Weeks 3, 4, & 5 2025-2026 in Review
The prior three weeks at TCC have been a flurry of activity, filled with cardboard creations, planned and pop-up offerings both, Pride preparations, culture conversations, DnD campaigning, mixed-age play, and community care. Week 3 was a short week, and the two days we did have together that week were dynamic and creative, with projects ranging from a cardboard diving suit and cardboard machine dubbed "The Pokemon Trader 1,000," to balloon-propelled toy cars, to tinkering with fixing the engine of a motor bike (and succeeding!).
Another highlight of this short week was our weekly culture session where we explored needs, and co-generated together a list of some of the needs we'd like to have met, both as individuals and a community, in order to thrive together. The work of considering various individual feelings and needs in community, and how we can honor them while planning, while navigating conflict, while co-creating this place and space, is the crux of our work together.
We came back together in week 4 with no loss of momentum. We made music together; we folded zines and organized donated books for Tower Grove Pride; we marveled at and identified caterpillars, stickbugs, turtles, and spiders, mushrooms and flowers and leaves as big as our faces. One young person was so captivated by growth in the garden that they harvested some squashes and peppers without the consent of the rest of the group. This came as a disappointment to many, as some, but not all of us, knew we had a loose plan to make soup with those squashes. Rather than punishment, this prompted a group tour of the garden with a focus on consent, answering questions together like, "What plants can we harvest freely?" and "What plants do we need consensus around how we'll use them?" and "How will we communicate garden updates to everyone?" This week also included the launch of an offering series, "TCC Cartography with E," in which we intend to create a full map of the land at TCC over time; the creation of a functional DIY bow and arrow set, complete with cardboard quiver; the launch of our community DnD campaign; a woodcarving offering with Lavi; and the introduction of a Nintendo 64 into the digital studio space at TNP.
We had a beautiful experience and very full days at Tower Grove Pride last weekend, and had a number of meaningful connections with Queer young people and adults alike. We were overjoyed to see some of you there, and to see our booth become a hub for many familiar faces. "This is the best booth I've visited all day" we heard, along with, "I make sure to stop by your booth every single year."
These past weeks felt both very slow and very fast.
We had space this week to prioritize one-on-one connections with young people about how they want to spend their time here, and to start planning for moving forward some of their long-term ideas. We now have a number of culinary adventures in the queue, which necessitates thoughtful planning and consideration for community time and other resources. Offerings ranged from designing and carving original stamps with E, to a discussion of Ethics and Philosophy facilitated by (another!) E, to plotting out and weeding the space for our future cut flower garden. Those who participated in E's ongoing Cartography offering made their way into the forest for orienteering. We continued our DnD campaign, navigating together the difficult question, "What do we do when a party member isn't here?" Guitar music hummed in the background through the week, while some colored, read, connected in hammocks, or played "Zombie Apocalypse" in Tree World. We reflected at the end of a day especially full of emergence what it means to "do nothing," and how there really is no such thing as nothing. E noted, "It's like Seinfeld - we might think of it as a show about 'nothing.' But really it's a show about everything."
More on the idea of doing "nothing" here soon.