Cara Delevingne. Nat Wolff. John Green. Sounds like the most magical group, right?
If you own a TV or a laptop, I'm sure you know what "Paper Towns" is. And if you don't, it's a book written by John Green, author of "The Fault In Our Stars."
If you haven't read the book, I would recommend it. It is one of my favorites. I read "Paper Towns" the summer of 2009. The book changed my perspective on everything. It just so happens that the summer of 2015, "Paper Towns" has been turned into a movie.
Green, the author, planned a tour called "The Get Lost, Get Found Tour." This tour visited three states, which were chosen solely on fan votes. All 50 states (and Washington, D.C) had a chance to bring the stars to their town. The final three chosen were Ohio, Texas and Indiana.
When I got news the tour was going to be just three hours away, I knew I had to take off work and make sure I was at the event. I texted one of my dearest friends, Emily, and hoped she was up for the adventure.
Once we figured out that we both wanted to go, I explained it to my mom, and she was also OK with it.
Next, I got ready to head over to Emily's. I was there as soon as she got off work, and we then did a little research. We found out wristbands would be distributed at 9 a.m., meaning we would have to be up by 5 a.m. to be in Indianapolis on time. We soon agreed, packed up our portable chargers and headed to bed.
Five a.m. rolled around early, but it was worth it. We (surprisingly) got up to our alarms, threw on our outfits and got on the road. (I don't do well with mornings, so this was a big deal.)
We got to Indianapolis after a three-hour drive and realized were easily within the first 100 people in line. So we sat. And napped against a steel fence. And sweated. And sat.
We talked to an event security guard (who was quite frankly LOVING all of the attention from the hundreds of teenage girls). He told me wristband distribution would be happening at 11 a.m. So we continued to sit and wait and sweat.
FINALLY, around 11:20 a.m., I started seeing 'Margo maps,' the red carpet being rolled out and blue wristbands being distributed by actual tour staff members in all black. It was finally becoming real! We shortly got our wristbands and continued to sit.
The sun was beating down on us. We checked the temperature and realized we were sitting in 90 degree weather! Emily walked a little out of the line to stand under a shady tree, I left my bag in our spot in line and joined her. We shortly saw one of the official staff members in all black coming up to us. We looked at each other, knowing we were about to be scolded for getting out of line. We had already been up for eight hours and were not in the mood for any kind of confrontation.
Instead of yelling at us, the staff member asked us if we had any questions for the cast. Without really thinking about it, Emily and I looked at each other and excitedly exclaimed said, "YEAH!" The staff member then ushered us to the front of the line and told us to tell the security guard to take us to the VIP section, so we did.
We were the first people to enter the auditorium.
Soon enough, Nat and Alex Wolff took the stage. (You may remember them as The Naked Brothers Band; unfortunately, they were clothed.) They sang three original acoustic songs, two of which were from the movie, written by Nat.
The mayor of Indiana, Greg Ballard, then took the stage to congratulate Green on all of his success. Ballard named July 14, 2015 as John Green Day in the state of Indiana!
Soon after, we were given a little speech about how we had to put our cell phones away because they had a little surprise for us. We got to watch not one, not two, but 19 minutes of the movie! Seeing as I had read the book so long ago, I was SO excited for this screening. I quickly put my phone away and squealed with the rest of the audience.
Once the screening was over, the cast came on and answered our questions, joked around with each other, tried on Colts jerseys from the fans, and basically just stood on stage being their beautiful selves.
I am SO happy I was able to experience the amazing, perfect Get Lost Get Found Tour with one of my favorite people, and I am so happy it came to our amazing city of Indianapolis!
If you haven't seen "Paper Towns" yet (it hit theaters July 24), I would highly recommend it. Remember, "you have to get lost before you find yourself."
