Lone wolf all my life.
Tonight, after another rehearsal, I found myself thinking about something that has followed me through different chapters of my life—the feeling of being the odd person out.
I felt it in the office. I felt it in my own theatre group. And now, somehow, I feel it here too.
Everyone already seems to belong somewhere. The directors share years of friendship and history. The stage managers have their own bond. The set movers are a close-knit barkada fresh from senior high school. The cast, for the most part, has grown together through age, shared experiences, and last year's production.
And then there's me.
I came into this production wanting only one thing: to help create the best possible show for these kids. Yet lately, I have found myself wondering whether my presence matters at all. Suggestions are often left hanging. Questions that I believe are valid seem to disappear into the noise. Sometimes I speak and feel as though the words never quite land.
Maybe they don't need me. Maybe they never did.
Tomorrow is the tech run—the day before opening night. Part of me wishes I could quietly disappear from everyone's lives and spare myself the feeling of standing in a room where I don't quite fit.
The truth is, the show will go on. It always does. Rehearsals become performances, performances become memories, and people move on to the next production, the next project, the next chapter.
So tomorrow, I'll be there.
I'll sit behind a projector and operate the background visuals. A simple task, perhaps. One that most people will never notice unless something goes wrong. Yet maybe that has been the story of much of my life in theatre—not always at the center, not always heard, not always seen, but still showing up and doing what needs to be done.
Because the show is not about me.
It is about the young artists who have worked for months to get here.
And if my role in helping them shine is simply to press the right button at the right moment, then I will do it with the same care and commitment I would give any role I have ever played.
Still, I would be lying if I said it doesn't hurt sometimes.
The curtain will rise on Saturday. It will fall on Sunday. And when the final applause fades and the theatre empties, I will probably slip away the same way I arrived—quietly, without fanfare, without needing a farewell.
I have never been good at goodbyes anyway.
Perhaps I'll leave a short note. Perhaps I won't. Perhaps one day I'll simply stop showing up, and the story will continue without me, as stories always do.
For now, there is one more tech run, one more opening night, one more closing curtain.
And for a lone wolf, sometimes that is enough.
