Welcome to my feelings, thoughts, and emotions (the appropriate ones, that is) for September 10, 2014, the last day of the Austin Mahone tour. To be honest, I hadn’t been feeling very well the past few days. I was overemotional, on account of there’s a full moon, I just got my period, and I’m Camila Cabello and I have a lot of feelings.
Long story short, I felt extremely homesick. It was like a numbness in the bottom of my stomach that left me starting the day with a pitiful lack of enthusiasm for anything at all. It was one of those moments where you feel confused and disoriented and overwhelmed and lonely all at once. It’s a seventeen thing. (By the way, I’m a generally very happy person and I was just having a moment, nothing serious.)
And I know this is supposed to be a blog entry about how the day was and what our routine activities are, but we’re human and it ain’t as simple as “wake up, get glams, do meet and greet.” In between, the stuff that isn’t shown on camera, those are the moments that make up who you are. The nervous breakdowns, the epiphanies, the daydreaming about a boy you like, the butterflies, the tears of joy, the laughter, the staying up late with a best friend. Those are the moments.
At our meet and greet, we met a woman and her daughter. I don’t want to disclose any names, but basically, her daughter came up to us. I noticed she was a bit shy and guarded, and the both of them had this look in their eyes, a tiredness, like they were carrying three elephants on their shoulders. They had a light about them though, like life had run them over with a huge dirty truck, but exhausted as they were they wiped the dust off and trudged on because they were good, and they had hope. Her father had passed away that year, and her mom came up to us with tears in her eyes (seeing moms cry is equivalent to seeing someone stepping on a newborn puppy and not being able to do anything about it) and she said “We’ve had hell in a year, but you helped her stay strong and I can’t thank you enough for that. God bless you girls.)
I swear I think I’ll be old in a rocking chair and still remember the look on her face. Fast forward. By the time that show came along, during the part in “Over” when it ends and we look at everybody’s faces in the crowd and we make eye contact, I got to thinking about all the stories that were in that stadium. There must’ve been about 6,000 stories. The young girl with the pigtails in the front row. What’s hers? Maybe this is her first concert and she wants to be a singer someday; she’s too shy, but maybe tonight will make her want to tell her mom she wants to sign up for singing lessons. And what about that girl with the light-up bow sobbing and singing the lyrics to “Miss Movin On” with her best friends in the far corner on the left? What if she’s getting over a recent breakup? She had been with the guy for 6 months and he was her first love. She can’t get him out of her mind, but those words and this bass and the crowd all sweaty and singing along can maybe make her forget for a little while. And there’s a boy right in the middle in the front row holding hands with his boyfriend. His parents are there too. He knows all the words and his smile tonight makes him look like the happiest man in the world. Maybe he came out to his parents this weekend and he’s never felt more at home in his own body in his entire life.
And all of a sudden, I’m dancing so hard I almost trip and I’m singing and looking at as many people as I possibly can because the mom and her daughter and the little girl with the pigtails and the girl with the light-up bow and the boy with the sunshine smile deserve all the happiness and all the hope in the world. They all smile back at me and I feel so light I swear I get butterflies in my stomach and I start to laugh.
These are the moments. These are the moments where you realize love is everywhere if you look closely. When you realize happiness isn’t next weekend, and it’s not last week, it’s right now. That was one of the best nights of my life. It felt good to know purpose. I lay in my bunk and I think of all the stories I’m in. I think about all the stories that are in my story. I think about all the stories that are left to be written. And it might be my favorite book yet.
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