Wetter was not better in this particular situation. I haven’t been this sad or disappointed in quite a while. Let me explain. As many of you know, I’m obsessed with Kelly Clarkson. She’s always in my CD player in my car, I have a large cardboard poster of her in my basement and I can listen to her all day long at work without blinking an eye. I heard she was touring with Maroon 5 and despite initially being put off by the idea that she wouldn’t be headlining, I saw the Gorge at my first Sasquatch this year and I decided I had to go to the concert.

Unfortunately when I looked up the date, I realized it was the same day as the Seattle AIDS Walk. This wouldn’t be a huge problem for many people, but seeing as I’m co-captain of an awesome team called Teamocil, it was definitely a problem for me. You see, because my co-captain Braxton and I cook breakfast bright and early for our team and then make sure everyone has a grand mimosa-filled time. Therefore, me and everyone I am close to, was going to be drunk Saturday.

And we most definitely were. It was pouring down rain throughout the whole 5k walk and I was drenched from head to toe. We had a lot of fun, drank mimosas, stopped near the end of the walk for a shot and finished in truly epic, waterlogged fashion.

But luckily for me, my friend Katherine really wanted to go to the concert and was not participating in the Walk. She picked me up a little after 1pm on Saturday. I was still soaked because I hadn’t gone home from the walk yet but I was determined to push onward. She had gotten us pit tickets and we headed off to the Gorge. It’s about a 2.5 hour drive from Seattle so I dried off a bit in the car.

We finally arrived in Quincy, WA and grabbed some Mexican food before we headed to the concert because the town is so small I’m pretty sure that was the only restaurant open. Then, we parked in the massive lawn parking lot and decided to “prefunk” the show. Our driver, Eddie, would have plenty of time to have a couple of drinks as it was only 6pm and the shows would probably not be over / we would not be able to get out of the parking lot until well after midnight. The three of us went into the amphitheater and made our way to the pit.

The show started with an opener none of us had ever heard of, Rozzi Crane, who is signed to Adam Levine’s record company. She was wearing a small dress that the wind threatened to fling up so she danced carefully around the stage while belting out her songs. Her set ended and my anticipation was high because I knew Kelly was next. I was also about 10 feet from the stage and a bit off to the left from the center. Perfect placement.

Then, all of the sudden, the security guards started to push people in the crowd back away from the stage. They set up new fences further away, severely minimizing the size of the pit area. Some girl who had gotten there extremely early to get right up front and center started crying because she feared she wouldn’t be as close to Adam Levine as she hoped. I was just angry and almost refused to move.

But she would never get close to Adam Levine. We soon noticed that they were actually packing up equipment on stage. My friends and I knew they were canceling the show almost immediately. We pestered a security guard until he confirmed our suspicions. The poor girl cried even louder. A wave of sorrow washed over me.

We made our way back to our car totally and completely defeated and disappointed. I was still wet and cold and our efforts to make it out to the Gorge for the concert were all for nothing.

To make matters worse, we had just had a mini party in the parking lot before the concert and therefore, none of us were sober enough to drive. We only all had one or two drinks each but it was dark and we wanted to wait it out to feel safe. Our car was one of the last out of the parking lot.

Adam Levine is the only one to say anything. He took to his twitter account and said, “I’m so sorry we had to cancel tonight guys. We will make it up to you. We had to take safety into account. We hope you understand. :(” Kelly has said nothing.

But I don’t think they really understood. No one lives near the Gorge. We all drove hours and hours to see them. Eddie pointed out that he’d been to a concert that had safety concerns before so the artist just got up on stage and did an acoustic set for the people who showed up. He was probably the most angry out of the three of us.

And I don’t really know how they’ll make it up to us: people drove from all over the state just to sit or stand in the rain and wind. All I’ve heard is that we’ll be refunded for the tickets. If there was concern about the weather (as I know from being out in the storm all morning, it was bad in Seattle and weather tends to travel east), they should have canceled much earlier. Supposedly it was the first concert Live Nation has canceled at the Gorge in 27 years.

It’s just sad. We got home around 1am. It was a twelve hour ordeal for nothing. It may be the first time my feelings for Kelly Clarkson have been anything but adoration. And it may seem simple and petty but it would have been nice to hear Kelly Clarkson also apologize. The silence makes me all the more disappointed.

But I guess it’s a good thing no one died from rogue stage lights blown off by the massive winds or whatever… but someone try telling that to that poor girl crying about Adam Levine and see how she responds.