They tell me I'm young and that I have time to grow
I say I'm not patient, they say I'm cold as the snow
My heart's insecure and my mind is a bitch
And I can't cast a spell even though I'm a witch
“Cold,” Feel Your Feelings, Fool!
I am fifteen years old and sitting in my dining room. I am painting a mask from Michaels for a school project on A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She’s the fairy queen Titania, and I’ve just given her violet skin and covered her eyes with a delicate film of pink tissue paper to represent the magical concoction spread across her eyes by the fairy Puck. I’ve hot glued flowers to her brow, vines to her cheek and adorned her covered eyes with a sparkly purple liner.
I’m only really sure of two things: (1) that when I grow up I want to create something that makes other people feel something the way The Regrettes make me feel and (2) I’m desperately terrified of growing up.
As I work, I listen to "Feel Your Feelings Fool" by The Regrettes, a new band I’ve just discovered and quickly fallen into a deep obsession with. When I decide to get bangs my sophomore year of high school, I give a photo of lead singer Lydia Night for reference. Their lyrics are brash and bold and sometimes clunky, but they always feel right to me in a way I’m not yet able to articulate. I’m in high school. I have no idea who I am or why I’m feeling the way I do.
In fact, I’m only really sure of two things: (1) that when I grow up I want to create something that makes other people feel something the way The Regrettes make me feel and (2) I’m desperately terrified of growing up.
So hard to enjoy the time that you're in
'Cause when it starts getting comfortable, yeah, it's ending, yeah, it's ending
“California Friends,” How Do You Love?
I am eighteen years old and sitting in my bed staring at my pro and con list at three in the morning. It’s April 2021 and my senior year of high school, so although I probably would’ve felt like the world was ending anyways, the COVID-19 pandemic has given me extra cause to think so.
I’ve spent the past four years aching to be done with high school but scared to leave it all behind. I’ve spent the past four weeks in limbo with college acceptances and the promise of freedom in hand but overwhelmed with dread trying to choose by the May 1st deadline.
It doesn’t make my decision for me, but it helps me pick myself up out of my comfortable idleness, and to start to want to make a choice.
Nearly a year earlier, on May 1, 2020, The Regrettes had released a single written and individually recorded during quarantine, called “What Am I Gonna Do Today.” On the track, Lydia Night worries over and over, singing, “What am I gonna do today?/Is it gonna slip away?/I don’t want it to” over top of a gentle guitar and soft harmonies.
I wallow in the ennui of this track and try to convince myself that I am excited for the future, that change will be a good thing. The song makes me want to take a walk outside and feel the breeze off of the James River in my hair. It doesn’t make my decision for me, but it helps me pick myself up out of my comfortable idleness, and to start to want to make a choice.
The moments slippin' through my fingers
I'm always runnin' when it's right there
I'm just a cynical believer
Can I just be here?
“Nowhere,” Further Joy
I am twenty-one years old and I’m scrolling absentmindedly in a post-finals haze on my phone when I come across an announcement that, after eight years, The Regrettes are breaking up. My stomach drops out from underneath me and I quickly begin cycling through the first four stages of grief.
And then I reread the announcement. There’s a farewell show.
December 21, 2023 at The Fonda in Los Angeles California will be the last time and place my favorite band performs together. And I’m going to be half an hour away, visiting my grandmother for Christmas. I’ve tried to see The Regrettes live before, but could never quite make it work for one reason or another. And now the pieces have unexpectedly fallen into place. I call my Mom and splurge on the tickets.
I don’t catch a lot, and I certainly don’t remember the exact phrasing, but I know Genessa said something along the lines of “and it’s nice to be able to do this and then to be done.”
I go, and The Regrettes are every bit as spectacular live as they were all of those times alone in my room, through my earbuds or blasting from my phone while I showered. The mood in the room is mixed—people are ready for a show, ready to dance, but the sense of finality is palpable.
And I quite often hate endings.
Then, on my way to the restroom in the lobby of The Fonda before the opener, I suddenly realize that the band's lead guitarist, Genessa Gariano is standing right behind me. After briefly panicking at my proximity to an artist I’ve spent years of my life enjoying and admiring from afar, I can’t help but briefly eavesdrop as I pass by their conversation. I don’t catch a lot, and I certainly don’t remember the exact phrasing, but I know Genessa said something along the lines of “and it’s nice to be able to do this and then to be done.”
I shout and dance and cry and I think about how I will never get to do this again but for once I don’t worry about it.
The final show that felt like a terrible ending for me seemed—at least from a brief snippet of an overheard conversation—to be the gratifying final chapter of one story and the start of a new one for the members of The Regrettes.
And I realize: all of tonight will be so much more meaningful because I know it will be over soon. Because I know this is the time, if ever there was one, to be in the present before looking to the possibilities of the future. So I sing along to every song I know (most). I correctly guess their opening song ("Anxieties (Out of Time)"). I forget my I.D. at home and cannot share an overpriced drink with my sister (fifteen dollars for a rum and coke). I shout and dance and cry and I think about how I will never get to do this again but for once I don’t worry about it. My souvenir t-shirt has a typo on the back and I realize I think I like it better for not being completely perfect.
I am there when it ends and yet I know I am really there for a new beginning. No Regrettes.
