When it's Over

It feels like yesterday.

I was just 19 when I made my debut on August 4^th, 2006. I remember I walked onto the field on a sweltering day in Chicago’s Grant Park, tens of thousands of people around me. This was the type of stuff you dream of when you’re a little kid in Indiana, making it here to the big city. 

People were in various states of undress, swimming in fountains, drinking beer. A group of guys huddled behind a tree with a shovel, unearthing drugs they had buried days before. A celebration of excess, debauchery and what it means to be young; a journey of self-discovery and very loud music.

I sheepishly walked up to a press tent and displayed a pitiful self-made pass. It read ‘The Booze News, Indiana University – Reporter.’ The guy shrugged his shoulders, gave me a wrist band and pointed me backstage. I sat there holding a Michelob Ultra, wearing a Phi Psi Cycling shirt grooving away to an afternoon of Umphrey’s McGee vibes and unlimited possibility. 

That’s why people go to music festivals of course, the potential. Who will you see? Who will you meet? Who will you be? Will you fall in love or make a connection? It was never about the music for me, I was there in pursuit of a story…a memory to carry around for the rest of my life. 

Every weekend was a subtle escape from the dregs of responsibility. For a few days, nothing else mattered but the people around you and the dreams of the day.

On one hand I never want it to end.

I like the chaos of it all, the thought that I am temporarily escaping to an alternate dimension where one’s only purpose is the pursuit of happiness. I like planning the outfits, staging the photos, even the long car ride to some forgotten civilization that will soon be overrun with angsty youths looking for something more.

I’ll never forget the afternoons in the snow, the days in the sun, the long walks back to camp or the nights that turned into mornings and everything in between. I met so many unbelievable people out there, did so many stupid things but I don’t think you can ever truly feel more free than when you’re dancing like no one’s watching even though they all are.

Last weekend was number 40 for me, a pedestrian number to some, though I can feel the wear and tear on the body at this point. Nearly a year’s worth of weekends spent trekking around fields, crashing in crowded AirBnBs and frantic packing come Monday morning. 

So many long trips home, regretting every decision I’d made, only to get that itch a few months later and to run it back one more time.

On Sunday I suited up for the last time. I hit the bottomless brunch in the morning and then stormed the park in my Hawaiian shirt for one last hurrah. I left it all out on the field. So now 12 years, one month and seven days after I first walked through those gates, it’s time to hang it up.

I’ll never forget the people I met, you made it all worth it. The places we saw, the things we did, the music we heard…it will fade like an old henna tattoo but it will always be a part of me. I felt love, I felts sadness, I felt hope, often all in the course of 48 hours, but most importantly I got to live my dream for 12 years. Many others around me were forced into early retirement but I got to play a kid’s game until 31 and that’s something I will always cherish.

The sun sets on this chapter. The women in their fur and boots begin the long walk down a trail of tears to an afterparty that ended hours ago. The molly is all worn off now, the juuls empty, the weekend over.

I don’t know what lies ahead for me, simply that at this particular bar the lights just went on and an old man shouted ‘last call.’ I don’t have to go home but I can’t stay here. Peace out music festivals, it’s been real…

For now at least, because you can never rule out a comeback.