The final grueling days of Tech Week are in progress, and the stress of working with lights and costumes is making the past two-and-a-half months of demanding rehearsals seem easy. At this point, my drained body has barely enough energy to parrot lines. Out of pity and guilt, especially because it has been sleep-deprived, I allow it unlimited quantities of carbohydrates, sugar and dairy whenever I want it. With full certainty, I know that once the play "Lights Out," showcased at the University of Pennsylvania, has completed its run, my burgeoning waistline will be my next source of angst. The order at the moment, however, is to prepare for a magnificent performance, bribe the whining body and, afterwards, confront my growing gut.
Even though I will be relieved once this consuming show is finished, I have become so accustomed to its daily presence in my life that I know I will miss it. Since January, it has become more than a string of rehearsals for a play about rape and the bystander effect. It has become a more personal, emotional experience about gradually becoming comfortable with a group of people until you can experiment freely with and in front of them. It has been about the coffee breaks during which we all could complain about rehearsal performance or life more generally. It has been about costume changes, laughter fits, awkwardly forgetful pauses, communal analysis, nitpicky assistant directors, constructive - and playfully destructive - criticism, backstage discussions and much more.\nBefore I become tearful, I realize that wherever people go, they create their own special niches because all that is required are vivid experiences and engaging interactions. Maybe that is simplifying it too much, but those are really the essential and basic requirements. When I first arrived in Philadelphia, I accepted - yet still worried - how I would spend this entire semester without familiar surroundings or people. I thought my life would only occur between the points where I lived, 4618 Hazel Avenue and where I studied, Penn. I miscalculated the range of possibilities that transpires between two points and how satisfying it would be.
Even now, as I lay in my too-soft Murphy bed writing this article, I can hear every sound in this gracefully aging Victorian house, and I feel nostalgic.
Gabriel and Karin, my renters and surrogate parents, are getting ready for classes and work. Gabriel is probably red-eyed and glued to his Mac, looking like Sinbad from under his hoodie and inhaling cups of tea. Karin's probably in her physical therapist's uniform, clearing up the kitchen while effortlessly lugging around her pregnant belly - meanwhile, I'm constantly in fear that she's about to go into labor. Across the hall, my other tenant-companion, the fierce and energetic tiny South Indian, Sahana, is usually up by this time, rapidly chattering away on Skype to her family back home. Often our similar cultural backgrounds will find a way to pull us together from our erratic schedules to discuss Bollywood films, pine for tropical weather or criticize the South Asian food in the United States.
I am wistful because all of this will soon end. The people who have become my own and the experiences we have had will be in the past. Sure, we can find a way to connect beyond time with technology, memories and will - but we can never find a way to relive it once again.
And like all of life's little eras, this one will soon end, and all I can do is open my arms to embrace the next one.
Tanzima's column runs biweekly Fridays. She can be reached at t.chowdhury@cavailerdaily.com.
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