It's Almost Over
Everything comes to an end. So it is fitting that that end come to the tune of music. Music speaks to us. It helps us communicate, both with others and ourselves. The complex interplay of emotions and melodies can help us see new sides of ourselves, and release feelings long pent up. Many creation myths posit that reality began with a song. Whatever the real beginning of existence, this may not be far off, whether the song be the thrumming of matter and antimatter as it speeds in all directions from where it had seconds before been an infinitely small clump of matter or the purest songs of the angels in praise of God. Certainly, a song makes for a plausible creative tool for whatever force molded our universe. The prevalence of music in just that small corner of it that we percieve seems to add credibility to plausibility. There are songs of beginning and songs of ending. Songs of opening and songs of closing. Songs of happiness and songs of joy. Songs of anger and songs of triumph and songs that don't even know what emotion they invoke.
I myself get lost in music. I let myself get carried away within it. The right song can make me happy, or sad, or angry, or calm. This doesn't work terribly well with music too discordant with my mood, but a wide enough array of tunes works wonders. But I digress. Let us go back to the subject of endings.
This conference, Creating Change 2006, is ending. In the next twelve hours, it will be over. Those who travelled here from all corners of the United States will go back to whence they came, or in some cases will continue on their journey to wherever they are to alight next. Tonight, the goings-on ended with a party, for the myriad youth who had attended the conference. It was interesting. With the exception of a couple of songs, it was all good. The lighting was wonderful. A perfect variety of patterns and colours, changing every now and then so as not to get repetitive. I sat for several minutes and watched the ceiling, which seemed to pulse with the music as if a living thing. The cause, of course, was a series of flashes of near-total darkness, where all the main lights were turned off for an instant. This was imperceptible to the human eye when one looked at the dance floor, because the immediate shift to a new colour of light made the eye completely forget about the blackness. It was visible only in two ways that I could tell: either you saw the ceiling pulse and comprehended why or you were sitting further out and could notice the flashes of black (don't ask me exactly why that is. I'm no lighting technician. As for the pulsing, darkness makes things seem smaller. Whenever the darkness flashed, the room seemed smaller for an instant. If I'm wrong, please correct me.)
I guess it's also fitting that I wasn't really partipating for the first hour or so. I sat outside, watching the people dance. Watching old friends and new friends comingle. I eventually joined in, of course, and it was fun. It wasn't as fun as I'd have liked it to be, but it was decently fun anyhow. It'd have been better if I had someone to dance with. I did for a moment, here and there, but such is the nature of the dance floor that groups of friends oft get dispersed unless they have a driving reason to stick together. Like love. There were a few couples on the dance floor, celebrating the closing of this meeting together and only together. Naturally, my eye caught most on the lesbians. Meh. I'll not go into that. It'll only make me feel lonely again.
So thus it was with music and comraderie amongst the youth of the GLBT community that the Saturday of the conference drew to a close. Meanwhile, I stood awkwardly around the edge while my muse narrated into my brain much of that which I have here written. I would really feel better in the middle, without her narrating to me so immediately, but rather telling the LiveJournal database the whole story from scratch later on so that others might peruse it if they see fit. Such is my lot in life, I guess. Perhaps it will change when I get estrogen in my body and grow breasts and all that. Perhaps I will feel bolder, more confidant. Perhaps not. I would feel better, anyway.
I'm dying for some sort of social interaction. I'll probably go and talk to those friends I came here with, since everybody else seems to either be asleep or busy. I guess that is to be expected at two in the morning. The lobby is still full of people, but many of them I don't know and the rest I don't feel like talking to. All of the ones I did feel like interacting with have left the public area and I don't know if anything is currently going on in any hotel rooms.
I guess I'll sign off here. To those of you who have left comments recently, I promise to say something back to you when I get home, which will be tomorrow in the early evening.
I myself get lost in music. I let myself get carried away within it. The right song can make me happy, or sad, or angry, or calm. This doesn't work terribly well with music too discordant with my mood, but a wide enough array of tunes works wonders. But I digress. Let us go back to the subject of endings.
This conference, Creating Change 2006, is ending. In the next twelve hours, it will be over. Those who travelled here from all corners of the United States will go back to whence they came, or in some cases will continue on their journey to wherever they are to alight next. Tonight, the goings-on ended with a party, for the myriad youth who had attended the conference. It was interesting. With the exception of a couple of songs, it was all good. The lighting was wonderful. A perfect variety of patterns and colours, changing every now and then so as not to get repetitive. I sat for several minutes and watched the ceiling, which seemed to pulse with the music as if a living thing. The cause, of course, was a series of flashes of near-total darkness, where all the main lights were turned off for an instant. This was imperceptible to the human eye when one looked at the dance floor, because the immediate shift to a new colour of light made the eye completely forget about the blackness. It was visible only in two ways that I could tell: either you saw the ceiling pulse and comprehended why or you were sitting further out and could notice the flashes of black (don't ask me exactly why that is. I'm no lighting technician. As for the pulsing, darkness makes things seem smaller. Whenever the darkness flashed, the room seemed smaller for an instant. If I'm wrong, please correct me.)
I guess it's also fitting that I wasn't really partipating for the first hour or so. I sat outside, watching the people dance. Watching old friends and new friends comingle. I eventually joined in, of course, and it was fun. It wasn't as fun as I'd have liked it to be, but it was decently fun anyhow. It'd have been better if I had someone to dance with. I did for a moment, here and there, but such is the nature of the dance floor that groups of friends oft get dispersed unless they have a driving reason to stick together. Like love. There were a few couples on the dance floor, celebrating the closing of this meeting together and only together. Naturally, my eye caught most on the lesbians. Meh. I'll not go into that. It'll only make me feel lonely again.
So thus it was with music and comraderie amongst the youth of the GLBT community that the Saturday of the conference drew to a close. Meanwhile, I stood awkwardly around the edge while my muse narrated into my brain much of that which I have here written. I would really feel better in the middle, without her narrating to me so immediately, but rather telling the LiveJournal database the whole story from scratch later on so that others might peruse it if they see fit. Such is my lot in life, I guess. Perhaps it will change when I get estrogen in my body and grow breasts and all that. Perhaps I will feel bolder, more confidant. Perhaps not. I would feel better, anyway.
I'm dying for some sort of social interaction. I'll probably go and talk to those friends I came here with, since everybody else seems to either be asleep or busy. I guess that is to be expected at two in the morning. The lobby is still full of people, but many of them I don't know and the rest I don't feel like talking to. All of the ones I did feel like interacting with have left the public area and I don't know if anything is currently going on in any hotel rooms.
I guess I'll sign off here. To those of you who have left comments recently, I promise to say something back to you when I get home, which will be tomorrow in the early evening.