If someone told me a few years ago that this is where I would be now, I wouldn't have believed them. I'm currently sitting in my bed fresh from my very last Zoom call as an undergraduate. Three months ago, I had never even heard of Zoom. My eyes are raw from the tears. My heart feels so full, yet completely empty at the same time. I wanted to somehow document this moment. This sensation. I have never felt fear, hope, uncertainty, and painful yet blissful anticipation all at once before. As I look through a blurred vision at my senior class and professors who made me who I am today, I can now say goodbye. Even if it is behind a smeared laptop screen with crumbs sprinkled across the keyboard, it was exactly what I needed.

This is hard. I am thankful for the mute option so that I can hide my loud snotty weeps. I'm sitting here in my graduation cap alone while I raise my glass to my senior class of eleven musical theatre majors. To our memories. To our challenges. To our growth. Some people are drinking wine, others are drinking straight rum. Voices are shaky. It's so difficult because sometimes during this hour I am crying because of how sad it is to say goodbye to the most magnificent four years of my life. Sometimes I cry because I am accepting that I am closing a wonderful chapter of my life, and other times I cry because I am thinking about how absolutely shitty the whole situation is. I'm looking at my friends who've become a family to me behind a screen while they're scattered across the country trying not to become a victim of a global virus. I mean seriously, what the f*ck? Aside from the tears of disappointment, disbelief, and outrage, the final zoom was beautiful. I needed the closure, in person or not. It's something that I've been brushing aside for months. I tried to push myself away from the sentimentality of it all because I thought what's the point? So many celebrations and traditions have been taken from me, but I begin to think to myself and realize that I am so thankful that today I got to release the anger and find the joy with the most special eleven people one last time. I finally have a revelation.

This pandemic has been absolutely brutal, but it doesn't mean that I should not validate my success. I've been grieving for weeks alongside the rest of the world. Today I stopped grieving. I let something go within me that I didn't even realize I was hanging onto. I felt absolute love in my soul because the people behind that dirty screen have given me the most incredible gift anyone could ever wish for. They gave me exhilaration. They gave me support and intoxicating laughter. There isn't a virus big enough to take that away from me. The past four years have been something of a dream. Right now, the world is a mess, but that doesn't swipe away every special memory I've made. Sure, I won't get to shake some university official's hand in an arena full of hundreds of strangers. Maybe my move to the city of my dreams will have to be postponed a few months. It. Doesn't. Matter. The relationships I have made are stronger than a stay at home order. What's happening in the world right now can never touch my past. I am graduating Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Musical Theatre surrounded by wildly talented and dazzling people, dammit! This discovery was long overdue.

This article might not make any sense to you. I realize that it's very personal, but I think the lesson I discovered today is somehow translatable. At least, I hope it is. The world is madness and my plans, as well as many others, have been shattered into a million pieces. YES! It really is awful, but holding onto the precious things we take for granted will get us through this. Professors, parents, and even celebrities have tried to pound this message into my brain for months, but it took my own breakthrough for me to really understand what they were saying. I will forever remember this day. Staring back at the tear-stained smiling faces of my brilliant friends and colleagues changed something in me today. Without them, who knows where my mind would be? All I know now is this: It's not forever, it's just a pause. It's just an intermission, and the first act was outstanding, so I can't wait to see what happens in the second act. The show must go on, and it will.