We’ve just finished spending four lovely days with Bethany’s friend, Heidi, in Charlottesville, Virginia, a beautiful old city in the shadow of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Though our time in the city was great, in this entry I’m going to talk primarily about Esmont Rocks, a small music festival that Heidi invited us to on our first night together.
But first we had to get to Esmont.
That morning we sweated ourselves conscious in a BP truck plaza, the sound of diesel generators groaning through the leaves. It had poured the night before, and the air was both warm and damp. We tidied up the bus and, a pair of truck stop vegetable omelettes later, struck out down I-81 from Hancock toward Charlottesville and Heidi.
It was around 6:00 pm when we turned into the driveway that led to the farm where Esmont Rocks was to take place. Lined with more than a hundred yellow milk crates, the driveway wound through the trees before opening up onto a big grassy parking lot which, it was clear, had been a pasture just hours earlier. Though the gates had opened just an hour before we arrived, already the pasture lot was filling up: cars had begun to sort themselves into tidy packs while tents had begun to pop up along the edges where the pasture met a line of shady trees.
Just beyond the pasture was a pool in which children splashed. Nearby was a white colonial farm house with a porch at both the front and back. To the side of the house was a barn where goats bleated. Finally, just down a gently sloping hill already peopled with concert-goers, there was a large white tent under which stood the stage and a sea of tables and chairs.
We found Heidi, grinning and newly blonde, among the lounging listeners on the hill. As night came on, the crowd grew. The place began to smell of rich simmering lamb, chicken and pork. We sampled the pasta salads, bread, leafy greens and desserts while tapping our toes to the bluegrass and country.
Sometime around sunset, Jesse, a lean blonde man dressed in a suit, shuffled his way onto the stage and announced in a calm clear voice that he was sorry to interrupt the music.
“I hope you’re all enjoying yourselves,” he said. “But I have an announcement to make.”
All eyes shifted toward him as he gently strummed a guitar and spoke into the microphone:
“I’d like to take this opportunity to marry Ms. Jen Fleisher.”
Hoots and cheers rippled down the hill like a breeze through tall grass, and with the cheers came the crowd. The big white tent that was draped in gold lights quickly filled with concert goers turned wedding guests. From among the crowd stepped a young female minister, and as the crowd arranged itself in a semicircle in front of the stage, from somewhere beyond them came Jen. Clad in a black dress trimmed in maroon, she strode smiling toward the stage, the crowd parting for her as she came. Cameras flashed and people hooted, many of her friends cat calling and yelping at the surprise bride as she stepped up onto the stage and arranged herself facing Jesse.
The ceremony was quick and casual, and before we knew it the band was playing again and the bride and groom had retreated back into the mass, reassuming their roles as concert organizers.
Torches were lit all over the hill as darkness rolled in. The music got louder and more raucous. There were banjos and stand-up basses, fiddles and twangy Telecasters. The crowd sang along to the tunes they knew. Everybody in Esmont seemed to have a good voice. Kegs were drained and sweat glistened on the dancers as they wove and jittered both on the hill and on the grassy dance floor beneath the glowing white tent.
Eventually we retired to the bus and drifted into and out of sleep while the bands played on into the early morning. It was a wonderful, musical introduction to the good people of Virginia.
