The last day of a conference is always a bittersweet experience.
On the one hand everyone is happy to have gone through such a positive and cathartic experience – an entire week of heightened reality, with everyone representing what they have been doing for the past yea, entire months of preparation going into single twenty minute presentations. In some sense everybody – for one week – becomes an embodiment, a sort of living avatar, of what they have been doing for the previous year, as everything comes together in one intense apotheosis, an affirmation of why we do what we do.
On the other hand the last day has an elegaic quality. Old friends, people who matter to us both personally and symbolically, will soon be going home, perhaps in just another few short hours. It will be another year until we all gradually build again toward such a crescendo of concentrated energy. We hug, we say goodbye, we promise not to wait an entire year to keep in touch.
And now each of us will recalibrate, will renew our own vows to our chosen profession. In the coming year there will be new mountains to climb, entirely new challenges to throw ourselves into.
But first, it would probably be a good idea to get a little sleep.