My Love Affair with Eddie Vedder

The other day, I was thinking about how we confuse people with their public masks, and that got me thinking about Eddie Vedder and why it is I love him. My favorite line of any song of all is from "Corduroy" when he says, "I don't want to hear from those who know / they can buy but can't put on my clothes." I mean, what could you ever say that could say more than that? And I loved Eddie Vedder because he wasn't just talking about the corduroy shirt some kids bought because they wanted to look like him. He was talking about everyone who thinks they know what it's like to be someone else. You know, you can buy the costume, but you can't know the reality until you're there.

All my life I've been judged by people who have no idea what I am really like. If I could have one statement carved upon my tombstone (insert YGB quote: "They carved no hopeful verse upon his tombstone, for his dying face was gloom."), it would be this: "She was complicated." I've been an overachiever because of an older brother who was perfect, overweight because of a family whose remedy for any kind of pain was food, and a cutter because of a misplaced sense of guilt since I was such a burden to my mother when I was born. I've been the best mother ever, and I've been a terrible mother. I've been a good friend, but mostly a terrible friend, and that's why I don't have friends. I've been a model employee and almost gotten fired (thankfully not at the same jobs). I've been a reader and a writer and a lover of lyrics. I've been flat-on-your-face broke, and I've been a hoarder of stuff I'll never use and paid way too much for.

I've dreamed in color, and I've dreamed in red. I've seen the path cut by the moon, for me to walk on. I've dreamed the dreams of other men, the dreams that pull us in. I've had love affairs with my 16-year-old self, and I've hit myself in utter disgust with how I look.

And Eddie Vedder seems to be the only person in the whole world who understands that. So, Eddie, I'm not putting on your corduroy shirt, but I want to thank you for putting on mine. For the times you reached inside and pulled me out and wrung so hard that I felt the breath leave my body, and for the times that you breathed life back into my soul. For the voice you gave me, for the words that cut like glass and the words that healed my wounded breast. For sitting on top of a bus in the wild, paying tribute to a boy who refused to play by the rules, for saving the oceans, for reminding us all of the injustices of the world. For growing out of your own angst and realizing that some pretty cool things happen in this life - you've got two, and I've got two, and for your music that touched us all.