Leaving Elysium
A deeply impactful piece of art will change you, and the way you experience the world. I’d bet such a piece of art doesn’t come around more than once a decade for most people. Disco Elysium altered (improved) my ability to appreciate my own life.
I’m leaving Denver soon, possibly for good1. Coincidentally, recently The Church nightclub transferred ownership.2 It’s a nightclub that’s a converted old church, and the basement hosted the Sunday Goth Night in Denver for many years. They haven’t been hosting them since covid, but there was one final Goth Night last Sunday to commemorate the passing of an era before the property changed hands. A lot of people came out that I see every week. A lot of people came out that I hadn’t seen in years.
As I’m dancing in the red lights, lasers spinning. Everywhere I look there are lives I know bumping up against each other. I see flares of loves, all the little dramas and heartbreaks and wars and friendships. I see people who hated each other sharing a dance floor. I see people who once were gone for many months to fight cancer. I see a couple that were broken up last time I saw them, now obviously back together to some degree. It's so petty and small, but also so turbulent and rich. Everyone here is so broken and healed and beautiful, trying to set aside life for a few hours to touch transcendance.
I have only the smallest pinhole view on these lives. We talk sometimes, and I’ll get a portal into a deep part of someone’s life. A view very few will ever get into something anguished or exultant. But it’s limited. It’s a deep borehole that picks out one little detail in a life as vast as the sky. I feel like I’m in my own Disco Elysium. Each person is a story of unfathomable depths, and I only get one hologram shard. But the pieces are all around me, a field of burning pinprick stars strewn across deepest void. The little parts sparkle with blinding flashes. It’s beautiful. I understand the Disco Elysium narrative more now, on a level closer to my soul. I hear the Psyche notification sound in my mind as I look from one person to the next.
I didn’t know I was doing this, over the years. I thought I was just dancing, chatting with people between songs, sometimes hanging out and being buffeted by some drama. I didn’t realize I was building a tapestry of flashes. A cathedral of moments. These are a different type of connection. None of them is a deep, intense connection with a person. They are all shallow, to different degrees. But in aggregate, they make up a massive web of connection to a bizarre, half-light community. I did not know this could happen.
I realize now that I’m not just leaving behind a dance venue and a few friends. I’m leaving behind a project built up of souls. It will be forever unfinished, if I don’t return. And yes, I can start over in a new city. But I am realizing more each day that I will not live forever. I won’t even live that much longer. Any new cathedral that I start to work on will forever be a decade stunted, years behind what it would have been if I’d stayed in one place.
This moment is an amazing one, I’m happy I could put it in the timestream. And I’m happy I’ve learned this sort of thing is possible. It’s so worth it. I spent so much of my life trying to avoid attachment, and even here it snuck up on me, and it turns out it’s actually wonderful. Even when it hurts.
I won’t know until next year
or management, I don’t know the details, lots of rumors in the air
The dearth of comments doesn't mean people didn't appreciate this post. It's so "perfect" that commenting on it seems like throwing mud on a diamond.
But I'll do it anyway.
I fear I've missed out on something because of some knowledge I lacked. I've been at events similar to the one in your photo, many times. In college I was desperate to connect with the exciting college night life, and spent--I would say wasted--hundreds of nights out at, or throwing, parties of all kinds. I rushed a fraternity and helped throw some of the most-notorious parties in Buffalo. And I never made any lasting connections during a party. While planning a party, yes; while actually dancing / shouting / elbowing thru a crowd, no.
The photo you've taken looks like the kind of party I hated most: the dance party with bad lighting and, I presume, painfully loud music you can feel in your body. I never understood why anyone wanted to go to these. It was impossible to say a word to anyone. I'd have to lean into their ear and shout the same thing 2 or 3 times before they could figure out what I was saying. It seemed to me that the entire purpose of these events was to eliminate speech and force people to interact like animals during mating season, all body language.
Am I mistaken? I never saw a party or a night club with both dancing and funky lighting that didn't have music playing so loudly that conversation was impossible. Was this different, or is there some non-sexual way of interacting with people at these parties that I never discovered?