My Pete Of The Week

CHRIS JONES
SHARES A GREAT PHOTO
WITH THE LOVE OF PETE COMMUNITY




A Huge Thank You to
MIZ DEATH
for her great note to us

I just wanted to send a note to tell you how much I love the blog. I’ve subscribed to the email updates, and read them every morning while I sit on the porch with my coffee and the dogs and start my day (read: smoke two cigarettes) before getting ready to head into the office.

I was never a “super-fan” of TON, rather I had a deep love for many of their songs, and yes, like all women, I fell in lust with Peter’s physicality and self-deprecating humour.  I loved how he buried his joke by wrapping in thin sheets of metal. I was turned on to TON while falling in love with the love of my life; he lent me the CD (already 6 or six years old at the time) and that was literally it for me – the music just resonated with me, made me laugh, made me feel human, really just made me “feel”  – the great irony is that, Bloody Kisses - to this day- gives me the physical feeling that is the beauty and pain of falling in love. I will cherish it forever as it was the soundtrack to one of the happiest times in my life.

 The man I fell in love with at the time happened to be a 6’7” metal fan with long blonde hair, a strikingly beautiful face and a build very similar to Peter’s. Each and every year I would try to convince him to “go as Pete!” for Halloween, but he was on to my evil ways and refused my requests for black hair and fangs – despite that fact that my Dad is an oral surgeon and could have done them for free.  But alas, I tried.
 Like many people, I have a list of “must do” things – they run the gamut of riding a horse in Germany (done) recording a cover of Teenage Kicks (done) driving from coast to coast in a convertible (done) seeing Roddy Frame play live (not yet) and seeing TON (sadly, no)

 A few Halloweens ago, TON played in Detroit but the show wasn’t announced until after we had purchased tickets to another event in Buffalo (we live in Toronto) –  and we agreed, as much as it pained me, to carry on with the initial plan, and my husband promised me we’d make the trek to see Pete the next time he was anywhere in the vicinity – we’ve been known to drive to NYC, Chicago and Detroit for shows as were really only 7 or 8 hours from all of those places. In hindsight, missing that show was one of the biggest regrets I have as we lost Peter a little over a year later.

 The day he died I had a busy day and was in meetings for most of the morning; when I walked into the office my entire staff looked at me and looked away – they knew of my fondness for Pete through my “Pete of The Week” Facebook posts. Id often slip in quotes from Peter or some of TON’s lyrics into my  “motivational” emails to the group to help keep a sense of perspective and humour in an exceptionally corporate environment – needless to say, I was devastated by the news, mainly for selfish reasons as I hadn’t seen TON play – but also because but I loved and relied on that persona to be out there in the world, much like how I felt about Joey Ramone – life just felt better knowing he was out there.

 Keeping up with your blog has taught me a new sense of your loss and the love that surrounded Peter. I feel like I am beginning to understand him as a person through your relationship, remembrances and life with him - more so than any album or interview could ever convey (although Playgirl did come pretty close…)

Thank you for helping me to understand his greatness as a person, friend, son, brother – please keep going for as long as you can, because it helps to make it feel like he’s still here. And that’s a really good feeling.

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Looking for that Spa treat for Halloween,
here's a shout out to Jessica Cassino.
A fellow beauty blogger and music journalist
Ratajczyk Family12 Comments