Smidgen
Ashland, 1990s
Ashland Oregon is about halfway between Seattle and San Francisco. It’s an eight hour drive to either city. When we were growing up, the population was about 15,000, and disproportionately pretentious thanks to our primary industry, Shakespeare-based tourism. There’s no shortage of martini glasses in Ashland, but not one of the Taco Bell, McDonalds, Dairy Queen, or Pizza Hut managed to stay in business. There’s nothing for teenagers to eat, and there’s nothing for teenagers to do.
We spent most Friday nights at 24 hour truck stops 15 miles up the Interstate drinking coffee and sucking ketchup off of French fries. There was a park, but curfew was strictly enforced, and a movie theater that showed a lot of independent films and offered nutritional yeast as a popcorn topping. There was only one band in town, as far as I knew, Kai’s band, Smidgen. This was the late 90s and Smidgen was in its post-ska, horn-free incarnation. I saw them play all over town: on the quad at the high school, at the Shriners’ temple, and in coffee shops all up and down Siskiyou Boulevard. My mom saw them. My sister saw them. My friends’ moms’ sisters saw them. We saw them through the windows of the Beanery because they were much to loud for anyone to enjoy their coffee inside. And we saw them through the windows at Evos because the smoke machine made our mochas taste funny. It was cold on the patio. But man, it sure beat another night of gasoline fumes and cigarette smoke.
SMIDGEN 4EVA
merch girl diaries 