Re-Meet The Team
In the Tile Park, if you know what you’re looking for, you can go directly to the column your workshop did last year, or the bench you sponsored. At the time, you weren’t sure whether to choose red or orange for that one section, but you’re glad you went with red. It’s personal, that red. It’s part of the Tile Park story too, that red. It’s your own personal voice, narrating this one part.
At the dawn of a new season, we at the Tile Park like to take stock of the project. Sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in the slowness of it all, the “how much there is left to do” part, without considering how much has changed. How much effort all those tiles represent.
Last year on our blog’s Meet The Team series, it was fun to be able to spend some time with the people behind the park, and get to know them on a deeper level. It’s apparent there too, when taking stock, how much has changed. Many team members have moved on for one reason or another, so we’ll definitely do a Meet The Team series for the 2019-2020 season.
Thinking back on the team last year, one thing is apparent: we were strong then, and we are strong now. The changes are always incremental, sometimes almost imperceptible, but indeed upon reflection, on a long enough timeline, it is a different assortment of people entirely at certain points. All these unique voices. All these personal choices.
Our Place, For A Day Or A Lifetime
The whole premise of this community-funded project is, well, the community. Coming together as a group to complete this labor of love. Some folks come through for just one workshop, and plenty of others become fixtures in the park, returning every year just to hang out with us and stick tiles. Likewise, we have some team members who don’t stay all that long, while others are “lifers”. But everyone’s voice is there, will remain forever, if you know what you’re looking for.
“Should I bother re-posting that person’s blog?” I think to myself. (In other ch-ch-ch-changes, we have a completely re-built website too, necessitating a total backfill of all the previous blog content.) “They’ve been gone for over 9 months already.” It takes maybe 3 minutes of mulling over, and most of that is just accepting the clunky logistics of backfilling that much content. Of course we should re-post their blog. They were here at one time. Their voice still echoes here. They still hold the same place of honor that was intended when the blog was originally written. “Here is this person, they are part of the team, and this is some of their story. We’re proud they’re with us... this is an awesome team to be part of.” Very little about that statement is untrue now. They’re no longer on the team, and that’s about all.
So, here at the park we’re looking forward to a new season of new faces, and the same old mugs too. A chance to meet everyone again for the first time, and honor those who helped pave the road to here too. We’ll see you there.