of public decency I ever had" guy; there's the pushy autograph seekers (a category which I once fell into), the surly gang of clueless youths looking for someone to fight, the angry lady who can't believe people behave this way ... then there's me, standing alone, evaluating whether some guy named Todd Wade can play offensive guard.

And I'd have to be the biggest idiot of all of them to forget, again and again, how much I hate it. But I was there, man!

Evan Redmon is a manager of a public golf course in Washington, D.C. and writes a few things about stuff sometimes. Contact him at evanredmon@yahoo.com if you really want.