The Rocker

Men's egos are a fragile thing. We don't like to admit it, but it's true. At one point in our lives, most men have stood in the mirror and admired themselves or have convinced themselves that they have the seduction skills worthy of an E.L. James novel.

Admittedly, I've done one of the above but in my defense, not without what I viewed as good cause.

Take a Hamster from my past that we'll call "Sheena."  I'll have to use a fake name here because candidly, I couldn't remember her real name under military interrogation. She was a striking blonde with a shapely figure (this was back in the days where not every 21 year old had breast augmentation.)  Her Madonna-esque hair, leopard skin high heels and sequin purse screamed "sophisticated" to me. (/sarcasm)

Anyway, this Hamster was a student at a local University who worked at the book store.  One evening, she came into my night job and we struck up a conversation. Me being the smooth talker that I am was, I convinced her to put her phone number on the invoice I entered into the computer. I called her a few days later on the premise of a follow up and so began a series of dates over the next 2-3 months.

At this young age, my hormones were raging as I was a later bloomer and was eager to make up for lost time. I wanted to find a good girlfriend with similar goals in life, similar morals, a stimulating intellect and someone I could really be proud to take home to my mother.

Naturally, I chose a women with pink spandex pants, multi colored striped wife-beater with a halter top underneath and hair like a lion's mane. Yup, Sheena was a rocker.

At the time, I was in my Depeche Mode/Duran Duran phase, so dating a rocker was like nibbling on the forbidden fruit. Nevertheless, we hit it off and despite fighting over the radio channel on my JVC-pullout car stereo, we got along splendidly.

After a couple of months getting to know each other, we were ready to take it to the next level. Sheena had finished a shift at Bobby McGee's (she was a cocktail waitress) and headed over to my place. The condo I shared with a roomie was spacious, with two master bedrooms and mine opened up to a patio. I made sure to always draw the blinds, as I could see right into my neighbor's place a scant 20 feet across the way.

On this particular night I drew the shades, but apparently I forgot to close the sliding glass door. On any other night for the year preceding this night, it would not have been a problem.

As she dimmed the lights, our interlude began. After a few minutes, with things heating up, she reached into her purse for something. Naturally, I thought she was reaching for protection. Instead, she pulled out a cassette tape. I was half expecting a romantic little mix tape, which was trendy at the time. Instead, it had one song on it...over and over and over. The song? Great White's "Rock Me."

Apparently, Sheena liked to use this song during this "exact moment" as she thought it was the perfect song. Not sure if it was the slow, rhythmical build up, the towering vocal crescendo, or what, but suffice to say that she sang along for the first run of the song and by the second run, she was slowing me down in order to time the "crescendo" for just the right moment.

In a scene from "When Harry Met Sally," her bedroom karaoke quickly turned into blood curdling screaming and using profanities fit for a sailor.  Apparently, she felt remorse somewhere during the process as I heard her call the good Lord's name repeatedly. It got so loud, one of the neighbor's yelled from across the way "stuff a sock in her mouth or finish her off, dude!"

I jumped up, closed the sliding glass door, turned on the AC and got back down to business.  Thirty seconds later, it was all over.

Being a lad in my early twenties, I briefly convinced myself that I was that good. Judging by the satisfied look on her face, I had every reason to believe that. Or so I thought.

With Great White now on its fourth or fifth run, I decided to lean over and turn off the cassette player.  Sheena barked "yeah, turn that crap off."  She was strangely attached to that tape and made sure to grab it from me immediately after I pulled it out of the boombox.

I was all set for a little post-action chatting and maybe even a dinner, but Sheena excused herself and told me she had to get up early the next morning.  Exchanging a quick kiss goodbye, she darted off and I resigned to the patio with a cold beverage and my favorite terry cloth bathrobe. To my surprise, my neighbors were still out on their patio drinking beers and smoking cigarettes.

One of them said to me 'dude....that's awesome.  When did you start dating Sheena?'  "A couple of months ago," I replied. The feeling of relief that they weren't upset with me for all the noise soon turned to a feeling of bewilderment.  Sheena had screamed my name and God's name, but I was as quiet as a church mouse. How did they know her name?   

A quick inventory ran through my head. Did she have personalized plates? No. Her name on her shirt? Only Def Leppard's. Her name on her purse? Negative. Cue the camera doing a zoom-dolly shot to the theme from Hitchock's "Psycho." 

Suddenly it occurred to me that Sheena has given that concert performance before. For one of my neighbors? Who's to say and I didn't ask. Granted, I grew up in a fairly small town so something like this was likely the stuff of local legends.

While I didn't have to buy a ticket to Sheena's concert, I did get a "box" seat and to this day, Great White's "Rock Me" is still on my playlist. Even when I hear it today, I find it curiously arousing.