Music City USA for Meatball's B Party

When I was 12 years old, I met a kid at Jefferson Jr. High named T.C. Jackson. T.C. loved rock n' roll, sports and girls, just like me. He had an earring and liked wearing gym shirts out on weekends.

We started hanging out and listening to Led Zeppelin, walking around neighborhoods for hours on end and writing music about girls from school.

T.C. and my sister Kathryn fell in love and got married in July. His bachelor party was in Nashville - or Nashvegas, as some people call it.

I've come to truly appreciate the moments in my life that belong as a scene in a movie. In Nashville I experienced two of those moments. Billy and I were walking back from getting pizza and the sky quickly changed color, opened up and rained harder than I can ever remember experiencing, with thunder so loud that it rattled our bones. We ran to a building entrance with a small overhang, smoked a couple cigs, talked about where flys go when it rains and watched the rain crash down on an empty parking lot in Nashville. A perfect scene.

The following morning following an all-night bender, I watched the sun come up over the Nashville skyline with Davit, Billy, TC and McNees, our arms around each other, pants at our ankles, singing "The Sweater Song" by Weezer, in an empty courtyard in downtown Nashville surrounded by historic buildings. Then Davit, Billy and I stumbled around town looking for breakfast as the sun climbed higher and the residents of Nashville woke up with a hangover from another crazy Saturday night. "This feels like a movie," Davit mentioned as we slowly staggered across what would normally be a bustling street during daytime hours. How right he was.