Raise a glass
What do I even say about the magic that occurred on Sunday evening? I was so caught up in the logistics –family and friends coming in from out of town, making sure everyone’s tickets were squared away, that they knew how to get to the after-party – I hadn’t given much thought to the main event.
That was admittedly on purpose though. One of my favorite coping mechanisms is to focus on what I can control so I don’t dwell on what I can’t. Specifically, the emotional roller coaster of Miguel’s last show and wanting the evening to be perfect for him, for us, and for everyone who was in the theater that night.
A couple of weeks ago I tried to think about how I’d felt during the final performance of Hamilton in Chicago. However, since that occurred less than two months after Adelaide died, if not for photos I don’t know that I would remember much of it at all. We also knew that Miguel would be performing in the role again on Broadway. It felt less final because it was.
Before we even sat in our seats at the Richard Rogers Theater on Sunday, I had already cried three times that day - which is weird for me. Since coming out of my darkest grief years, I don’t cry much. I still feel all the emotions but my tear ejector button, once so sensitive I simply needed to breathe in its direction, now requires a solid jump-kick to get going. Apparently, not Sunday though!
Miguel kicked off my tears when he broke down before leaving our home to go to the theater. Then my bestie from Chicago surprised me in my bedroom after telling me for months she wasn’t going to be able to make the performance. Sneaky bitch, she knows I hate surprises. By the time my eyes sprung a leak for the third time, when Miguel gave a speech backstage and dedicated the performance to Adelaide, I understood this was the emotional wave we would be riding today and honestly, it felt good.
I did NOT cry during Miguel’s nearly minute-long standing ovation when he first entered the stage. I did, however, scream my head off. Not that anyone would have been able to pick me out specifically, the roar from the crowd was deafening.
I made a promise to myself to stay present during the show, to enjoy it as if it was my first time. I couldn’t hold back the flashbacks though. During Yorktown, I was transported to Tavern on the Green, where Hamilton held its 2016 Tony party. Miguel had just begun rehearsals to join the Broadway company as the Hamilton alternate, but he hadn’t been announced yet and no one knew why we were there. Which was equally fun and bizarre.
It was a gorgeous June night and there were TV’s set up all over the patio where the cast, crew, and guests not performing were buzzing about. As we watched the dancers thrill the audience with a performance of Yorktown (sans guns out of respect for the Pulse nightclub shooting that had tragically occurred the night before), Miguel began to cry with the realization that in just a few weeks he would be up there, standing on an apple box, leading the cast in yelling, “we won, we won, we won!”. Our world had indeed turned upside down.
When the first notes of Theodosia twinkled up from the pit, I had to swallow my heart back into my chest. Folks always ask how Miguel performed Quiet Uptown every night (he’s an actor, it was his job, Hamilton loses his kid each night, not Miguel). But it is Dear Theodosia that has always challenged me. It is a moment in the show filled with so much hope and love. A lullaby for their children and all they will have the opportunity to accomplish.
Except Theodosia would die at 29 and Philip at 19. That song with all its hope, mirrors the hope we had in the early days with Adelaide. Hope and dreams for a life that would not come to fruition – or at least not in the way we imagined. I reached for Jackson’s hand, and he leaned in close to me. An action he repeated unbidden during Quiet Uptown – though this time I caught him crying as well. God, he’s the best.
The last line Hamilton says in the show is, “Raise a glass to freedom.” Miguel choked it out after a weighted pause. I’ll spare you a dramaturgical exegesis of that moment in the play, but I can’t help but think about the freedom Hamilton afforded our family. Or the freedom Miguel would now feel being released from the strict Broadway schedule.
I don’t know that we will ever fully grasp the impact Hamilton had on our lives. The doors opened, security afforded, and life eased - like Mary Poppins floating in on an umbrella helping us when we needed her most and then moving on once we were stable.
By the time Miguel took his final bow, I was praying to the makeup gods that my waterproof mascara was holding up. And then Mike Moise, the music director, handed Miguel a laminated picture of a ladybug and I’m not sure I could have told you my name if you had asked me at that moment. Hiding behind my hands, ugly crying, I was transported once again, this time back to the fall of 2015.
It was the first time Miguel and I saw Hamilton, months before we knew the role the show would play in our lives. I was eight months pregnant with Adelaide and could feel her moving inside me throughout the show. Adelaide may have only been physically with us for four years, but she has been with us every step of the way these last eight years.
Sunday night was no exception.
ID: Miguel on stage in his black Hamilton costume, crying with a clenched mouth holding a laminated picture of a ladybug on a stick. His castmates are behind him slapping the stage in his honor.
