We asked a guy for directions at the Garth Brooks concert. He pointed us to the front row.
The truth is, before July 16, I was no Garth Brooks Superfan.
Country music wasn’t big where I grew up in Pennsylvania. I’d never heard Garth sing until my college roommate played him on repeat in our small Chapel Hill dorm room. I learned his song lyrics through osmosis. In comparison, my husband Wes — who grew up in Kentucky — loved Garth as a kid.
When he got the tickets, he asked if I wanted to go, or should he find other friends?
Sure, I said. Of course I’ll go. It’d be a fun to see an artist touted as one of the “Greatest Entertainers of All Time.”
On the Saturday evening of the concert, as we walked up a large, mostly deserted concrete ramp inside Bank of American Stadium in search of Section 252, my friend Raili and I saw an official-looking guy with a walkie-talkie. Another group of women was walking away from the man; I remember thinking they seemed giddy.
Our husbands were with us, but weren’t interested in asking for directions. No surprise there. Raile and I approached the guy anyway, to ask if we were going the wrong way. Turns out, we were.
Also, turns out, the legendary country superstar doesn’t sell his front two rows, this guy explained — because Garth instead gives those best seats to random fans.
Then, instead of directing us the proper way to 252, he handed us wristbands and individual tickets with the words “Row 1.”
We told him we were a group of four and waved the guys over. My husband didn’t believe him. Looked at him when he offered and said, “This is a sham.” So the Garth guy — who kindly but emphatically declined to take a photo — opened his fanny pack to show multiple colored wristbands and a stack of tickets wrapped with a rubber band. Wes, gratefully, shut up.
Moments later as we skipped down the ramp with neon paper attached tightly to our wrists, two moms squealing like the 11-year-old daughters we each have, it hit us: The man cleverly avoided a photo so his face wouldn’t get posted, and future concert-goers wouldn’t comb venues looking for him.
We arrived at our seats to find that they were even better than unbelievable. With a 360-degree stage, we could’ve been front row back of stage. Or front row, side stage. But this was front row. Middle of row. Middle of front of stage.
What is there to say about seeing a Megastar performance on a sold-out stage in your home city from a vantage point so close, you can touch his shoes? Nothing. It’s not about words. It’s about the feels.
We let go, didn’t worry about how we looked, danced, sang, and stomped the night away.
In fact, Garth said as much himself in his Facebook Live presentation the next day. As his producers were showing Charlotte concert photos, one popped onto the screen of the moment he leaned down towards me and he said: “Shhhhhhe was fantastic. She was so … lost in the music, having a great time, and finally at the last second … I didn’t know what she was going to do with the pick, but she finally reached up to get the pick. It was a cool moment.”
Yeah. “Cool moment.” Also known as: UnfathomableImpossibleBestLiveMusicMemoryForLife.
The series of circumstances that fell into place for July 16 to play out in the way it did could never be scripted. A series that will certainly never be repeated. The evening is further proof that the best moments in life are the ones you don’t expect. Because we didn’t know front row, middle of row, middle of front of stage was going to happen, we had no time to envision what it should look like. We simply ran into the moment.
Thank you, Garth. Thank you, Lady Luck, appearing in the form of a man with a walkie-talkie. And let the debate forever be silenced: It’s OK to stop and ask directions.
Molly Grantham is a WBTV evening news anchor, author, speaker, and mom of three.
This story was originally published July 28, 2022 at 6:00 AM.