Field notes

What:

What?

Three trains passed, on their way from Villanova to the parade in Philadelphia, without stopping. I eventually just took a cab to the center. By that point, I was late, but I was still there to help with clean-up. “Hope”, the woman who had told me on a previous visit that she didn’t want to go home, that the people there were rude and it was too far away, came up to me, said she had missed me, and told me excitedly that she was getting a new apartment, with different people, closer to the Center. I told her (truthfully) that I was very excited for her. Several other people came up to me, shook my hand, and either asked me my name or welcomed me back. I saw “Usmail” for the first time since I had helped him with his horse sculpture.

I was told by *Sam* (the guy I work with) that he wouldn't be in the center at the time that I usually visit. We tried finding another time, but our schedules weren't aligning. He told me to take the day off and that we would see each other next week. 

This week the kindergarten was closed on Monday because of a power outage, so I ended up going to the Haverford farm to work with A again. It was an hour and a half of transplanting kale, which was fine. Not paticularly interesting. So I decieded to join Paola and go to the kindergarten on Friday like last week, because I did not feel that I really learned or observed anything interesting on Monday.

This past Wednesday we returned to the center to continue work on our boxes. When the artists came back from their snack break, we split off into our pairs, and made a kind of assembly line to get things done--although Carl* and I had to work on our project alone, since we were a little bit behind after I missed a week. We used one of the tools to carve our legs into fun, curvy shapes, and I rode the stationary bike for a *long* time. While we did that, another pair worked on cutting the pegs for all of the boxes, so that we could attach the legs with wood glue. When we finished our leg cutting, we took a brief musical interlude (I made some beats on the table with the wooden legs and Carl and I danced).

Friday, 9am

1. Today the kids talked to me a little bit more. One girl was extremely surprised when I knew her name. Another student remembered my name, which I was surprised about, especially since one of the teachers in the classroom still doesn't know my name (she called me Jocelyn and Cedric)?????
2. I think there were more kids in the class today then I had ever seen and the mess they made while playing was huge. It also seemed a little disorganized which I was surprised to see, since the other times I had been there it was pretty well organized.
3. I saw again the hierarchical  thing that I saw once in the classroom. Three of the girls were playing with these toy chains and the one girl (Cara) started creating a long chain to hang off her shirt.

This past Wednesday, the participants who we typically work with in the woodshop traveled to Haverford again, this time to work with trees. We have been using wood from white oak trees to build our boxes at the center, and wanted to engage directly with the source--of which there are many on Haverford's campus! I worked with Carl* and Natalie to measure around a tree (at about chest height) and use some calculations to convert that into how old the tree was. We talked about how amazing it was that this tree, at 55 years old, was older than all of us. We then used perspective and a wooden dowel to stand far back and determine the height of the tree.

As I wasn't feeling well, I didn't go in to the center this past week. I'm looking forward to this coming Wednesday, when we'll be working with Natalie at Haverford to measure trees and to have a small workshop-style conversation. The topic was originally going to center around gender, sexuality, and our bodies, but it looks like the focus is shifting to a more general get-to-know-you session, as we haven't had many opportunities to really talk to the participants we're working with.