It’s 5 am. You wake to a soft, muffled crying in the gym. Someone, you realize, has grasped the inescapable reality that awaits them: all of this will be over in 24 hours. In 24 hours, we will be lying on our soft beds back home, unable to go to sleep because the hard gym floors and cramped bus seats have become more comfortable than a damn mattress. We will feel more disconnected than we could ever imagine, for we have changed on this seemingly impossible journey and we don’t belong anymore. We will wake up to deafening silence as tears roll down our sun-burnt faces because we have lied to ourselves; we find no happiness in being back home. And what happens to you? You’ll return with nothing more than the clothes on your back and the memories of a life that already seems so distant. You’ll be alone in this false reality, knowing that no matter how hard you try, they won’t understand this fantasy of yours. They, who spent their summer comfortably inside air-conditioned rooms, unaware of your horrific and violent transformation. They won’t understand the singe of the sun dancing off your back or the crunch of the scorched earth under your feet. They won’t understand the feeling of your heart pumping faster and faster or the shortness of breath when the show ends; the screaming, the shouting, the applause of a stadium full of people. They won’t understand the bonds you forged with strangers who, in a few short months, have become your second family. They won’t understand any of it, and mostly, they won’t understand you. But God, you’ll wish they did. But that’s 24 hours later. For now, the crying has stopped and the calm breathing of 149 people echoes throughout the gym in peaceful harmony. This is what you’ve been waiting for since the first day. This is what all the hours of rehearsal and refinement culminate to. This is the last day.
The Last Day // B.K. August 9th, 2014 - Indianapolis, IN. (via neomusicology)
