Pushing forward

In my last blog i wrote that we had finally passed the point of no return, hit the middle of the country, etc. Today, as we went from Iowa, through Illinois, Indiana and finally crossed the Ohio state line i felt something new.... this sorta swelling of pride for the first time about what this group was accomplishing and for all the people who have helped us along the way. Now we're really past the middle point. When we were about 3 miles out, I called our host in Columbus and as she answered the phone i heard tons of chattering in the background before she yelled "Sshh!! It's DOUBLE VISION!!!"... when we arrived at 11pm tonight there was still a good-sized welcome party of artists here to great us with ice cream, hugs and conversations :) these are those really great sort of moments... the better moments are when we realize that we've really presented people with something they'd never seen or thought of doing before. Fortunately we've had a number of those interactions.

Yesterday at the Bookey's residence in Des Moines was wonderful. It was relaxing and it also afforded us some time to solidify the rest of the tour. We now have 3 bookings in new york!

Anyway, going back to what i was saying..... it finally hit me today that we've done a crapload of work... both leading up to and during this tour. The frog has been instrumental in planning the budget, making the budget and maintaining it (not to mention earning it)... the ram has also been really helpful in planning and obtaining gigs. Squirrel has gotten us almost all of our housing. The eagle and i just do what's needed... as have all others. But everyone must be here for some personal, specific reason. Oddly enough, we've never as a group discussed what brought us to the decision.

Here's mine: I wanted to finally see what it meant to live life artistically and really try to be part of the (some) artistic community. To give and take, present and watch, teach and learn in some ongoing symbiotic manner. I also wanted to be constantly immersed in an intellectually and stimulating community. Finally, I wanted to see if i really wanted to make art, teach art... or...?

Have these goals been met? Yes and no. But the process of realizing the surprises, disappointments, and perhaps over-ambitious expectations has been perhaps just as important as the goals themselves. I'd be curious to hear why others are here.

Again, regardless, we're all here. Still here, despite many trials and likely because of SO many successes along the way.

There's more of both to come i'm sure... stay tuned :)

OH! and for those of you traveling through Indiana, there's this great little Creole restaurant called Yat's which was very cute, cheap and SO yummy! Within a block radius we also saw signs for a Noise Festival, Fringe Festival and something else.... plus everyone made eye contact and smiled :)