As months and shows come to pass here at CLOC, this delusional way of life sets further into our psyche and habits. What at first seemed like an impossibly hectic schedule has become second nature to us. The friends we've made within the confines of this company have effortlessly become as close to us as those friends we've known exponentially longer. I think that by condensing a process that most of us know to take many more days than what we're given here makes the reality created here consume us far quicker and with an increased emotional intensity unmatched by any I've been a part of. We find ourselves receding deeper and deeper into the realm of CLOCadoon, a mysterious land that exists only for 9 shows, because trying to handle the facts of the real world on top of the stressors here feels impossible in the moment.
But reality has a strange way of rearing its head even in the recluse of CLOCadoon. It's funny how it works. I'm thinking about how much I wish I had a coffeemaker here and then I think about having one in my apartment next year, apartment with no furnishing, classes I need books for, friends who think I am dead...And down comes the carefully built Jenga tower protecting my fictional reality here. CLOC is just a summer and when I get out of here, I'm back in my real life, the life I've been utterly neglecting here in favor of emotional stability.
As the Jenga facade crumbles, one starts to question the newly exposed fantastical reality. The rosy colored CLOC glasses get removed, I don my all too real jade specs and objectively look at CLOCadoon as one would a travel brochure. I see me being unmistakably myself and being friends with people who are really and truly friends I value outside and inside of fictional lands.
I feel confronted with the fact that CLOCadoon will disappear into the mist and fog but the lessons I've learned and the people I've become close to will always be a part of my real world.
Every chapter of life, place you've lived, school you've been to, is its own mysterious land that arises only for a certain period of time. It will disappear and the people involved might fade with it but what matters is that it happened and served to change you and your 'real world'.
