Time for just another moment.

Today was one of the most difficult days I've ever had to face, and I know this is just the beginning of the painful detachment I have to go through for the next two weeks. I say "difficult" with the tears in mind, but these tears were so different than the ones that I'm used to. I didn't publicly sob today because I was sad. Yes, I was sad, but I was also happy, hopeful, lonely, loved, and most of all, nostalgic. Feeling all of those things at once, it's no wonder I bursted a little at the seams (my seams being my tear-ducts).

I performed for the last time on the Vinik stage today. The tears started before I even made it to the dressing room. Reminiscing with old friends about what my school's theatre program has meant to me over the past six years got me started. The funny thing is, although I felt like a phantom walking through the green room, the minute I got into makeup and costume I felt sewn up again.

I performed without shedding a tear. I didn't think, "This is the last time I'll ever do this," as if I had already finished. Everything was present tense, and I threw my soul into it all. I lived the show more fully than I've lived my real life at times. I let go.

The tears came back for the Finale Ultimo, just as I expected. As I stood there under the lights, singing my last ever notes for an audience in that room, I felt all the time I had spent in that very same theatre whooshing by me. Set changes, tech rehearsals, performances, acting classes and other memories seemed to all be clanging together simultaneously: a cacophony of time, space, and growing up. I thought back to the awkward fifthie who was asked to step in for the title character one April day in 2009. That, in turn, makes me think of the passionate senior who proudly stepped into the light as the title character in 2013.

The funny thing is, right after I got off the stage, I felt the loss. The magic has disappeared. Vinik became a room again; the hallway just a hallway; the props just objects. The Theatre Collective would never be mine in the same way.

When I was very young, I had this dream about a toy coming to life. It was extremely vivid, and I remember just how attached the living toy and I had become. We loved each other. At the end of the dream, however, the magic was lost. I remember that the dream ended with me shaking the suddenly lifeless toy, pleading for time to rewind so I could be so happy again. I woke up sobbing. And I never forgot that feeling.

This chapter of my life, doing high school theatre, has closed. It's gone. My director will never be the same guy to me. I will never act with many, if not all, of these people again. Some may never do theatre again. We're all going to get older. We're all going to continue moving. With or without one another.

I was thinking today; there will be so much room for so much more in my life. When I think of who I am, I think of all the anecdotes that brought me to where I am. But hopefully my life will be five times as long as it had been. I've lived so much, felt so much, learned so much, and I might only be 20% of the way through. I can't linger in the beginning forever. I need to let the plot develop and thicken--allow the characters to develop more. Such a great beginning deserves to be seen through to its ending.

Bittersweet

Today has been (and will continue to be) a fantastic day. We had one of my infamous ticket selling events to promote the Spring Musical, which allowed me to sit in the sun with a few of my favorite people for the good part of the afternoon. We also had Sitz Probe, which is the one time in the rehearsal process where all you're asked to do is rock out with the strength of a full band behind you. I spent some time in the studio with Greggles, and now we're off to dinner and Gatsby. Overall, a pretty wonderful day.

But I've been a bit off today. I don't know why, but I just didnt feel like interacting with people. I didn't really question it much today, but as I'm sitting in Greg's car with the music slightly too loud (in a good way), I find myself with time to think.

Just as I'm watching the world rush by me in this comfy CR-V, all the time that I thought I had left with a school that I love is rushing by me as well. I can't deny it any longer. 10 more pages in my assassin book and I will be a high school graduate. It will all be over.

This is the epitome of bittersweet for me. In many ways, it's time for me to leave, to start fresh, to grow. But my school is all that I know right now. It's my nest (moreso than my home ever was), and once I fly away I can never really return in the same way.

I'm going to lose a lot of people when I leave. How do I even begin to say goodbye when I know that it could be forever? I know who I'm going to try and stay in touch with, but I can only plan so much before life gets in the way.

When will I ever again spend such a nice day doing my favorite things with my favorite people? This big change in my life is robbing me of my most valuable possession: security. I no longer can be sure of where I stand. I probably won't be for a while after this.

But I am sure that I can't stop this train, so I might as well buckle in and enjoy the ride.