Context Collapse: The Concert Edition

I have experienced collapsing context while attending a Janelle Monae’s Dirty Computer Concert. I went with my two sisters and friends. Walking into the Tabernacle, my younger sister and I saw two church members, the Stevens sisters in the middle of the hallway. While our friends got drinks, Chelsea and I walked into the standing room only venue.  I used my size to my advantage to get towards the front of the stage. I invited the Stevens sisters to join us up front come up front. It was a nice moment. The duo of sisters, linked by growing up in the same Black church, rocked together to St. Beauty Band and Rayvin’s opening sets. After waiting in long lines for vodka cranberry, filled with a splash of the latter, my older sister’s friends, Aikeem and Shanice texted me to find where we were standing in the large crowd. I met them towards the back of the venue, and  waved for them to follow me to the spot where Kelly and Chelsea and Andrea were. Aikeem felt the ease in my moving through the crowd to our coveted spot up front, parting the crowd like the Red Sea. Now that we were all together the Steven’s sisters  who happened to be shorter than Aikeem and Shanice had been pushed to the back. 

St. Beauty Band Opening Performance Setup

I noticed the frowns on their faces, my friends were blocking the Stevens Sisters’ view just they had begun to get used to spot I staked out in the vast crowd Monae’ fans. I began to sense the tension between the disparate groups of people from different worlds my personal communities. In view of Stevens’ sisters it was almost as if I replaced them with the people I came to the concert with, symbolized with the newcomers blocking their ability to see the stage. I remembering how frustrating it was to be a shorter stature person shifting between a sea of taller individuals to get a glimpse of the stage, and the pressure to keep from being swallowed whole in the concert crowd. I pointed to my taller friends and asked for them to stand behind them. It was a big ask in terms of viewing and access to the stage, but they obliged creating an equitable arrangement for everyone’s viewing pleasure. As the show went on the divide between two personal worlds began to simmer, and by the time the concert was through everyone was vibing together as unit. We had become a part of the Dirty Computer ecosystem housed in the Tabernacle that night.