Strange Times

March 16th 2009 by E..

I’m no stranger to strangeness.  I’ve been in Disneyland four times with over 1000 Southern California goths, have dyed my hair every color of the rainbow (and then some), hell, I even paint my own nails!  But there’s one thing I draw the line at, and that’s not drawing a line.  I’m not one to get too geeky over things in public, especially around people I don’t know.  While I know and have known countless people who have gone out of their way to be quirky or unusual, that’s never been for me.  I don’t force myself to be into anything I’m not genuinely into, or to be someone I’m genuinely not.  Gee, that’s deep.

This past Saturday was the Spring edition of Monster Mania, a weekend of horror, sci-fi, and all-around geekiness in Cherry Hill, NJ.  The highlight of this, like any other respectable hobbyists’ convention, is the chance to get stuff signed by people that are generously referred to as “celebrities.”  Mostly, it’s folks who had bit parts in a well-known (or cult favorite) horror flicks, such as Michael Berryman from the original The Hills Have Eyes, (as well as Weird Science and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest) and Jennifer Rhodes, better known as Grams from “Charmed.”  This particular convention usually features a ‘reunion’ of sorts featuring multiple members of a movie’s cast, such as a Saw or , like this weekend, a Friday the 13th reunion.  While the price of admission and the prices of each autograph are enough to quickly drain a geek’s tight budget, the experience of seeing your (favorite?) horror peoples in person can be worth much more (like getting a big hug from Tony “Candyman” Todd or getting Patricia “Magenta from Rocky Horror” Quinn’s e-mail address after praising her nephew Jonny’s band, Snow Patrol).  Naturally, there’s an extensive marketplace, where black t-shirt-clad guys with goatees and tattoos of goatees sell bootlegged DVDs and frightfully unnecessary trinkets to other guys in black t-shirts.  You could also buy a corset or frilly things if you’re a girl, or action figures if you’re a kid (or a guy with a goatee).  The organizers often screen locally-produced movies that make Night Of The Living Dead look like Titanic.  On top of all that madness, there is usually one bona-fide famous person who, like Elly May at a kissing booth, generates an inordinantly long line for such an otherwise meek event.  Past events have featured Bruce Campbell and Robert “Freddy Krueger” Englund.  This weekend, the special guest was rock ‘n’ roll guy/golf lover Alice Cooper.  Since my traveling buddy Josh Pincus has been a fan of Alice’s for many years and I have been a fan of meeting vaguely famous people for many years, we decided that we would (uncharacteristically) wait in the unavoidably long line to meet the glam icon.

We arrived in Jersey with plenty of time to pay our admission and get in line to meet Alice Cooper.  Still, by the time we got to the hotel that was playing host, a line of people had formed around the outside of the building.  Though not particularly long, it wasn’t going to be a short experience.  Since we expected as such, we took our place in line behind three young men who were probably around sixteen years old (each, that is).  The two of us mused our musings, traded quotes from There Will Be Blood, as well as quotes from other movies in the “Daniel Plainview” voice.  Having been to Disney theme parks as many times as we have, diversions to pass waiting times come rather naturally.  Our attention was also frequently drawn to the young men before us.  As Josh has since described them, they were real-life versions of Beavis and Butt-Head.  Every obscure pop culture reference was met with a “heh heh” from one and a “huh huh” from the other.  Topics ranged from plotting what they would each do to one another should they become involved in Mortal Kombat-style battle to old standbys like insulting each other’s mothers.  Cloaked in nearly floor-length black trench coats and baggy, chain-heavy pants, the spectres represented the may facets of this particular brand of geekdom: superhero logos, horror movie fanaticism, and a love for generic heavy metal bands.  Ostensibly, I was linked to these three by my mere presence behind them in line, but the distance I felt could not have been any greater if I had just stayed home.  Yes, I used to wear a long black coat.  Yes, I used to wear black pants with chains and buckles (and maybe would again if I felt like it), but I never did it to ‘wear the uniform.’

I hate to sound like I’m patting myself on the back, but I’ve always been very happy, subculturally speaking, with not taking myself or my style too seriously.  I do like looking good when I go out in public, but if I feel like wearing a Lou Reed shirt at a folk music conference, I’ll do it (and I did).  I’m proud to not dress or act a certain way to please anyone who isn’t me.  My distaste for the three young men in front of me is not too different from my previously-discussed issue with hipsters: their behavior is just too predictable.  Part of that has to do with the mass marketing of youth culture, but that’s something I’m not going to get into (not now, at least).  Just remember, David Byrne said, “I find rebellion packaged by a major corporation a little hard to take seriously,” and don’t forget, he wore the Big Suit.

In the end, we got to shake hands with Alice Cooper, paid way too much for an autograph, and I got nice and cuddly with Fairuza Balk (who is rather short).

E.

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