*Earworm (Letter to David Grohl)

Hey, Stewart, you don't mind if I use this space to address another drummer, do you? I know, it's only two days before your birthday, but if I can make the following funny, it might be worth it. We'll see, okay?

Dear Dave Grohl,

I have spent the last two days humming your damn song "Bridge Burning," and I'm starting to get annoyed. You've written many catchy, bouncy, peppy, slightly derivative pop songs in your career, but this one takes the cake.

It doesn't help that your voice is unmistakable. I hear your screeching and whispering, the songs that vibrate between loud and soft, and I worry about you. Have you been trained to sing like that? I don't know what effect all that yelling will have on your voice in 20 years; I only know I've been listening to you do it for what feels like forever and your voice, which in my mind has a beard the same as you do, tickles my chin and gets in my head and I can't get it out.

You should know, Dave, that I used to think I was too cool for your music. I used to think, Dave Grohl! He gave up the drums to be a front man. Even Phil Collins and Don Henley stuck it out behind the kit (dude: Don Henley! You just made me invoke Don Fucking Henley). Ringo Starr looks like a giant fool when he sings at the mic, and you know why? Because that dude is a drummer. But did you notice I said "I used to think..."? I had to give up thinking that, and I'll tell you why: I was never cool, that's why. I play the piccolo, Dave. I wear glasses. I have a blog in which I write to Stewart Copeland. I drive a Honda.

It's either that I'm just not cool, or that you are one big ol' talented guy, because, like Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy, I like you, no, I love you, in spite of my best efforts not to. (My husband and I saw you open for the Police at Dodger Stadium, and I couldn't get into your act. I realized later that I was just jealous because I was a hundred miles away from your little spectacle.) I even had a dream about you the other night; (a PG dream, sure, but you should know, Dave, that I was pregnant. BY YOU.) and in that dream you broke my heart. I woke up and played that dream over and over in my head all morning. Luckily it was a Sunday.

Don't break my heart, David Grohl. I started listening to "Better Off" on the way to work this morning and I had to smile, because I think that's going to be the next "Bridge Burning" for me. Bookends, huh. You really know how to play me.

Love,
Irene