Stories of Art All Around Us
There are so many creative pursuits. While at the International Puzzle Party this last week I heard stories from friends old and new about the creative things they’ve been up to in the last year. From play and running to gardening and woodworking I discovered there is more art around me than I realized. Here are a few of the stories I heard and have collected to share with you. Play. Cacti. Running. Community. Four creative ways to find joy.
Andrew told me about his work at the Lilly Museum in Indiana. Andrew curates the puzzle collection. There are lots of cool puzzles to discover. By lots I mean thousands. From jigsaw puzzles to rubric cubes, from Japanese trick boxes and disentanglement to sequential discovery. Cool things can be done with the puzzle collection. Friday afternoons is the puzzle showing. Each week Andrew pulls out a dozen different puzzles to share with the public. There are regulars who come every week to see what’s new. Andrew also takes puzzles into school classrooms. It used to be there was money for field trips. But that has dried up so now Andrew takes the puzzles to the schools. The most interesting tid-bit I heard was about how important play is. Play has a conference. Play is talked about by a wide variety of people like museum curators, park rangers, librarians, teachers, and store owners. Knowing there are people concerned with play and how to bring more of it into our lives made me very happy.
Julie told me about her work with the Tucson Cactus and Succulent Society. A big part of what she does is rescue cacti. I had no idea they needed rescuing, but they do. When developers go to clear land they will first call the Cactus Society. The society comes in on the weekend before the bulldozers to harvest the saguaro and barrel cacti among others. Other rescues happen when someone calls and they’d need plants removed from their yard. They might be putting in a pool or need a cacti growing too close to the house. The society doesn’t question the need. They just come and give these plants a new home, for free. The cacti are transported to an eight acre park in Tucson. The park had four trees when they started years ago. Now there are hundreds of cacti. And the area has recovered; rabbits, bees, ground squirrels and all kinds of life has returned. Julie loves saving cacti. They are beautiful and they help sustain more than the park. Each year the Succulent Society has a sale of cacti they have saved. At $40 a foot it’s a good deal and helps keep the Succulent Society going and rescuing. People wait all year to see what blooms and delights are on sale. I loved hearing about this niche of joy in the Southwest.
Bob is an ultra runner. He runs in races that last 24, 48, 72 hours and up to 6 days! He loves his sport. Injuries have kept him out this year however he serves the community as a board member of running clubs and races. He’s active as a mentor. He’ll be back out there for sure. He’s been running for twenty years. Bob is known for being a consistent runner. He is not fast but he can go for very long distances. He often wins the races he enters. He’s run across Tennessee for example. I have no frame of reference for running hundreds of miles. It seems like a crazy pursuit. Why on earth would you do that to yourself? I asked what he liked about the sport. He admitted there is a time about four days in to a six day race where he wonders why he is doing it. Everything hurts. However there is also the time when he has run so far that suddenly he feels connected to everything. There is no us and them there is no trail and sky there is Bob and all of it as one. He says that these days he is chasing that feeling again, to be connected to everything. That is something amazing to run after.
Anne works at the Foster Museum as the director. I learned a lot talking to her about museums. She shared some of good they try to offer the community through education and tours as well as all the inner workings is takes to run such an operation. I was fascinated by the conferences she goes to about museums. They are concerned about how to interact with the public, not just best practices and policies but innovative ideas for engagement. She told me about a talk they presented that shared how they used the art in their museum to engage school children to look at a piece of art from the smallest detail rather than trying to take in a big work of art all at once. I could tell Ann was excited about sharing art with the community. She knows an hour spent slowing down and resting in front of a piece of art will do so much good for our world at large. And she wants more of us to know that is an option.
There are lots of creative ways of “doing your thing.” What are you passionate about? Whatever it is I hope you will consider diving deep and then sharing your joy with others. We could all use your creative expertise in whatever it is you love the most.