But for now it’s between green and gray

My summer is over. So crazy! So scary! But so good at the same time.

My summer was wonderful. I truly enjoyed every moment of it and learned a lot about myself and others and things of that nature. I don’t miss the summer, however. There are some things I wish had gone differently, and I’ve had more than my fair share of living in a van and out of a suitcase, and I’m ready to move on.

It was weird going back to ENC for a night after debriefing and realizing that I wouldn’t be staying there for the upcoming year, moving into my new room and whatnot. Very strange. I cried.

The facilities at ENC are not what draw me to it - definitely not. The music rooms aren’t soundproofed, the pianos always need to be tuned, Munro is a firepit without air conditioning, the heat is always sketchy, as is the hot water. But the people draw me there. The community draws me there. And it was weird for me to go back to ENC and realize that not only am I not returning – most of my friends aren’t either. The class of ‘09 is exactly that – the class of ‘09. Past, not present. And now we face real life with loans and jobs and bills and new and old relationships. College was wonderful, but I am looking forward to life being wonderful. I know it will be hard – I need a job, I need an apartment – but I’m excited to enter the workforce and I’m excited to make new friends and keep the good old ones. I hope to travel frequently. And I’m excited to see  my relationship with Andrew continue to grow. I’m also picking my guitar back up again after four years of neglecting it.

So I will miss the Chamber Singers and A Cappella Choir. I will miss traveling in a van every summer, and going to a new country every other January. I will miss the classes that challenged me and the classes that I could breeze by in. I will miss the community, and I will miss the fellowship at mealtimes with my friends who became my family over the four years I was in college. I will miss decorating my room and chatting with my roommate every night before we fall asleep. I will miss being challenged in my beliefs and ways of thinking. I will miss growing spiritually and academically with my peers.

But I look forward to the green and gray of life – because I know great things will come from it.

I’m in a room full of people, hanging on one person’s breath.
We would all vote him most likely to be loved to death.
I hope he still wants it, but it might remind him of when
He aimed for the bull’s eye and hit it nine times out of ten.
That one time his hand slipped, and I saw the dart sail away.
I don’t know where it landed, but I’m guessing between green and gray.
Well, I thought nothing of it, but it still haunts him like a ghost,
With all eyes upon him, except two that matter the most.

He says “Green is the color everyone sees all around me.
Gray is the color I see around her, and she’s just a blur.”
The more the crowd cheers, the less I can hear and they don’t really care what I play.
It might be for her. But for now it’s between green and gray.

We paid and we cheered, now we’re gone and to us that feels right.
But for him, every one of those evenings turns into a night
With another hotel room where he lays awake to pretend
that he’s doing fine with his notebook and discman for friends.

He says “Green is the color everyone sees all around me.
Gray is the color I see around her, and she’s just a blur.”
Night after night what I hear, what I write fills the room and my head starts to sway.
It might be for her, but for now it’s between green and gray.

I want you to love me, he whispers, unable to speak
And he wonders aloud why feelings so strong make the body so weak.
Then he awoke. Now he’s scared to death somebody heard.
If it was you, and you know her, please don’t say a word.

~ “Green and Gray” by Nickel Creek