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Eulogy for a ShadowCaptain: 1971 - 2022
Dec. 20th, 2022 11:05 pmI relaid altar tonight, for the first time in...a long time. I'm not sure how long. The cat has been Interested in it of late (after two full years of living in this house and ignoring it entirely) and so I took the opportunity to pick up all the pieces and clean out the cube I keep it in and re-set it entirely.
What do I put in an altar right now? Well, the first thing was a black bandanna, folded as though to be worn on top of the head. I don't remember where I got it, so I can tell myself that it really was once on his head, and a gift from him. Because the black bandanna was a ShadowCaptain trademark.
And it has been a hard six weeks, and I have not had time to mourn, or maybe it's just that I haven't _wanted_ to mourn because if I let myself cry that he is really truly gone, then it means he is really truly gone.
Really truly.
But no one is gone while their name is spoken or their story is told. So let me tell you a story about ShadowCaptain. It's the story of March 11th, 2006. It is, to go back to the old tease, the story of how I lost my virginity.
...my Rocky Horror virginity, that is.
Because the movie had come out when my mother was sixteen, she declared that sixteen was the magic age, the magic number, when us kids could go see it for ourselves. I didn't really know much about it, just that it was supposed to be fun and weird and queer and cultish and unique. I had bits and pieces gathered from various places, I'd heard the Time Warp, I...had no fucking idea what it really was, but I knew it was gonna be something I liked.
And so I was sixteen and a half, and still hadn't gone, and mom's friend ShadowCap volunteered to bring me along to the next Satanic Mechanics livecast, right there at UMD College Park's Hoff Theatre. I wore heels and bright lipstick and had a V written right on my forehead. I played the virgin games (and won them!), and I danced the time warp and I learned that in addition to everything else, there were people shouting funny lines and making the whole audience laugh!
And no one was funnier or louder or more exactly on cue than the normally kinda-socially-anxious black-clad redhead who had brought me. I became _obsessed_ with the show for a good long time, and so much of that obsession is because of the company I kept, and the high standards with which I was raised.
(a story that is not about ShadowCaptain is when I was in Atlanta, several years later, and visiting the local cast. We finished the show and were ready to leave, and a cast member came up to me and grabbed my arm. "Where did you come from?!" they asked, amazed, because here I had of nowhere to bring dozens of callbacks no one had ever heard and deliver them with perfect panache.
Of course, that story really is about ShadowCaptain, because every word I shout at the screen I do in his voice. I am not clever like this myself, but I am a very good mimic.)
He drove me home and I was absolutely bubbling over with excitement the whole time. The Mechanics only performed a couple times a semester, and I don't think I missed another one until well after I went to college. And neither did ShadowCaptain. He was there, with his voice and his camera, ready to be pleasantly surprised by me appearing out of nowhere just to see this show with him.
I don't think I have any artifacts from Rocky Horror that could sit on my altar. But I do keep a key for my virginity. ShadowCaptain and I never had sex, we never dated, we weren't in any way that kind of relationship. But I think you can call that First Time one of those significant steps away from childhood and into my adult self. Calling it ~virginity~ is a funny joke. Calling it ~growing up~ suddenly makes it serious.
Thank you, 'Cap. Next time RiffRaff throws open the grandfather clock, it's your body I'll be asking to see. No one else will get it or understand, but I think it might've made you laugh.
I'm gonna fucking miss him.
~Sor
MOOP!
(Oh yeah. And if you wanna go see me being an original tease, this link should keep it exactly how you would've seen the 16 year old's post on your friends page...)
What do I put in an altar right now? Well, the first thing was a black bandanna, folded as though to be worn on top of the head. I don't remember where I got it, so I can tell myself that it really was once on his head, and a gift from him. Because the black bandanna was a ShadowCaptain trademark.
And it has been a hard six weeks, and I have not had time to mourn, or maybe it's just that I haven't _wanted_ to mourn because if I let myself cry that he is really truly gone, then it means he is really truly gone.
Really truly.
But no one is gone while their name is spoken or their story is told. So let me tell you a story about ShadowCaptain. It's the story of March 11th, 2006. It is, to go back to the old tease, the story of how I lost my virginity.
...my Rocky Horror virginity, that is.
Because the movie had come out when my mother was sixteen, she declared that sixteen was the magic age, the magic number, when us kids could go see it for ourselves. I didn't really know much about it, just that it was supposed to be fun and weird and queer and cultish and unique. I had bits and pieces gathered from various places, I'd heard the Time Warp, I...had no fucking idea what it really was, but I knew it was gonna be something I liked.
And so I was sixteen and a half, and still hadn't gone, and mom's friend ShadowCap volunteered to bring me along to the next Satanic Mechanics livecast, right there at UMD College Park's Hoff Theatre. I wore heels and bright lipstick and had a V written right on my forehead. I played the virgin games (and won them!), and I danced the time warp and I learned that in addition to everything else, there were people shouting funny lines and making the whole audience laugh!
And no one was funnier or louder or more exactly on cue than the normally kinda-socially-anxious black-clad redhead who had brought me. I became _obsessed_ with the show for a good long time, and so much of that obsession is because of the company I kept, and the high standards with which I was raised.
(a story that is not about ShadowCaptain is when I was in Atlanta, several years later, and visiting the local cast. We finished the show and were ready to leave, and a cast member came up to me and grabbed my arm. "Where did you come from?!" they asked, amazed, because here I had of nowhere to bring dozens of callbacks no one had ever heard and deliver them with perfect panache.
Of course, that story really is about ShadowCaptain, because every word I shout at the screen I do in his voice. I am not clever like this myself, but I am a very good mimic.)
He drove me home and I was absolutely bubbling over with excitement the whole time. The Mechanics only performed a couple times a semester, and I don't think I missed another one until well after I went to college. And neither did ShadowCaptain. He was there, with his voice and his camera, ready to be pleasantly surprised by me appearing out of nowhere just to see this show with him.
I don't think I have any artifacts from Rocky Horror that could sit on my altar. But I do keep a key for my virginity. ShadowCaptain and I never had sex, we never dated, we weren't in any way that kind of relationship. But I think you can call that First Time one of those significant steps away from childhood and into my adult self. Calling it ~virginity~ is a funny joke. Calling it ~growing up~ suddenly makes it serious.
Thank you, 'Cap. Next time RiffRaff throws open the grandfather clock, it's your body I'll be asking to see. No one else will get it or understand, but I think it might've made you laugh.
I'm gonna fucking miss him.
~Sor
MOOP!
(Oh yeah. And if you wanna go see me being an original tease, this link should keep it exactly how you would've seen the 16 year old's post on your friends page...)
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