I thought I’d share my reaction to the Nova Music Festival tragedy. While I’ve been pained by many horrific events over the last few decades, this one hit me hard. It was personal, even though I have no connection to Israel or Gaza. I feel like my own people were slaughtered because before I was oldmanriver, I was oldmanraver.*
I’ve been many things in my life- a construction worker, commercial fisherman, tech worker, yurt builder. I’ve lived in a dozen different cities. I’ve been a skier, a soccer player, a musician, a husband, a brother and a son. And for a glorious decade+ I was a raver.
For those who weren’t lucky enough to experience the 90s rave scene, it was the best of humanity. A music and cultural scene built around love and acceptance. Finally, a place where I wasn’t an awkward loner/geek. A whole wave of absolutely fantastic people who would drive to distant forests, hike into abandoned tunnels, sneak into warehouses, just to set up a sound system and dance together and share a common love for music that blended from one song to the next and wormed it’s way into your very heartbeat. We were and still are a family of people connected by soundwaves.
Maybe I am just waxing nostalgic, but I remember whole crowds of kids who had moved beyond racism, sexism, bigotry and hate. It felt like a better future was just around the corner for all of us, not just us ravers.
The phrase that brought me to a standstill reading the news was seeing a survivor mention PLUR. Peace, Love, Unity and Respect. The old raver moral code, still alive after all this time. To know that those ravers in the desert were holding that feeling in their heart, and then to meet the end they faced, just broke me. I’m not Israeli, but those were my people. Then to hear that people from all over the world were there dancing- of course they were, because ravers welcome all and ask nothing in return but PLUR.
This isn’t even the first time I’ve had this stab of heartache. The Pulse nightclub and Club Q shootings also hurt. Just innocent people trying to connect and live. My heart aches for those were there, both survivors and victims. It aches for all the ravers across the world who only ever wanted a better world where hate could be dissolved with music.
*sidenote: My username here is a play on that old username from a techno bulletin board. I was an older raver, but a young DKOS member. In a moment of pique I decided to pose as an old person here because I didn’t want to be dismissed as a kid. All these years later, I finally live up to that username. Careful what you wish for!