loose change

may has come and gone! what a month. i still feel like i’m settling into the year in spite of being five months into it.

time is still passing at an uncomfortable rate, but this past weekend it slowed down for a bit. i’m still coming down from it. on thursday i drove to las vegas to meet sam and a bunch of our camp friends for three nights of dead & co at the sphere. during the show on night two, i found my mind drifting toward how to possibly encapsulate the experience. i wanted to write it all down in those moments but naturally, i didn’t, and now i’m in a much less eloquent state of mind.

it was a weekend of magic. it feels contradictory to describe any time spent in vegas as magical. vegas is a crazy fucking place. it is bright, it’s overstimulating, it’s an environmental abomination, and it is densely populated by tourists of all kinds. certain things there are suspiciously inexpensive–three t-shirts for ten dollars, a shrimp cocktail or a hot dog for two dollars, mass-produced rhinestone-plastered animal figurines for fifteen dollars. other things are egregiously overpriced: $115 for a double of don julio, $40 for an 18-pack of pacifico, $18 for a bagel sandwich. there are so many graphic t-shirts. there are so many family vacations–kids ten and under wandering freely in casinos that smell like stale cotton candy and cigarette smoke, parents walking around with gigantic neon drink cups, indoor ‘rollercoasters’ and adventure parks, older couples sitting at slot machines seemingly staring into a void of potential money.

a vegas experience hinges upon the company you keep while you’re there, and thankfully i was amongst the very best. our idle time was spent variously, some gambled, some saw the sights, some, like me, stuck to the pool or the room, the safe spaces, the places that didn’t overstimulate. we were on a mission for music, and the music provided!

the sphere is a technological anomaly. it is mind-blowing to me that all of the pieces continue to fall into place, night after night–the sound, the visuals, the ac, the plumbing, the security. it’s impossible to describe the experience. for a brief second on the first night, i thought of the veldt, a dystopian short story from ray bradbury about human failure in the face of technology. the minute the music started i forgot all about it.

for the first two nights we were up high, in the 400s, the vertigo seats. once you acclimate to the height and the grade, vertigo isn’t an issue at all–there’s no time for it! we were awash in some of the wildest and most realistic visuals i’ve ever seen on a screen, bathed in blue light to the soundtrack of some of the greatest and most exploratory music of all time.

i have so many questions–how do they coordinate the music with the visuals? does the music become less experimental? do they sacrifice jams? do they pre-plan jams? if the jams are predetermined, do they still count as jams? is this fun for them? do they enjoy staying in vegas? how many days a week do they rehearse? how many setlists do they already have panned out? are they tired? does it get old? who’s in charge of the visuals as they come? how many times do they rehearse a single show before playing it? woof.

all i know is that given the opportunity, i would do the whole thing again in a heartbeat. from the 400s, it was the best sound i’d ever heard. the second night was so evocative–i was lost in this train of thought that began with all of these feelings coming up, and i was thinking about that–the visuals really make you feel something. i was thinking about art, and the idea that art doesn’t have to mean anything if it makes you feel something. this wasn’t a concert, it was a work of art.

and the other half of my brain just kept repeating: this is so fun. there was no other word for it. it was so, so fun. you’re simply an observer. we got to experience it three nights in a row. i felt incredibly privileged, and lucky to be surrounded by people who only made the experience better.

the shows were incredible but what made them so was the journey of the whole thing–the walks to the sphere in 100º heat, the herding of our group to try and remain connected, the post-show recaps and the pre-show excitement, the getting-ready-rolling-joints-donning-glitter-choosing-outfits, the set break meat stick sharing. i can’t wait to remember little moments of this weekend in the years to come. i drove home yesterday feeling like i was in a dream.

and now we’re back to regular programming! except nothing about it is regular at all. it’s my last week of school, and my last week as a teacher for an indefinite period of time. there are a ton of emotions surrounding that, and i’m not feeling any of them the way i’d like to. i’m not in a good practice of feeling right now. that is how it is. everything is pragmatic, very black and white, and everything feels very urgent, as though there is simply no time to properly feel. i’ve set it up this way without intending to, because i’ve not been very intentional about things the past few months.

i’m relieved not to teach next fall, but i am also sad to see my kids move on. i got so lucky with my little class of seven. i have learned so much from them–arguably more than they’ve learned from me, and i will miss them tremendously as the months continue to pass. it’s scary to be on this precipice of the unknown–i have no idea where i’ll be living in nine months, no idea what job i’ll be working, no idea of much at all. but it’s scarier still to imagine remaining in carp and santa barbara, scarier to defer change. i’m trying to piece everything together, and i’m leaving a lot of it up to time.

by the time i sit down to write next monday i’ll be east. i wonder how it’ll feel. i hope i breathe deeply between now and then. times are short! thank you for reading if you have–this piece was nowhere near what i wanted it to be, but i’m at capacity for now. love you xxo r