Chains outside the beautiful stone wall. A man stands at the door greeting passersby. As the masses enter they tie their masks around their faces. Only a lonely few step inside faceless. These lonesome few try to keep their heads from falling off their shoulders all the while they are pierced with judgmental glares from the corners of masqueraded eyes.
Inside the laser light show blinds any sense of true vision that may remain from the outside world. Neon signs flash in all corners, blaring propaganda of positivity in the faces of guests and members alike. The music, when not blaring overproduced self-indulgent praises, is set on turning any and all frowns upside down. No one frowns, unless of course they are a part of the charade. In fact, frowning is all but forbidden within the old wooden doors of the open gymnasium/chapel.
As the crowd settles in and the applause dies down the people adjust their masks and rush to their invisibly assigned seats. The older middle age man fake jogs onto the stage and makes a poorly timed joke and the crowd laughs on cue. The onlookers quickly quiet down and he says a few more words as the onlookers bow their heads. The tattered leather jacket of a giant antique of a book sits on a podium in front of him. Not once in the presenter's forty-five minute motivational speech does he even open the book. Instead, he refers regularly to trendy slides designed by a struggling or aspiring (it's hard to tell the difference sometimes) graphic designer and urges the crowd to follow along with him on their smartphones. The book on his podium is more like a visual sound block that the speaker strikes vigorously like a judge with his gavel, only this man does so emphatically spewing rhetoric to rile up the crowd rather than calm them down (if only to ignite their nerves inside).
