How to Reroute Yourself

Athena Dixon on singing Oasis songs at karaoke and steering her own course

I’ve had an entire bottle of peach soju when I finally muster the courage to grab a microphone and belt out Oasis’ “Wonderwall” while rocking side to side. The mic is clutched in my right hand and I’ve stuffed the left into the pocket of my jeans to stop some of my nervous shaking. I tell myself to stare straight ahead and look at the flat screen television mounted to a wall across the room because if I do I don’t have to see the others at the tables around me and think they’re judging me. No one is. In fact, the others in the room sing along on the chorus in short and soft bursts and it gives me confidence. They join in between sips of their own drinks and bites of food stacked in small dishes on a table near the door.

Outside that door there is a restaurant and outside of that is Baltimore and the AWP conference all of us are in the city to attend. Some of the writers in the room I know and others I’ve been introduced to for the first time. The energy in the room is easy. People have already performed solo and in duos and trios. Those not on the mic aren’t afraid to add their voices to the lyrics and there’s plenty of laughter to go around. By the end of the night, we will have belted out Usher and Boyz II Men as a collective. But right now it’s me and an instrumental Oasis track trying to keep time.

I don’t really need the words of the song fading in and out on the screen. I know them by heart. I’ve sung them over and over at the top of my lungs at home alone. In my car while driving the back roads. In the dead of night with headphones stuffed into my ears and tears in my eyes. I don’t know how long I’ve known the song. I just know it. It’s in my body like a switch—one note and something in me changes or shuts down. It’s one of those songs that make me contemplative and hopeful. It’s always made me feel like I could move forward toward something better than my current place in the world or has given me permission to dwell a little in memory.

In October 1995, when “Wonderwall” was released, I was still in high school. I was just as you would imagine a Gen X teenager would be at the time. Angsty and quiet. Very serious and terrified, too. Back then I was still living into who I thought I should be. I was on the fast track to college, candy striping at the local hospital, a member of Junior Achievement, a cellist, and a very good girl. Maybe I’d heard the song floating out somewhere on the radio or at the skating rink. I could have seen the video in passing on MTV. I don’t know. All that I do know is that 30 years later I’m a little tipsy in a karaoke room in Baltimore living out some part of my teenage dream. I’m a writer. I may not be writing for Vibe Magazine like I’d planned, but I’m a writer nonetheless. 30 years later and I’m not the cool girl I’d hoped to be by moving to New York and covering the music industry. I’m not driving the Jeep Grand Cherokee I coveted or living in an exposed brick loft. I am cool, though. Cool enough that I am in this exact space with people I think are talented and creative and by extension that means I am, too.

When the first chorus comes around, I’m more comfortable. I let my hand slide out of my pocket and my arm swing next to my hip. I’m still rocking back and forth, but my grip on the mic is looser. It’s not the soju in my body. It’s the understanding that I’m safe here. That it’s okay to open up a little more because even if this moment was never one I daydreamed about, I’m right where I’m supposed to be. This isn’t that path I’d chosen when I was idealistic and still believed everything I ever wanted could come true. This is the adult version of my life earned through looping life lessons and veering off the beaten path.

Back in 1995, all the state testing and extracurricular activities set me on the college prep path. This path was supposed to lead to the American Dream. And it did in a roundabout way. I just got lost along the journey. I changed majors from what I loved (magazine journalism) to what I thought made sense (sociology) after hard criticism from a professor. I went back for another degree to right that wrong. Ended up in graduate school in my late twenties. Married. Divorced. Broke and rebuilt. Started a career in the polar opposite industry of where I really wanted to be. But all of it led me to the center of a dim room, gripping a mic, and singing about being saved.

I saved myself. When the second verse begins, the room and the people in it have faded a bit. I’m still staring straight ahead at the monitor, but I’m using it more like a metronome to make sure I’m not singing too quickly and getting off beat. The words flow out of me. I don’t sing any louder, but there is more conviction now. The person doing the saving is me. I’m not the person lead singer Liam Gallagher is crooning to. There is no mystery lover or friend who’s going to be the one to show up and right the world for me. It took me a long time to figure this out.

I can’t count how many times I wished and hoped and prayed for someone to step in and step up for me so that I’d be free from making big decisions, and small ones, too. I spent years telling myself that I just needed to hold on a little while longer and eventually the good work I was doing for myself would put the right person in my path. And it has, but not in the selfish way I was thinking of. The people, like those in this karaoke room and beyond, appeared to show me what advocating for myself looks like just as much as they showed me what respite is and not rescue.

That is what I was seeking. Respite. Some breathing room along the path of my life to give me time to figure out if the next step was straight ahead or if it was time for a whole new route. I’d spent my life waiting to be told what to do or waiting on the proper guideposts to appear to make sure I was on the straight and narrow. Had I stayed putting one foot in front of the other I would have missed so much. I certainly wouldn’t be in this room at this moment. I would have had a good life, I think. Far different than what I have now, though. I saved myself from a life much more dimmed. I took a scenic route that turned out to be richer than anything I’d ever imagined.

The song starts to fade out with a repetition of the same questioning salvation. The soju has warmed my belly and my limbs and I’m singing to bring it on home. A friend circles me with her phone videoing and photographing me for memory’s sake. It makes me laugh and I pitch forward to let it out and take my seat back against the wall, take another sip, and join in with the next chorus of voices.

Athena Dixon is the author of essay collections The Incredible Shrinking Woman and The Loneliness Files and her work appears in publications such as Harper’s Bazaar, Shenandoah, Grub Street, Narratively, and Lit Hub among others. She is a Consulting Editor for Fourth Genre and the Nonfiction/Hybrid Editor for Split/Lip Press.