Four hours. I showed up four hours early. It was a nine–hour drive, and I didn’t want to sit around the apartment any longer. The party started just as I got there. It was supposed to be a few days to find an apartment. I ended up overstaying my welcome. It was more of a vacation to me. In spite of my rudeness, I forged some solid friendships.

For many of the years I lived in Nashville, Blackstone was my second home. It was the hippest brewery in town. There were a lot of dynamite chicks who worked and hung out there. Then, for some reason, I admitted to a lack of experience and declared myself celibate–in the third issue of The Crisp Fabric. One woman whom I’d spent a lot of time flirting with was upset. It was the biggest cop out of my life.

The apartment I eventually found was a duplex on Evelyn Avenue. It was a poor neighborhood. It was like an experiment to see if I could get by living in a different time zone from most of my family. By the end of my tenure, I was pretty much incapacitated with horrible back pain. Returning to Virginia was like a military extraction.

There were some cool people living on Evelyn Avenue. I consider many of them good friends, even though we have completely lost touch. One neighbor would knock on my door to ask if her outfit was cute. Near the end of my time in Nashville, two immediate neighbors were the only friends I had left in the whole stinking town. All of my other friends had the good sense to go somewhere else.

Not one person I knew liked country music.