We left Lyon for Annecy in the morning. It’s actual, well-done, Instagram meat. It’s what Disneyland wants to be but can’t. Sitting on a lake, shadowed by mountains, and overlooked by a castle, Annecy is absolutely stunning. To enjoy a percentage of its glories is a feat of strength, for its sheer dominance ignores human eyes. Unlike the east coast of the US, nature will always trump man.

After Annecy, we drove to Chamonix, the little town of Mont Blanc. While on the way, we watched the sudden spring of mountains. We each pressed our phones against the wall while pointing out every waterfall—many of which were more of a drool. Doreen, after my impassioned zeal for one of those small trickles of water, commented that I have never been to Iceland.

I was continually disappointed by my photos. Each was this milquetoast reflection through a lens that couldn’t capture the spectacle. Yet, in some ways, that’s part of their beauty. They will always be exclusive to real eyes. Nothing can realize their grandiosity and mein; they are forever constrained to actuality.

Having been eternally trapped in my own mind, to see something which may surpass understanding is an experience within itself. I can only look. If I were to travel the mountain to touch it, I would still not comprehend its power. Yet if I were able to hold the earth in my hands, I would only glide over it; it would feel completely smooth. These impartial beings are somehow so infinitely changeful to the human mind, but are so inconsequential in the span of the broader universe. How small really am I?

And then there’s the snow. Yes, I understand that it’s just science, but to the Long Island mind, untrained by terrain that exceeds ‘flat,’ it’s a miracle that the snow of winter can coexist in the depth of a summer. The benign entity sits with a diadem of frozen glaciers, overlooking its kingdom. It reminds you that there was an antecedent before you—that you’ve only been here for a second of the year which created this converging vessel.

Mont Blanc is unmoving. I liked the way Percy Shelley put it; it entirely encapsulates my feelings. “It contains still and solemn power of many sights, and many sounds, and much of life and death.”

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Finally, our final concert began. Amidst the backdrop of the French Alps, we played on. Emotions were high. I felt, as if, suddenly, the lyrics of “Wildflowers” and “Bridge Over Troubled Water” were realized. I witnessed many tears as the choir left to sit. We sat, lamenting upon the last time we sang together. For many of the graduated-seniors, lucidity came about us, for we understood that this was our final destination of our formative years; we have aged out. We reveried on the friends we lost and will continue to lose as life funnels out. We reveried on the friends we still have and will continue to keep—those that are gold out of the pan of falling sand.

The orchestra finished and we had our final song and photo. What a blast.