a tribute to my favorite place, now gone
the urge died along with the collapse.
not a literal collapse, but it almost feels like it might as well have been one. i havent seen it with my own eyes, but i know it still stands there. a hollow shell. the outside is misleading. it looks just as it used to, but there are no more sporadic lit windows clashing with the light polluted sky. no sound. silence, where there used to be laughter, and music, the stomping of tall clunky boots, metal accessories chiming against themselves. i can imagine the rooms all empty, the chairs with no more occupants. it has probably flooded by now. the magic suddenly sucked away, and with no good reason. no explanation, nothing. only the faint ringing that persists in my ears.
the minute that i found this place, i knew that it would belong to me. some of my friends enjoyed it there, a couple of them hated it. but i knew it meant something different to me than it ever could have meant to them. im an atheist, i struggle to dedicate myself to anything spiritual. but i really feel as though my soul belonged there. i felt truly free. i felt a sense of belonging that i could never find anywhere else. it was more than dancing, or listening to good music, meeting unique people. it was feeling like i know who i truly am. it was feeling beautiful. it was feeling so connected to a time in history that i will never get to experience. it was raw and human and incredible. it was my youth.
i am so glad that i got my final night on that dance floor. i tried, i tried as hard as i possibly could to soak in every detail. i recorded a voice memo in my pocket the entire night. i just wanted to live in that moment for an eternity. i had hoped that it would not be the last night, but deep down i must have known.
i thought i would have this place forever, what a tragedy and a heartbreak to know that i will never step foot in there again. there were so many nights i missed out on, naively imagining it would always be there. i had heard cautionary tales, "carpe noctem"... seize the night. dont let these times pass you by, because at any moment without a second of notice, this magic can be taken away from the world. and it was.
no matter how much time passes, i will never forget my special place, and the magic that i felt within those walls <3 it will live on in my memory, and my pictures, and my voice memos for as long as i can hold them.