Concert turns into mosh pit macabre

Like everyone else in the Bootheel area, I made my way to the 3 Doors Down concert at the Show Me Center Thursday night. Meeting up with a bunch of my friends to stand right by the stage "rocking out" was an awesome thought at the time. However, I had never actually been on the floor during a rock concert and was unprepared in the massacre that would follow later that evening.

After standing in line for almost an hour in arctic winds, we were able to make our way inside toward the stage like a herd of cattle.

"Wow! We're so close to the stage! This is sooo cool!" I said innocently to my friends. If only I had known ...

Shinedown began their performance after 30 minutes of anxious waiting, so of course that was the cue for me to begin my poser rock act.

Don't get me wrong. I enjoy rock, but I've never actually played any kind of instrument except for a trombone that I used to play in band. And my knowledge of rock history is somewhat limited.

As the evening progressed, I noticed I began having more and more body parts pressing against my backside. It's when I saw that I was no longer talking to my friend next to me, but an armpit, that I knew the place was beginning to get a little rough.

"What's going on?" I thought as the weight of about 10 girls pressed against me. "What's wrong with you people?!" I yelled.

A rock-concert connoisseur then shouted at me, "Just push 'em the doopity-dop out of the way!" (She didn't say doopity-dop.)

At first I hesitated, since I'd been taught that it was wrong to hit a girl. However, I slowly grew to learn that these girls deserved to be pushed and jabbed with my elbow several times.

I eventually became alone in a crowd of animals with horrible body odor. All my friends had been swallowed alive.

"Oh wait! There's ... never mind," I thought as my friend's head was slowly engulfed in to what appeared to be someone's hair. I continued to "rock out" while fearing someone was going to yell "bomb!", causing my body to be crushed like potato chips.

All in all, it was a good show. Shinedown was, I think, the best of the three and I did get autographs from Tantric. Through all the hardships of concert warfare, I suppose the risk of death was all for the sake of rock and roll.

Oh, and to the girls that got in my way at the concert: My elbows will not warn you again. Got that?

Sam DeReign is a senior at Oran High School. Contact him at sdereign@semissourian.com.