Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Almost as fascinating to me as the things I wrote about in my college freshman journal were the things I chose not to write about.

For example, I didn't write about the fact that on the way back from driving me to college, my parents had an accident with my car, The Enterprise.

And then, of course, I also didn't write about the fact that I lay awake that first night, crying, dreadfully homesick.

Sometimes this sort of thing happened because I often wrote about events long after they'd happened, based on meticulous notes I jotted down when I didn't have time to write a journal entry. Other times, I deliberately -- or inadvertently -- was editing things out.

Case in point: A friend of mine and I went backstage to meet Ziggy Marley when he performed on campus in Spring 1989. We even managed to finagle an interview out of him for the college radio station, WPSU.

Strangely enough, although I remember this incident vividly and frequently tell stories about it, I didn't write much about it at the time.

Here's what I remember:

I went to see Ziggy Marley, prepared to dance. Having gone to the concert by myself, I was milling around on the floor, waiting for it to begin, when Jose Ramon came up to me. Jose was from Puerto Rico, a tall, milk chocolate, big-chested guy with tight curls that rose about an inch and a half on his head. He wore wire-framed glasses and, despite his size, was actually a bookish, gentle type.

When he came up to me, he was thrilled to see me. "Oh, great! Someone else from WPSU," he said. "Afterwards, I want us to try to get an interview with Ziggy Marley."

I was surprised. Neither of us was wearing a WPSU T-shirt or had any form of identification.

"That's okay, we'll get back stage," he said.

The show was a burst of color and sound. Ziggy was touring with the Melody Makers, largely composed of his siblings. Jose and I danced wildly to the music. The concert was held in Penn State's Rec Hall, which is the old gym and was used at the time for both basketball games and concerts.

Afterwards, Jose headed straight for the stage right hallway, which led back to the green room. Penn State security officers were stationed at the end of the hall.

"We're from WPSU," Jose said. "Could we go backstage and meet Mr. Marley to ask him about an interview?"

Oddly enough, the security officers didn't request further identification but let us go back. He told us to wait with the students from the Caribbean Student Association.

Jose got a little antsy, tossing back and forth on his feet. I tried to keep the mood light by cracking jokes. Ahead of us, the Caribbean students were chatting happily. My impression of them was a group of tall, bronzed people talking in musical voices.

Eventually, a door opened and we all flooded into a fairly empty room. As we stepped in from the doorway, Ziggy held court on a low couch on the left-hand side of the room. On either side of him were a handful of powerfully built men in colorful clothing.

Ziggy looked at us all and gave us a huge smile. The Caribbean students had formed a line and were filing up to him to greet him.

"No need to stand in no vagina line-a," Ziggy called out.

We stood around befuddled.

He said it again. "No need to stand in no vagina line-a."

We still couldn't believe what we were hearing. One of the heavies stepped in as a sort of translator. "Mr. Marley says you don't have to stand in a line."

Everyone broke formation and gathered around him in a group. As he greeted the Caribbean students, Jose tossed back and forth on his feet some more. But he did admirably when we got up there.

"Mr. Marley, Sir," he said. "We're from the student radio station. We wanted to find out if you would have time tonight to do an interview."

Ziggy turned to one of his staffers and had a brief discussion. "We can't come to the station tonight," he said.

"Could you call us? We could do it over the phone," Jose suggested.

Another consultation. "Yes. We can do that."

"What time could you call?" Jose asked.

"In about 30 minutes," Ziggy replied. He looked up at the clock behind him. "Midnight-thirty."

We exchanged information and I had him sign my ticket. Jose and I left, managing to hold ourselves together until we got outside, where we jumped up and down, hugging each other, before racing back to the station.

No one had been expecting this. We had to arrange a last minute engineer for the interview, and Jose had to write up questions. I was sitting in the studio when Ziggy called.

Jose was falling all over himself. "Mr. Marley, Sir," he said, and launched into his questions. It was a brilliant achievement.

And now, a dose of irony. Even though I was the executive producer of a weekly three-hour radio program and could easily have found time to run the interview, I left Jose in charge of editing it and figuring out where and when it should air. Another natural fit for the interview would have been the weekly Roots Vibration show, which played reggae and other Caribbean music.

But to my knowledge, the interview never aired. It sat in the bottom drawer of an unused cabinet in a back corner of the station lobby. I should have rescued it when time came to pack up and move on, but I had too many other things to think about at the time. And after all, it was really Jose's interview.

I guess in this case, the "get" (as Larry King would call it) was more important than the end product.

Now, here's what I actually wrote in my journal:

Sunday, February 12, 1989

Tonight was the Ziggy Marley concert in Recreation Hall. I wore my blue tank dress and my WAR IS STUPID shirt. A lot of really interesting people were there, dressed in every way imaginable. The dance floor was in the back of the gym, though, which was stupid. The Earthtones warmed up the audience, and they were really good. At first, I could dance fairly normally, but more and more people crowded the dance floor, and by the time the Melody Makers were on stage, there was hardly any room. I hung out with Jose and followed him. Once he took my hand to lead me through the crowd. I let him, because I couldn't think why I shouldn't.

Jose happened to know that Ziggy Marley might be giving interviews if we asked, so after the concert, we told the guards we were from WPSU and asked if we could go backstage. They said sure, so we did. There was a long line, but eventually we got in. Ziggy was cool. I couldn't believe I was talking to him in person. He signed my ticket, and we asked him if he would call the station later that night for a phone interview. He said he would, at "midnight-thirty." So we ran back to the station, shouting and jumping around and hugging each other. We called Russ Pownell down to engineer, and Jose wrote up some questions. Ziggy called, and we interviewed him and got it on reel. It was CLEEEEE!

Can you tell the difference? I don't know why I gave it such short shrift when I wrote about other experiences so vividly. Maybe my younger self was embarrassed by the whole "vagina line-a" incident. But that's the best part of the story! And while I always regretted that we didn't actually air the interview, that in no way subtracts from the serendipitous nature of the experience.

The unwritten, in this case, was far more interesting than the written. But then again, maybe it had to percolate in my mind, become part of my oral tradition, before I could do it justice.

Moral:
If we could edit our lives the way we edit our memories, we'd be far less interesting.

Copyright 2003 by Alyce Wilson

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