CELEBRATING MY 16TH BIRTHDAY IN BRIGHTON

Then, not too many days after the UB40 concert came the big James Blunt concert. My parents had booked out a cute little place called Queens Hotel on the very edge of the seaside, so that our view was of the pier contrasting against the ocean. Now anyone here who knows me even a tiny bit will know that I have this slight addiction to the sea and ocean – the way the sharp air whips your hair, the splashes of salt rising from the waves to lick your flesh, the fizzing sound of the foamy water edges fighting past each other… beautiful. So it was no surprise that when I found out that we had a clear view overlooking the water I was crazy happy. There is honestly nothing more beautiful than watching the sun set orange and red over a vast watery plain of aqua agua.

The first day was spent driving down to the seaside city, unpacking and getting ready for the concert. As the sun began to set we left for food, and stopped at a cute little Spanish tapas bar. I am a massive sucker for Spanish food, but then, who isn’t? I for one love not only the food, but the whole atmosphere of the place – music, accents, calm lighting – and, of course, it’s interesting to watch my parents chat with the waiters (for any new people here, my parents met on the Spanish island of Tenerife. I was *this* close to being born Spanish, humour me) whilst I only picked up words like “poco” and “serrano” and “oh enserio? Lo que fue la experiencia en Barcelona?”.

Then, in our hotel, who do you guess we met? Stevie Ritchie! Yes, I didn’t have the foggiest as to who he was either, but it’s the thought that counts. My father took a photo of Stevie Ritchie with me and my mother, and he completely basked in all the attention that all these middle-aged women were giving him, occasionally saying one-liners like “you need faith in yourself” and “if you try then all your dreams will come true”. He seemed cool.

Then we began to walk down to the concert place, where we bought drinks and whatnot. We sat down in the concert hall, waiting for the opening act – he was called Jacko Hooper and was pretty darn good (you guys should totally go check him out on Youtube)! He was crazy awesome live, and I couldn’t help but cry because I’m a wimp when good music with sad lyrics floods itself into my blood.*

My father walked into the concert hall with drinks piled up on one of those cardboard holder things, and then passed them to me whilst he sat down. Now, anyone who knows me would have realised that this was an incredibly awful idea, yet no one pointed out to my dad that this decision was disastrous. One by one, the drinks began to topple, and so I passed them over to my mum, either to steady them or just to stop the wine from dripping onto my dress. As it turns out, that didn’t work, and I managed to throw a cup of coke flying up into the air, catapulting onto the coat of the woman sitting in front. She moaned and groaned, and when apologies were made she just glared at me, slinking away to rub at her now badly-stained jacket.

I have been to concerts before, but never to watch an artist to whom I know every single lyric to every single song, so I was dancing and filming and singing, and yes, I was also crying. Did people stare at me whilst I sang badly and snorted the tearful snot back into my nose? Yes. Of course. I looked like a maniac.

When the performance started to draw to an end, James Blunt leapt off the stage and started to run up and down the aisles of people sitting in the arena. He raced up and across to the row of which I was standing at (my mother and I got up early in the show to stand up near the rails), and started highfiving people. The atmosphere was smokey and intoxicating, and so I only really realised that he was in front of me when he was literally slapping his hand against the person next to me. Panic rose inside me, because who really wants to miss out on highfiving their idol? So, because it was too late to touch his hand with mine and he was already on his way away, I reached my arm out to touch him. Long story short – he was closer than I realised and I’d extended my arm with more force than I intended, resulting in me actually punching James Blunt. Punching him. I will never live it down. My mum had tears streaming down her face from laughing so hard.

The show ended, and not too long after we’d started to walk back to our hotel. In the lobby, again, was Stevie Ritchie, lapping up the attention like a hungry kitten with milk. His manager was standing off to the side, watching with both bemusement and weariness as his singer told the fans that anything is possible if they just believe. My mother and I sauntered up to the manager person, and it was pretty chill. They talked like old mates and I felt like some kind of parenthetical groupie. Not too long after had Stevie Ritchie had to prise himself away from the middle-aged women, and so my mother chatted to him as well. Now, what did she say, you may wonder? She said things along the lines of “James blunt is really calm and good, not like you” and “wow you are such an attention seeker/ show off/ prima donna”. His manager laughed and Stevie himself looked a bit apprehensive, but my mother chortled whilst I gritted my teeth in shame.

The evening ended with a coke by the bar and then a tea back in the hotel room, with the sounds of the ocean engulfing the blackened waves.