Thoughts from day one:

The CTV crew set up to interview me right at 3pm, and this threw me off. I hadn’t predicted them being there. In hindsight, maybe I should have ignored them or asked them to come back after 4:30 so as not to take up any time of the actual happening. I’m not sure.

No one could build a “house” in 70km/hr winds, obviously. It didn’t seem like there was any real competition to do so, either. People just made an attempt for a while, stopped, tried again, and then left. There wasn’t any real opportunity to award anyone a free sign, of if there was, I missed it.

I’d brought a ladder as a prop, knowing that with the wind we wouldn’t need to use it. One of the best parts of the event was Mike sitting on it, holding a sign — that was a great performance.

Kids! I hadn’t really anticipated how having kids present would drastically affect the feeling/tone of the event. In some ways it was great having them there — they helped maintain a level of energy for building a house of cards despite the fact that it was clearly pointless. In other ways, though, it made the event feel more like a family event than I’d predicted it would be. There isn’t anything wrong with that per se, and in fact kids are a big part of why I’m doing what I’m doing. At the same time, it felt a bit like the adults were there to help the kids do an activity that was solely for their entertainment, and that’s just different from how I’d imagined things would feel.

Another way to put it is this: kids are used to doing things that may appear silly or pointless to grown-ups; to them, it’s fun and games. In a way, this was great, but in another way, I’d wanted the struggle we were going through to be serious at the same time as it was ridiculous, and I don’t feel like that came through. Maybe it did for others though.

I’m questioning what my position should be at an event like this. Should I have persisted on trying to build a house of cards alone instead of mostly with others? Should I have acted more theatrically? It was hard to know what my role was or how I should act, and I was aware of this through the event, which felt awkward. Then again, this is a new medium for me, so I guess it makes sense that I don’t feel confident about what I’m doing.

You know, thinking about it now, it actually felt like it didn’t matter what I was doing. People there were busy doing their own thing, and that was entirely fine. Great, actually. I wasn’t the happening, the participants were.

I had a number of brief exchanges with participants. People noted the metaphor of what we were trying to do… building a “house” despite the extreme challenges the environment around us (the weather) presented. I think one of the best moments was when one little boy said “we built it once, we can build it again!” after the wind collapsed a “house” we’d spent time building. Later he said “we can do this if we work together!” What a great attitude, dude!

I was too busy trying to build a house of cards (and running after signs) to really see if there were any passersby who stopped to ask about what was happening, but my guess is that there weren’t. It was a bit too blustery for many people to be out, and it was also many people’s Thanksgiving. So, it really felt like “my people” came out but no one else, and while I’m entirely grateful that they were there, I’ll have to think about how to change this for the next time if I want to attract the “unconverted.”

I didn’t get the chance to talk to anyone who was there to argue.

On the other hand, at least we were subjected to any violence.

Another EnviroCollective board member suggested that I hold upcoming happenings/performances in different locations, and I think that’s a great idea. I’ll try to pick places where there would be more people walking by. Perhaps I’ll set up in front of City Hall next time, and maybe on Friday afternoon when there’s more foot traffic. I just need to finalize what I’ll actually be doing …

We’ll see if things are any different tomorrow, and what else I can learn from this experience.

Again, I’m grateful to all the people who took time out of their Thanksgiving Sunday (including Risa), and I’m also grateful to Esperanza for playing the role of documentarian.