Thoughts on DIT Fest in Kent, Ohio

I was nervous all week about DIT Fest. The whole thing seemed out of control. Tao Lin, Sam Pink, Jordan Castro, Richard Wehrenberg and like two hundred bands. I kept driving around in my car thinking Ohio might blow up if Tao Lin and Sam Pink were in the same place. That the universe could not handle such literary weirdness in one single town in Ohio and there would be total entropy and the end of humanity.

Friday around 5:30PM in the parking of lot of The Alamo (The Alamo is an apartment complex where Brittany Wallace and the hipsters of Kent State University live). Sam Pink, Jordan Castro and Mallory Whitten got out of the car.

I had never met Sam Pink before. He was shaved, strong looking and had a nice Italian face. I realized immediately that he could probably beat me up. We hugged each other like we knew each other a long time.

Jordan Castro is from Cleveland and I see him randomly. Jordan Castro is 17 and full of determination and wild emotions. Jordan Castro is like a Charlie Parker saxophone solo, wild emotions, feeling, all over the place but at the same time still very organized and controlled.

Mallory Whitten who works at American Apparel was by his side. Mallory is always fun and interested in everything. Jordan and her are both just really interested and want to know to everything.

We went inside the apartment and sat on the couch. We were all kind of quiet. Everyone was checking each other out. Jordan Castro kept going, “It’s Sam Pink, it’s Sam Pink.” I kept looking at Sam Pink thinking, “It’s Sam Pink, it’s Sam Pink.”

We went to see Brittany Wallace at Rehab Vintage and printed out Sam Pink’s poems. Brittany Wallace was there. Brittany Wallace is a small, beautiful creature who says things like, “Don’t judge her, maybe Facebook is all she has,” or, “I don’t think I don’t believe anything she says.”