Week 22 2024-2025 in Review
The final week of our winter cycle together went by like a whirlwind (Wednesday especially so, in the most literal sense). We schemed together at Set the Week on Monday about how to fill our time, honor our commitments, and invite spaciousness into this last week together. We also discovered a common agreement on wanting to make the last day of each cycle something "special" in some way. Ideas included stone soup, kitchen-sink cookies - some sort of specialness that everyone in the community would get to contribute to. We didn't settle on an idea at that meeting, and planned to revisit it. Then, on Wednesday, to many's surprise and inviting a flurry of excitement and inspiration, E and H brought instruments, and we all figured out together that Thursday's specialness would be "Music Day." In addition to the musical offerings already on the board, many members of the community brought their own instruments in and played around and jammed together. How this emerged truly did feel special, as did how we made it happen.
We noted the joy of coming together and delighting in music.
We also had a full week of offerings. We met again for our Civics and Philosophy discussion series, this week talking about the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode "Lift Us to Where Suffering Cannot Reach," which invited us to really chew on how the subtlest nuances guide our responses to these notions of utopia. R continued his Drawing series, this week inviting the group to focus on shadow and tone while drawing a bunch of bananas. Sarah offered TCC Awesome Math virtually, where we learned about (and spontaneously drew) fractals, including the Sierpinski triangle. Excitement around this topic is high, and fractal explorations are in our future. E continued his Animation 101 offering, guiding the group through drawing the frames of a bouncing ball animation. And finally on Music Day, Emily brought "Juba Dance" from Florence Price's Symphony No. 1 along with an accompanying video on the tradition of Pattin' Juba, and A and E and those in the Singing and Dancing offering finished choreographing their number for "A Dancer's Heart."
In the background this week, we settled on T-shirt designs the group wants to move forward with, we played games and made games and navigated conflict (always), we gardened and talked and noticed how plants grow their roots in various fractal patterns, we broke in the new Swurfer swing, we Lite-Brited, and we enjoyed being with each other and the animals and the land.
We also continued our book club on The Sapling Cage by Margaret Killjoy, which has been such a gift and a delight to read and process together. As I (Zoey) reflect on this past cycle - which started in January, in the depths of winter, in the midst of a most unusual three-week run of freezing temps and snow on the ground - I find myself thinking about seasons, and how the witches in The Sapling Cage see the seasons. They don't divide the year into four seasons as we do, but into three: Birth, Living, and Death. Birth spans what we think of as winter, from the (winter) solstice to the (spring) equinox. A time when growth occurs out of sight, and many great transformations create the conditions for life to emerge. We talk about this truth often here - the ways growth and change are constant, and also not always visible or observable, yet happening, quietly, murmuring under the surface - whether that be growth taking place beneath the soil, or within us or the young people here as we move through our time together. Growing, learning, changing, always.
What has been growing toward birth this past season? As we now enter the Living season (spanning equinox to equinox), buds and shoots of life are evident and abundant. Here, in community, we've been tending to seeds of authenticity, conviction, and connection, through art, through play, through discussion. We've been dreaming and planning and laboring to build the TCC of our collective vision - a space with thriving gardens and a healthy forest, an expanded farm (which sadly might not include chickens for the foreseeable future, but will grow to welcome other animal kin), a variety of enriching indoor spaces and crafting and making spaces, and so much more. One learner came into this cycle with a new mantra, one I've found apt and inspiring: "It's time to stop wishing, and start doing." This feels even more true now as we enter the Living season, a time for action.
What is being born in all of us in these times?
What is about to emerge?
Who will we be?
We are eager to return to community together with each of you, and to settle into our last cycle of this learning year in an abundance of joy and connection.
With gratitude and care,
Emily, Sarah, and Zoey