Addicted to Bad Ideas: Punk-Metal-Rap-Ska Music Shows

Time: Tuesday Morning


There are tiny, intense bruises on my knees and elbows. My hearing is still iffy.

I can still feel the crowd's moshing, dancing and pushing, the way the ocean still moves you even after you've gotten out of the water. I can still see the crowd: folks making a space in the center of the dance floor to let couples kick-dance a demented carnival homba. When the Inferno changed the tempo, the circle exploded into a flying moshpit.

World Inferno Friendship Society. Bucketkickers.

This feeling is familiar.





Time: Sunday Morning (two days previously)


My ears hurt. My thighs hurt. I am super-duper happy.


Tonight: Music party at Harkness, with Andrew Gombas, Birthday Kids, and Dos Mil Días De Fuego. Before that, I saw Spring Back, a dance show, so it's been... a long night.




Spring Back!
The dance department here is growing, with more folks than ever enrolling in classes. We took in two new members of the faculty: Holly Handman-Lopez and Ashley Thorndike. Spring Back is part of the block of dance shows hitting around now -- Sprung, Colors of Rhythm, Essence's Steppin' in da Beat, Oberlin Dance Company and a lot of senior recitals. Warner, the main dance/theater building, is booked. If you dance, this is a good time for you.

The main focus of the dance department is modern, with contact improvisation, capoeria, bodywork and ballet getting some love too. Half of the pieces in Spring Back were modern, the others hip-hop, folk or break. As I have the dance awareness of a child, I seperate dances into:
- Emotive: You're communicating how you feel!
- Movement: You move amazingly! Your body is a work of art, a tool of creation!
There was a nice combination of both.

I must admit to a certain narrative inclination, which poses a problem in an unfiltered enjoyment of movement. Whereas in circus, I see tricks as, well, tricks... dance is an art form. It has meaning. So, to my plot-centric brain, it should have a narrative and relationships.

In the dance piece with three women, they were totally a mother with two daughters who had recently lost their elderly father in a tragic threshing accident. The daughters adjusted to the lost by throwing themselves with childish abandon into their farm tasks; while the mother dejectedly resumed normal functioning.

There were monks in brotherly love, a bride left at the altar, spirits of global warming wrapping their warlike arms around one another with apocalyptic glee...

Or, at least, that's what I saw.

I've had a few conversations with Kai about the difficulty of writing about dance. I can talk about how it made me feel, but not always so clearly about what occurred, without creating childish scenarios. The moves themselves were impressive: many of the performers wore kneepads, given the amount of times they flung themselves at the ground. All of the modern soloists controlled their bodies precisely. Their handstands landed slowly and gently-- they cartwheeled over and around one another.

With the folk/hip-hop/break dances, I find there's more of a vocabulary, because I'm less caught up in a search for story-meaning. They picked the crowd up. The hip-hop group did an incredibly tight piece that looked straight out of a music videos. SPARK rocked, showcasing their old heavies with their new blood. They popped, locked and broke, making Warner into their space. I've seen them do more ridiculous stuff in the past, but this act was so seamless.

I ran to Harkness, ready for action.
Question: Why don't dance concerts end with the audience having a dance party with the cast? Does strike really have to happen the instant the show ends?





Harkness Concert


Harkness Basement is a place of great joy. Amazing bands have played there, amazing food eaten there. It's a cafeteria: there are chocolate milk stains that will never leave the ground. The tables were rolled away and the ground was mopped. On the wall, there were still the co-op food posters on the wall by the drum set:
"Pros and Cons of Soy" and "Report Ideas to the "Fun Committee!""





Fun Committee of Harkness?




Andrew Gombas went first. You may remember him from Ma'ayan's post about Organs... He does music too! Acoustic and electric guitar and brilliant songwriting. Most of his songs are about some twisted, mangled love... like that time you went home with the prettiest girl and she was really into roleplaying games. Like the role-playing game where she's the "dominant young woman" and you're the "stupidface who took her to your home, got stabbed 19 times and robbed blind." That was a good song. It was a singalong.


I love this photo. Andrew looks like Mr. American Psycho.


Andrew:: "You may now know this, but I used to be an improv-style spoken word performer in the south side of Chicago. A rapper, one could say. So, I'll need two words from the audience to let me go..."
Audience :: "Watermelon!" "Somali pirates!" "Elk!" ""
Andrew:: "I heard... ''gun-related violence" and "attractive women."


So, Andrew rapped about ''gun-related violence" and "attractive women," which has a refrain that's so virulently not-PC that I don't think I should share it. Despite all of his evil-doing and disturbing lyrics, Andrew is a truly kind, warm and amazingly stable man. His nickname is Pickles.



Birthday Kids went up after: Liz, Ralph, Jim and Jesse, playing jam rock. Liz sang like a mellowed Janice Joplin; Ralph played the bass like a bear locked in a cellar for a few months. Jim controlled his drum set perfectly, and Jesse loved that guitar like a lover long-separated. The boys were all Connies (conservatory students): Jim is TIMARA, Ralph and Jesse are composition.


They have a lot of fun when they play: one of their games was "Mess with Jesse." Game was: Jim and Ralph would make a rhythm, and Jesse would solo. When folks got bored, they would raise their hands and Jim and Ralph would set a new tempo. Five hands determined the game, so it changed a lot. It also proved how ill Jesse is. That boy loves his guitar.



Liz and Jesse. Note how Jesse cannot see how gorgeous Liz is, due to his overwhelming love of his guitar. This is devotion, people.






After that... Dos Mil Días De Fuego!
Grey on rap/vocals; Sam on vocals; Khari and Sarah on the turntables, Ryan on bass; Jim on drums. It was awesome to hear them in a better venue (not a living room), even if I still didn't hear all of Grey's lyrics.




Grey spreads the word. Word, Grey.




They're an interesting band, with a lot of fluidity. Some songs are really furious and hip-hop/rap/metal, others are silly. Grey makes an excellent emcee, really pushing the crowd; Sam makes jokes and keeps things light, leading interactive dance sequences. She has a low, sweet voice, like a cup of hot chocolate in the morning. Khari and Sarah are sick-- they played amazing dj sets between each band, keeping the energy high. Their samples were tight. Ryan makes superb faces when he plays and holds the beat steady. And Jim? Jim is incredible. He played drums for both bands and after their intense, kickin sets, he smashed out a crazy solo.




Note: Ryan's face. It is superb.





Jim declared King of America.



It was an excellent crowd. We had enough space to dance -- Harkness basement is able to serve over a 100 members for each meal, so it certainly had space for 100 people to dance. There was a lot of good energy there: most people knew someone in the band, or really liked their style, so we had less general-party people and more open, happy, high-kickin' folks.


I left happy and sore, the way it should be.

Work it, dance it, write it.

In comparison to the first week of school, by the fourth week, I can tell a bit more where my energy is going. In short: everything takes five times the effort I originally expected. Sigh.



Admissions:

As an intern, my job is to interview prospective students, and assist the overall admissions process. I answer emails, work the front desk, speak with families, do filing. Right now, the counselors are working like mad, reading applications and meeting in committee. Each application gets read twice, then discussed in committee. Molly explained to me that the process is much more egalitarian here as compared to other colleges/universities. The first reader serves as the lawyer for the student, arguing their case to the rest of the admissions board. The decision is made by consensus, not solely by the dean.

Through this process, my respect for the admissions counselors has grown even larger than before. The sheer quantity of work they do is incredible.

Sco:

This week was a good one, dancing-wise. I grew up around music--my Dad ran a PA company, my grandmother has a Ph.D in music, my parents used to sing to me all the time. So when I need something to make me happy, music works best. Especially loud, silly music. On Wednesday, the Sco hosted Motown night, which got very, very crowded. I heard songs I haven't heard since election night, which was one of the happiest events of my life. The elation to "you can feel it all over" by Stevie Wonder was amazing, and the rest of the group was so alive. Whenever a mass of 100 people dance, there's so much energy generated that the mood becomes potent, electric.

Thursday's techno night was much more relaxed. My friend Daniel was DJ-ing--he played excellent trance. I met Daniel before school started: he's a first-year international student and I was catering some of the orientation events he attended. I remember working at a karaoke picnic, and arguing with him about which one of us should sing first. Anyone I can argue with is someone I want to befriend.

Yesterday, the Sco hosted a fundraiser for IYS (Immerse Yourself in Service) which hosted Triceratops, B-52s Cover Band, Bowie Band, and OSTEEL. Picture this entry, now add more hopeless noodling over how cool the Bowie band is. Their guitar players are ill, sick, ridiculous, and impressive. They turned "5 Years" into a rock epic. After the Bowie set, the crowd chanted "One more song!" or "Ten more songs! At my house!"

When we finished dancing, Ma'ayan invited myself, Yoshi, and Amanda back to Harkness for some pie. During the day, Ma'ayan and Daniel had made Derby, Bavarian Creme, and Chocolate-Coconut-Pecan pies.

Pie = Love.



Neurophysiology:

Some people speak Spanish, French, Chinese. My friends speak Science. If I didn't speak at least some pidgin Science, I couldn't understand them at all.

At Oberlin, I've taken Human Neurobiology, Behavioral Neuroscience, Abnormal Psychology and, at present, Neurophysiology. As much "vocabulary" as I've learned in class, I've gotten most of my grammar from my friends. I heard about Becca's woes with programming for experiments on childhood development, Alex and Jo Ling's fish, conversations on whether snails or crayfish would prove more effective for gathering data on neuronal membrane potentials.

I can tell I learned something in college because when I read this phrase at a normal pace: "'Cerebral activation patterns induced by inflection of regular and irregular verbs with positron emission tomography. A comparison between single subject and group analysis'" ... I understood it completely.

Three years ago? Not so much.

I wonder what my college career would have been if more of my friends spoke fluent Humanities. I might know about epistemology, determinism, or radical self-conscious ethnocentrism. As is, there's always more to learn.



Writing:

Creative Writing is a fascinating major--we don't have Honors, Capstones, or Theses. We just write, write, and write. This semester, I'm working with Chelsey Johnson and Sylvia Watanabe on a super-long project: The Novel.

Remember the Novella from last semester? That was the larva. This semester, I've gotta hatch a butterfly.

With Sylvia, I'm in a super-small workshop (five people) who are all top-notch kick-butt writers. Most of us were in Novella last semester, so we've got a feel for each other's styles already and have gotten comfortable being very constructive with one another. Workshops work when you can say to a writer: "This character? He's a jerk. He's not funny. He's not smart. Why is he here?" ... without being self-conscious.

With Chelsey, I'm going over the piece, full blast, each week. We did a close reading the other day and met for over 2 hours. It was great. Chelsey's focus is fabulism, a super-crazy writing style similar to magical realism, from writers like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Aimee Bender, and Ursula LeGuin. She gets my weird, post-apocalyptic romance stories.

Happily, my friends get it too, as the other language they speak is art. Making it, mostly, not analyzing. The mechanics of the creative process are so fascinatingly messy. All the rehearsals that take too long, the film shoots that die in poor lighting, the muscles pulled before the rehearsal, the paint splattered on new clothes, or hours of research for a character who will take up about a minute of script.

Even if we don't love the same thing, we love it in the same way.

Main Street Readings: Flash fiction, poetry, and bluegrass!

Dear All,

We are delighted to invite you to read your flash fiction stories at the Valentine's Day Main Street Reading on Sunday night, February 15 at 8 p.m. Before we announce you as the winners of our competition...(etc).The five invited readers and their stories are:

Mack Gelber: "Frosted Flakes"
Sarah Hoffman: "Toaster Angels"
Aries Indenbaum: "The Happiest Place on Earth"
Marilyn McDonald: "A Certain Age"
Anna-Claire Stinebring: "Odd Jobs"

We will be sending out a general announcement soon. Thanks so much and congratulations!
Lynn Powell & David Young


----

When I got the note, I started dancing in the library and letting out some jubilant obscenities. I hadn't expected to win, especially for a story I hadn't workshopped, in a style I was new at. It made the whole thing very, very sweet.

The Main Street Readings pair the Creative Writing department with the local community, which is flush with great authors. Events take place at the "New Union Center for the Arts", an old schoolhouse with a giant steeple. I've seen poetry readings there, children's theater, fashion and arts displays. Freshman year, Boredom, a semi-improvised dramedy group, used to perform there. The place reeks of good memories.



Boredom: Guy, the cool older kid, with Shawn, the neighborhood cutie, attached.




The V-Day readings started with the Outhouse Troubadours, a twangy, loud, and totally kickass bluegrass band. The players were tight, their sound was spot-on. Doug, who lived in my dorm last year, is an awesome banjo player. He murdered his solos in gorgeous new ways. Their fiddle, guitar, mandolin and upright bass players were similarly skilled -- the fiddler plays in OSTEEL as well and seems an all-around musical wunderkin.
I know their singer, Alex, who kicked the crack out of her notes. I didn't think Obies could sing with that much country. Best of all, they were all really, really into it. You can always tell when the band actually loves to play, and they did.


Outhouse Troubadours at the Cat, photo credit to Ethan Robbins.



After the band, Nancy Boutilier read love poems. Now, my inner sap aside, I don't really do love poems. They unleash whole new worlds of atrocious. I normally feel a bit nauseated after hearing five. But not now.
Nancy's poems were brilliant. She wrote the way I want to write: explosive, funny, poignant, amazing and sharp. At the end, when she said she liked my piece, I felt like I'd been regaled by sweet angels.



Then, it was the students' turn. Marilyn McDonald had written about elementary school love, which the night's organizer, Lynn Powell, read aloud. Marilyn isn't a student, but a violin teacher in the Con, now playing in DC. Oh, Oberlin. The second writer, Mack, wrote one of the meaningful, thoughtful pieces I can never create. He focused on the frayed relationship between a middle-aged husband and wife. The story was melancholy, but never outright sad, or depressing, just very... realistic. Anna-Claire's piece was incredibly visual, emotional without being melodramatic. It was like watching a gorgeous short film, rather than a story. It was simple--girl has sunburn, boy helps her find pharmacy--but loving in a larger and more gorgeous way.

The third story was easily my favorite of the night. Sarah wrote letters from a man begging forgiveness for his emotional unreachability. The letters were hilarious, describing angels in the toasters, and the alien-ness of the narrator, who called himself an "autistic badger." Sarah had a deadpan, Buster Keaton-esque delivery that proved remarkably effective, reducing the audience to spasms of laughter.


Despite my confidence with storytelling to large groups, I get terrible stagefright if I have to read in public. Like piss-myself-and-cry stagefright. I sat on my hands so they wouldn't shake. There were about 60 people there, but I knew many of them. Somehow, friends are scarier than strangers. My story was also the only "R rated" tale, driving a small family out of the room. It was a story of teenagers in lust, at Disneyworld. Some of my professors were in the audience, and the thought of saying inappropriate things in front of them was galling. Still, I did it.


Afterwards, there was wine and chocolate, the best way to end a weekend.

Chorale at 2:45 minutes in...

I listened to Jim's piece "Chorale" this morning.

Damn, it was great.

At first, I'd imagined it would be like the music I normally listened to- something to hear while doing something else. But no. It was challenging, difficult, in a way that literature should be. It was also miles away from my normal listening style, much more electronic. Jim's a TIMARA major (Technology in Music and Related Arts), his sound is deeply divorced from my ordinary mix of Ben Folds/Decemberists/Muse/Cake/David Bowie/Scissor Sisters. I can only compare it to the soundtracks from "Children of Men": without being in a lyrical form, it's deeply emotional and jarring. There's an apocalyptic sorrow that hangs over it, a thrash of echoes.

Most of the folks I know in the Conservatory are Composition majors- overall, they're a splendid, friendly, eccentric group. But strangely, I've heard very few of their official pieces. Even Eric, who I've known since freshman year-- I can remember hearing only two of his official composition, one at a departmental function, and the other at his Senior Rock Concert. I've heard some of Sean's pieces, but few-little of Ed, and none of Kurt, who I spent 30 hours a week with. Secretive bunch.

It was nice to listen to Jim's piece in the sanctity of my dorm room, rather than the concert hall; wondrous to hear my beloved computer, Kiwi, belt out music I would call art, not entertainment. There's also some innate pleasure I take in knowing that my friends are really freakin talented. Somehow, I know folks who can make music out of nothing.

Good way to start the day. I had to sit down for a while afterwards.

---


Midterms are squeezing in on us all- I ran into Erin and Daniel after working (albeit distractedly) in the library for a bazillion hours and we chatted, in that timeless way that finals/midterms enables. The ends of the conversation get stretchy and long, gasping into some deep revelations on the Way People Are. It's like a dream, 3AM conversations feel so profound when they happen, but afterwards, I'm left disoriented- "What did we talk about? Why? I don't know." My mind gets fuzzy at night.

The crux of my work is a paper for David "Brilliant" Walker on the play "Blasted" by Susan Kane. Blasted is playing in NY- if you're there, you should see it. But I'm terrified of the paper. Papers are not my strongest suit- my analytical style is scattershot, or more geared towards oral presentations than written documents.
My thesis: all love in "Blasted" is communicated through violence. It's not a difficult argument, but I struggle with the presentation of it. My theses are not always too strong or revolutionary; I hesitate to be overly critical of a text. I'm also not an expert on formal dramatic analysis and JSTOR yielded only one paper on the topic I could look to as a model.


I think I'm going to throw the paper at the Writing Center tonight, and ask for their tender mercies. Phew.

I don't write my stuff anymore, I just kick it from my head.

Ratatat, playing at the Sco on Tuesday, was insane.

There were two starter bands: E-Rock and Panther. The former I really enjoyed- he came in wearing a black cloth over his head, covering his face with big sunglasses and a white bandanna holding it all in pace. He looked like a robber, if not a terrorist. On his arms, he'd drawn robot-style joints and a heart. Overall, an awesome aesthetic. His set was solid electronic dance music. I liked "teengirl fantasy" more, pound for pound, but it was an awesome way to start it off. I wouldn't hesitate playing it for my Dad when he asked what newfangled stuff I listen to.

Panther was a bit to indulgent indie, but with a solid beat and amazing drummer. The singer seemed like a self-absorbed dweeb- he made his voice echo on nearly every track- still, I danced.

The Sco filled to its sweaty brim as Ratatat set up. I was at the very front for the two openers; by the time Ratatat was ready to go, I was about 4 rows of people in after a bunch of folks pushed ahead of me.

Izzie looked around and said, "Guys, we're gonna get crushed," a mix of fear and excitement in her voice. The dance floor filled more and more.

The instant Ratatat started, the crowd became a huge, amorphous organism. We swelled, we danced, we jumped, we moshed. The Sco workers moved to the head of the stage and pushed the crowd back, away from the equipment. Despite the claustrophobia, the crowd was really pleasant, all of us swaying in the sweaty human ocean. Sweaty isn't the right word, but it approached the soaked-ness that described the whole audience.

I love Ratatat.

---

"What's so funny about attrition?" asked Prof. Kalyn, in a lesson on Zipcar for Entrepreneurship.
Yoshi and I looked at each other and laughed. I'm obsessed with attrition and Yoshi and I had a disagreement about the value of following up on new OCircus recruits through some alternative means. Yoshi wants us to build a solid structure and let the newbies settle as they will; I want to increase the social activities of the club to increase the cohesion of the club.

On Friday, we had an incredible showing at TGIF: it felt like a festival. There were so many freshmen learning, picking things up... I taught about 8 people beginning poi, including a girl who was the spitting image of Harper Jean. About a fourth of us, myself included, pulled off our tops and rocked out in our bras/skins. Given the number of people, it was pretty paramount in my mind to keep as many as I could around. New blood, my friends. New blood.

-

Death of a Salesman was phenomenal. It was something special- the Theater Department brought in 5 Actor's Equity folks to put on a professional show. Adrian Brooks was Willy Lohman. Adrian Brooks, Captain Sisko in Deep Space 9, amazing actor and orator. His reading of Willy was painful and brilliant, making his dementia more explicit and grand than I imagine a lot of actors would do. Justin Emeka, who teaches theater was directing and playing Biff- he did an amazing job. The lead cast- the Lohman family- was entirely African-American, meant to highlight a racial component in the class struggle, so visceral by Miller's play. I stopped noticing race about 10 minutes into the show, going from "this is the African-American experience" to "this is the American experience." Bernard and Charlie were very Jewish refugees, an interesting choice- Josh Sobel, who's in my Drama Literature class, played Bernard and did an amazing job, especially with the age component of the play. Raphi was brilliant, as ever.

Walked around Oberlin after seeing Salesman, to go from Very Serious Theater, to a campus where music echoed out of every third house on a Saturday night. I'm glad I saw it. I cried afterward for about a half-hour.

---

Pertinent quotes:
"I'm a robot! I've always been a robot! Our relationship is doomed!"

Decline and Fall

Dear Wall Street,

Please, babe, get better. Do you remember that stock market project we did, back in the good old days? You know, the 90s? I miss that.

Yours,
Aries

--


Rebel Diaz, playing at the Sco, was so good. They were three singers, two of them siblings, who sang political populist hip-hop. The lone woman of the group was one of the tightest, most amazing rappers I've ever heard. Their beats were dance-able- if they hadn't been such a powerhouse performance, I'dve been rocking out in the back, trying out what I learned at SPARK.

SPARK was demented in a good, life-affirming way. Hip-hop is not my traditional domain, but I do like it. I didn't get a shuffle-step, but I got most of the rest. I'm a fan of top-rock; I'm not looking forward to pikes, except in the awful-bits that like when I fail at things. I take a long time to learn movement styles; I need a lot of repetition and things don't come naturally to me. Expecially... uh.. hard things. Like anything that involves balance.

Post-Diaz, we went to Agave for the coffee and burritos. It's nice that something other than Downtown Pizza and the Feve stays open past midnight on a weekend. Especially when that thing is Agave. Blessed Agave.

Diagnosis: Ridiculous, amazing day

Tuesday did not feel like a Tuesday.

Classes were grand. Discussing the play “Saved” in my British and Irish Drama class was excellent. In “Saved,” a crowd of men stone a baby to death… because they can. The ensuing talk about the relative merits of violent satire was pretty heated. Normally, discussion classes take about a week to get brewing- we spend the first two meetings being polite and wearing some kid gloves, just to get used to each other out. Not this one. It was refreshing to hear “I disagree completely,” followed by some interesting, evocative point… on the second class. We talked about everything from the duty of theatre, censorship, how graphic cruelty fits in and when it’s alright to laugh.

Immediately after class, I ran to the Storytelling meeting. Teaching an Exco Class isn’t difficult; figuring out logistics, like meeting times, that's hard. Liz told her “pirate story,” with the killer line: “What’ya do with 40 pirates... Get funding!” It's so fun to teach the Storytelling Exco to first years, having taken it as a freshman myself. The students seemed to get how it worked, automatically sitting in a circle and chatting, but getting really quiet once the stories started. Storytelling Exco is a workshop class, based around improving spoken performance. We meet once a week, tell 10 minute stories to each other, and give constructive criticism. And people really listen, because for 10 minutes- listening is their job. Not taking notes. Listening.

-

From there, I sped to the Tumbling Club, met some new gymnasts, and worked on flexibility. Carey taught me how to do funny things in a bridge; Zwasi pulled my limbs around. We watched the freshmen do some amazing things. One of the first years, James, is ridiculous. He can do a series of 10 flips in a row, in socks on wet grass, without warming up.

Carey: So, how did you learn that?
James: Well, I saw the gymastic floor competitions on TV and just... did what they did.
Zwasi: WHAT?! You didn't train?
James: Not really, no. It looked cool.
Zwasi: You just saw it on tv.
James: Some things on youtube.

-

The real Tuesday-buster was GZA, a founder of Wu-Tang, playing at the ‘Sco. I was in the front row, when the crowd of 350 started shouting “Wu-Tang, Wu-tang.” There was a girl who had a Wu-Tang tattoo dancing on the other part of the stage. There was so much energy in the crowd. I had slept little the previous night and started to feel a bit woozy, which quickly passed away after I got some water.

By the fountain, I ran into one of the members of “Teengirl Fantasy,” an Oberlin electronica band and gushed about how cool he was. Teengirl Fantasy had opened for the show and had gotten the crowd to a screaming, rocking peak. Given the audience was more a hip-hop crew than electronica, that's not so easy.

The concert continued, becoming a giant wave of arm-waving and dancing. I left at about 12:40, covered in sweat. A good Tuesday.

Day of Service!

In the name of all things holy: Ratata and GZA (founding member of Wu-Tang Clan) are playing at Oberlin. Life is too good to be believed.

--

Day of Service!

When I was a first-year, Day of Service (DoS) was my favorite part of Orientation. DoS is meant principally for first-years or any early arrivals, and acts as a great way to connect firsties to the Oberlin environment and community in a meaningful way. My Day of Service was to do some parks upkeep and trail clearing- which I loved. I like to work outdoors, to sweat and get muddy. After DoS, I used to walk over to the George Jones farm- where Oberlin gets a lot of its produce- and work until it got dark. Also, working at George Jones meant fresh, right-off-the-vine tomatoes. And I will do some serious malarkery for good tomatoes.

Now, as a senior, I decided to be a Site Leader - the pointperson for my group. We were a small bunch- me and 4 freshmen- Emily, Gus, Rachel and Michael. They were very chill folks- all very relaxed and wonderful. We were working at Plum Creek, the river that runs through Oberlin, cutting right where "Downtown" ends, still within an easy walking distance. After playing 2 Truths and a Lie, we walked across the bridge lined with flowers and got to work: clearing out invasive species, weeds and beautifying the public park.

The site supervisors were Kate ad Robin, two amazing local ladies who had the words "Role Model" painted all over them. Kate, who looked more like a paintet than an activist, had started the Western Land Concervancy to safeguarded various properties around Northern Ohio from development, to be used as nature reserves. Kate mentioned the struggle of selecting sites to buy - a small beachfront or a huge farm- and the struggle of working with complex paperwork and with folks who distrusted the government and any associated organizations. She was also incredibly modest, glossing over the fact that she founded the Western Land Concervancy. Robin, who owned the property, was a trip: she raised 7 kids, worked 30 hours counseling in the local schools and ran a private psychiatric practice.


The work was fun. Robin and Kate gave us a variety of shears and rakes to take out as many weeds by the creek edge as we could, as well as removing any garbage we found. The creek was about 10 feet below street level, so we had to prune the stones that lead down to it. There were lots of big weeds, vines and elms that we battered away. We finished the job in record time, with less people than normal.
The only downside to the work was the prevalence of poison ivy. Found out I'm not allergic to PI... Yay!