All posts by Lloyd Davis

I made this

Make SOMETHING EVERY DAY – MY ARCHIVE 001

You get two posts today as I catch up. Can’t find a catchy enough title for this project, but this is only Day 2, we’ll see. Do I work on Sundays (tomorrow)? Dunno, we’ll see. If you missed it, the beginning of the previous post has an explanation.

Today I pulled “My Archive”.

Already, I can’t remember what I was thinking when I wrote these out. But there’s a lot to be done with “My Archive”, that’s for sure, whatever it is. I’m not certain quite where the line is between my archive and family history at the moment, I suppose it’s things that I made or things that are about me – but who cares? So there’s a bit of the process emerging which is that I have to have a bit of a think and a bit of a write first before I settle on what it is that I’m going to make. The writing, thinking and doing might not all get represented in the blog post.

I got a bit distracted by the perennial blogging software/where to publish/how to publish bullshit and that’s the last time I’m going to mention it. But when I’d calmed down and thought about it, I realised that actually scanning some negatives that I shot in about 1980 or ’81 and putting them on Flickr with some tags and a bit of a description was a worthwhile enough thing to do, it does get me engaged with organising the massive cloud of stuff that’s on digital platforms and in cardboard boxes, the only real index of which is my brain. Just writing stuff down instead of thinking about it is really useful, if only because it helps me to stop thinking about it.

R01-S23 Gig 1980/81
1 of 23 in the first roll

I’m not entirely happy with how the album got embedded from Flickr in WordPress, so I’ve replaced it with just one image. You can jump to Flickr if you want to see the whole thing and maybe like and comment and stuff. Maybe you recognise some of the people I don’t. Or the venue. Or know when it was. None of which I have much of a clue about – some archivist.

It was shot on HP5, and these are straight from the scanner, no cropping or colour correction yet.

I was using a flash, so wasn’t at the stage where I was experimenting with pushing the film speed to extremes. I know that I got my first SLR for my 15th birthday, so this is most likely to be 1980. Tony joined the Zenith Hot Stompers in October 1981 and so this will be before then. If I didn’t fear contradiction, I would say it was a configuration of the New Delta Jazzmen – Tony Davis, trumpet; Mick Jones, trombone; Clive Millward, drums; Pete Barnard, banjo; I don’t know the clarinet or bass players. And I’d also say it was upstairs at the Booth Hall at Hereford, but I have no evidence for that other than forty-year-old memories that are very unreliable.

This was just the first 24-exposure roll, there’s another 36-exp one to do, which might yield more clues.

It’s very odd looking at pictures I made forty years ago and trying to think about what I thought I was doing. I can see that I was experimenting and getting my eye in. But it was hard then, not having near infinite storage or the ability to check what you just shot. Experimentation with shooting live events was risky when you wouldn’t get anything back till you’d had some time in the dark room. There are plenty of rookie composition mistakes and bits where the person I was shooting turned their head at the last minute, but again, you just don’t know that until you develop the film.

So how does that add to my archive? Well it’s a bit more action research, I suppose. I’ve done something, thought about it, recorded some data and written about it. It’s not nearly as organised as I want it to be, but it’s an improvement. Progress.

I made this

learning how to work out loud again – ANIMation 001

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I lost the knack. And I started a job where I found it hard to do it consistently, so didn’t do it at all. And I got diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 56, which explained an awful lot.

And after the raging and choruses of “no wonder!” I’m now settling into being able to do a day job and do other stuff too, trying to work with my brain’s constant search for novelty and variety rather than against it.

But I’ve not been writing here or very much anywhere online. Posting to Facebook feels like it just creates an obligation to respond and engage. There’s fewer folk here and hopefully not as needy.

So I came up with a scheme. I made 15 little cards with “genres” on them “forms of expression” if you like, definitely not “content types”. They’re things I like making, don’t worry about it – oh and I’m not going to say what they all are until I’ve got at least one set of 15.

I’m pulling one out of the pile every day and making that the focus for today. And then writing a little bit about it. So it’s the old schtick of “do cool stuff and write about it on the internet” but maybe not as cool and definitely not with anything else in mind but a desire to ship something everyday. WordPress isn’t the perfect blogging tool (and the block editor hurts to use), but it’s what I’ve got. There’ll be a day for playing with blogging software, but it isn’t today.

Yesterday’s was “Animation”. So I made a couple of things. One was while I was having lunch, I made a little time-lapse loop of people going in and out of TK Maxx. I put it on instagram because that seems the easiest place to host things like that. Not ideal, but again not today’s battle.

Then after having a bit of a think, I spotted a picture I took in the woods a while ago of a tree trunk that someone had drawn a bear’s face on.

IMG_20181004_131829_292

So when I came back I imported it to GIMP and made some blank layers on top. I faffed with pencil width for a bit to try to match the marker that the original was done with. And then I traced the bits I wanted to keep in this piece onto the first transparent layer. I do this in some contrasting colour so that it’s easy to tell which is the drawing and which is the original – for this I used a bright red.

When I was fairly happy with it and knew that the lines kind of joined up well enough, I got rid of the transparency and started filling in blocks of colour based very loosely on the original (I also made the “inner” of the ears bigger and the eyes bigger and solid black). That’s the point I’d got to when I sat back and thought I should write it up a bit.

It looked like this:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/lloyd-davis/51392575761

Next I copied this, freehand and quite sloppily another three times so that I had four frames that look the same but are very slightly different. When turned into an animated GIF, the looping makes it look a bit more lively (it’s what I remember as the Roobarb & Custard effect, because I’m old). I’ve done some of this here before, but can’t be bothered to search back.

Anyway, now, shrunk down a little, it looks like this:

and that pleased me enough to let it be for another day.

(yes, I did write about it yesterday, but didn’t post here – progress not perfection) – stop moaning you’ll get another one in a minute and then you’ll be sorry.

words

Signs of life

Three things popped up on my radar in Guildford this week. Promising signs of things starting to happen. They might not all be to everyone’s taste, but it’s all better than the void in new activity that’s had to pervade for the last year.

1.

First one, I can’t find anything official on yet – so I guess it’s still just a rumour – but I hear that Zero Carbon Guildford are going to be taking on the empty retail unit at the bottom of North Street formerly known as New Look (so, interestingly right between TK Maxx and McDonalds).

I got this from the local Labour Party newsletter (yes I’m still a member, no I don’t know for how much longer) which says

 after some essential work they plan to open: a zero waste shop , a café, Library of Things, Cinema and Meeting space. They will be needing lots of volunteers as things open up, so keep in touch through https://www.zerocarbonguildford.org/ 

2.

Then there’s The Boathouse or Soulspace which is down by the river next to the Weyside Pub (for very aged readers, The Jolly Farmer). Again, details are sparse, and building has only just begun, but I’m on the mailing list – it’s café and coworking and dedicated space for local charity halow (who currently we see a lot of at Guildford URC) as far as I can see. They’re doing some right things, reaching out to community to see what’s needed and I’ve sent them an email, so we’ll see.

3.

Finally, there’s news of redevelopment of the old Burymead House site at the bottom of Portsmouth Road (between The Cannon and the Wycliffe Buildings. It’s been undeveloped for twenty years – twenty years where it could have been used for *something* but has just been left to wilderness (and not even very good wilderness – too much rubbish and rubble still left lying around)

So now it will be 303 “co-living” spaces and branded as Guildford Plaza – it looks like student accomodation for people who’ve just finished being students. So I expect much criticism (enough students already!) but I’m on the fence currently between “it’ll never happen” and “ooh 300 new neighbours!”

words

In Tuttle last week, I realised something.

It feels like the last ten years have flown by and I haven’t done anything.

I’ve done lots of things that were important to do, but compared with the five years before that, none of it feels very significant. And I’ve lost the habit of talking about it out loud. It gets stuck inside me and then I have to do some other activity that lets it out.

If I want to know what I was doing at some point in say 2009, I can look to the archives of this blog to give me some sort of anchor point. There are ways of doing the same with, like, 2016, but it’s nowhere near as reliable.

I do need to perform, in some way. My work at church can’t provide that at the moment. And in the middle of a pandemic, there isn’t much that can, but I can have a go here. That’s what this is, just putting words down, one after another. Writing and then deleting whole paragraphs that express the thing in a different way. Groping towards understanding and some sense of meaning. Getting the muscle memory back of taking the thoughts that for a while have been swimming around and then suppressed and actually doing something else with them. Without shame or fear of comment.

Or I could go and pick some more fruit in Animal Crossing.

words

Hello again

1 Comment

is this thing on?

it seems that it takes a very long time for me to get round to writing anything at the moment. partly i blame the facebook. It’s a lazy excuse. Take responsibility.

Am I so boneheaded that I would rather a) scroll through blip after blip of my friends’ odd choices of what counts as news or some lunatic theories about how the world works and b) take part in the same ridiculous charade of self-expression by allying myself with somebody else’s thoughtshower? Yes, clearly, yes I am precisely that boneheaded.

I heard two things this week that brought me back to myself. "You need to express yourself more" and "Put your own house in order before going around telling other people how they could improve their lives." These are not new thoughts. The voices that say this kind of stuff to me have been with me for a while. But I’ve been ignoring the voices. Taking the FB meds and ignoring the voice within.

Sorry.

I gardener

This morning I popped out to have a closer look at the broccoli that is growing in my newly-made vegetable patch. Now there are two things (at least) to know.

One is that I didn’t set out to grow broccoli. I mean I did, but not properly, big plants, I had a packet of sprouting purple broccoli seeds in the cupboard because I tried them as an addition to my sprout mix (usually lentils, mung and adzuki beans) but they grew a little more slowly and weren’t very interesting, a bit cress-like, and so I gave up on that. And then with lockdown I thought I’d see how they turned out if you let them grow for a few days so I sprinkled some on a few pots of compost and watered and waited and they kept growing and so then I planted them out in the bed when I prepared that, but I was still waiting for them to die. And they haven’t, they’re too close to each other and this weekend I was thinking of thinning them out a little and transplanting some.

Oh the other thing to know, is that I have close to zero experience or knowledge of how to grow anything that I actually intend to eat. My gardens over the years have been decorated with flowers that older relatives would come and plant for me. I’ve had a compost heap for the last three years since we moved to Guildford but it’s been input-only. That meant when I did open it up a few weeks ago there was loads of good stuff in there, but it was bloody hard work getting it out. And, as I’ve discovered, there was a lot of un-rotted organic matter in there – like seeds, so I have an interesting collection of weeds that might turn into something edible.

So that’s why I’ve been watching a lot of YouTube and learning by killing things.

Anyway this started as a story about finding bugs on my broccoli. So that was one of the things that I did that was standing between me and writing, I had to locate and clean a spray bottle, load it up with soapy water and give the little blighters a good old soaking.

run, fat boy, run

The other unexpected facet of later middle-age for me is that I became a runner a couple of years ago. Of course I started out as a plodder and waddler, but with some practice and perseverance and the amazing C25K programme I convinced my body and my mind that I could both run for more than thirty minutes at a time and that in that time I could cover five kilometres or more. Today, for example, I ran for forty minutes and that meant about six and a half thousand metres.

It still astounds me that I can do it and continue to do it, but it has helped a great deal in this time of pandemic houseboundness to have a good reason to start every other day with a bit of a bounce around the neighbourhood. And as I am fortunate enough to live next door to greenery, it’s a pleasant aesthetic experience too (though not for anyone coming in the other direction, approached by a sweaty bald man in his fifties).

but the writing though

I suppose getting into the garden YouTube sub-genre has helped shock me into seeing what a load of horrible imitation broadcast media stuff there is out there. This isn’t what we started this stuff for. This isn’t what I got excited about blogging in order to do. I don’t want my blog to be just a kind of wannabe Guardian column (or worse!) but it can become like that, very easily, especially if I don’t write anything at all and then it’s a wannabe Guardian column that never gets written.

And running has taught me to just keep going, just keep putting one foot in front of the other and trust that you’ll get to 5k (or not) today. Just keep putting one word after another, Lloyd, and trust that it will make sense (not to anyone else necessarily) or rather that the doing of it will move you into a space that is different from the one you awoke to.

PS

I also did some traditional blog software ridiculousness before I started to actually write. On this occasion it meant using the block editor on wordpress.com for the first time. But this has all been one block, a Markdown block and the only formatting I’ve used in the headings. But it’s not hurting anyone, is it?

PPS

never end a blog post with a question mark.

words

Pandemic Tuttle on Zoom

We did the first one of these this morning.  I’m up for doing it weekly.  Will do a better invite next time.  At the peak we had 16 or 17 people.  It still felt manageable.

And Brian broke us the news of the Prime Minister’s infection while we were live.

But Facebook won’t allow me to post the contents of the chat window because something in there goes against Community Guidelines (I think it was a particularly crufty URL from Brian).  Anyway, that’s why I still have a blog.

These things were said:

09:59:03 From Brian Condon : Suggest we use the chat as well for people who want to speak.
09:59:19 From Brian Condon : Chat back channel
10:03:26 From Caron – @pcmcreative : Hi Brian, a back channel is an excellent idea. I approve.
10:09:51 From Brian Condon : Yes – like David Brin.
10:11:32 From Brian Condon : https://twitter.com/GreenwichDiary/status/1242400655966384128?s=20
10:15:25 From Brian Condon : Very wise.
10:17:29 From Brian Condon : https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/03/oxford-study-coronavirus-may-have-infected-half-of-u-k.html
10:27:00 From Brian Condon : Anybody used VOIP cards? https://voipcards.tomarmitage.com
10:29:31 From Lloyd Davis : do mute if you’re not talking to avoid grabbing focus
10:29:40 From Brian Condon : Hi Andy Broomfield!
10:29:46 From Andy Broomfield : Hi
10:29:54 From Brian Condon : Nice to see you!
10:30:21 From Andy Broomfield : I can’t hear anything, but nice to see everyone
10:31:21 From Andy Broomfield : Ok, I can hear people now.
10:32:04 From Benjamin Ellis : Lovely to see everyone – I have to hop off!
10:37:58 From Jon Husband : The physical-distanced version of the casseroles period in 2012 in Quebec .. people marching through the streets banging pots and pans for a month .. obviously not feasible now
10:38:03 From Tall Man with Glasses : Feel free to add a song 🙂 https://open.spotify.com/playlist/42UpuT00Y7L8zl4x3CVjEA?si=ryme9yooQ3Wa5yQ0exvCMQ
10:38:13 From Jon Husband : Re: #clapforcarers
10:38:27 From Al Robertson : Spem in Alium, Thomas Tallis – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Cn7ZW8ts3Y
10:39:13 From Jon Husband : The cannabis stores here in Québec are experiencing a significant surge in demand .. and have an excellent delivery service to boot
10:42:07 From William : www.ChatMutiny.com
10:47:34 From Dd Davies : https://www.dddavies.com/#/statue-of-wall/
10:47:53 From Andy Broomfield : Hi Anke
10:48:13 From Brian Condon : Hi Anke!
10:48:31 From Caron – @pcmcreative : If anyone wants to talk to me about pivoting to digital with a mind to extending back into the physical when the time comes. Book a call. https://calendly.com/pcmcreative/30min-video
10:49:07 From Dd Davies : link above is to images of my statue of liberty built from construction timber. I then do a performance piece whereby I dismantle it. It is called When Things Come Apart.
10:56:13 From Caron – @pcmcreative : Dd I love the photo with the rainbow. Solid construction, nice. Thanks for sharing.
11:01:39 From Tall Man with Glasses : Not sure if there are any classic sci-fi/LEGO fans out there, but I’ve made a model of Dewey from Silent Running and submitted it to the LEGO Ideas platform. Any shares or votes would be greatly appreciated – https://ideas.lego.com/projects/3dbf0870-bb20-4589-9a1c-7b7503e82ccf/comments_tab#content_nav_tabs
11:02:35 From Andy Broomfield : Generator brighton is having a virtual code hack thing in April https://generator.horse
11:04:02 From William : Peter Woolbridge at Liverpool – But if you add me on LinkedIn I’ll connect you.
11:04:09 From William : William Wardlaw Rogers.
11:06:07 From Dougald Hine : I’m going to have to head off now, folks – lovely to see you all!
11:08:13 From Caron – @pcmcreative : Free for the next 4 months – https://www.artsprofessional.co.uk/advertise/conferences-training-events
11:08:18 From Tall Man with Glasses : I’d love to see that 🙂
11:08:22 From Lloyd Davis : Contribute to the running of this ridiculousness – https://www.paypal.com/pools/c/8nIQCx9XTT
11:08:43 From Brian Condon : https://www.watsonbuckle.co.uk/covid-19/coronavirus-self-employed-income-support-scheme-seiss/

11:09:41 From Anke : I’m off, great to see you all
11:09:48 From Lloyd Davis : thanks anke 🙂
11:10:04 From Andy Broomfield : Bye Anke, nice to see you
11:10:12 From Brian Condon : Bye Anke!
11:11:30 From William : Perhaps if you can post the saved chat file on the FB group – that’d be useful.
11:12:09 From William : https://www.facebook.com/groups/freelanceheroes/?ref=br_rs
11:12:48 From William : https://www.facebook.com/groups/142964673673928/?ref=br_rs
11:14:28 From Bushra Burge : great idea
11:16:28 From Dd Davies : Tim Ferriss – well worth looking into what he has to say about pretty much anything.
11:24:46 From Brian Condon : https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1243496858095411200?s=20
11:28:52 From Bushra Burge : I have to go
11:28:57 From Bushra Burge : sooooo good
11:29:01 From Bushra Burge : to hang out
11:29:03 From Lloyd Davis : bye bushes, thanks for coming
11:29:08 From Lloyd Davis : bushra
11:29:12 From Lloyd Davis : x
11:29:30 From Bushra Burge : happens all the time lloud
11:29:56 From Lloyd Davis : yeah i get lloyd a lot
11:30:10 From Lloyd Davis : haha autocorrect

coronavirus, facebook, words

On Toilet Paper

1 Comment

2020-03-06_21-03

I’ve seen a few people on FB asking “Why on earth are people hoarding toilet paper?” or else “Why are people panic-buying toilet paper?”.  My intention here is not to put these people down, but to try to unpick what I think is going on here.

In Facebook bubble world, the hot-takes in response to these questions are mostly “people are selfish and only think of themselves” or “people are stupid and only do what they’re told by the media”.  In other words “other people” (it’s always someone else of course, nobody’s owning up to wheeling out 100 toilet rolls themself) are the problem and they’re simply conforming to the types that we already hold dear.

The other possible reason I can see is “because everyone else is”.  This is the herd mentality and it’s a little different from “because the media told them to”.  It’s hard for any of us (assuming we’ve money in our pocket) to resist taking a packet of toilet rolls whether we need it or not if we happen to see that the shelves are emptying.  Arguably talking about it on Facebook in these terms is driving more unneeded purchases because we’ve all seen that everyone else is “panic buying” and we need to get in there ourselves.

We don’t know, by the way that anyone is either “panic buying” or “hoarding” – these are phrases that we use freely though to explain why things aren’t on the shelves.  I think the likely scenario is much calmer.  People are doing their normal shopping, heading for the bathroom supplies aisle and picking up an extra hand soap and a larger than normal pack of toilet paper, no panic or hoarding involved, just a shift in the pattern of demand.

I think all of these explanations are part of the picture, but not the whole thing.  Some people are stupid, some people do behave extremely selfishly, unconscious purchasing happens all the time to all sorts of people – some people, for example, have all sorts of worries and feelings and habitually salve those feelings by buying stuff they don’t want and don’t need.  We all know (and, at times, can be) those people.

Isn’t it interesting though that we look first to blame individuals and try to discern why they are behaving badly?

Another way of responding to the empty toilet paper shelves is to ask “Is toilet paper just that supermarket product which is the most sensitive to fluctuations in demand?  Is there something in the system of toilet paper supply that means that if people buy just a little more than usual, shops run out of it more quickly than anything else?”

All of which reminds me of a campaign a couple of years ago that involved buying up toilet paper to highlight the fragility of the supply chain with the idea that this would show us all how dangerous a no-deal Brexit would be.  (Found it: Bog Roll Buy Up)

So is toilet paper the top of the list?  Is there a list?  A league table of products in order of their sensitivity to demand?  And if there is such a list what’s next?  Initial ranting on Facebook, at least in the Guildford area, would suggest it might be pasta (though I’m suspicious of the screengrab illustrating this post which reports that Tesco has run out of pasta completely.

It’s doubtless more complex than this – ie there will be products that are more sensitive to different kinds of crisis but I’d like to know if someone routinely does this kind of research so that we don’t have to construct it experientially as the latest wave of apocalyptic disaster unfolds.  If we have a good list we can measure the level of disaster by which shelves are empty. “Oh you think this is bad, I remember one time, you couldn’t even get tinned tomatoes for love nor money!”

In the meantime, please stay safe, don’t get into fights over tissue paper and please wash your hands, especially if you’ve run short of toilet paper and are having to “substitute”.

 

weeknote, words

weeknotes 07/2020

Five weeks later and I’ve found some time to blog again.  I’m having to pay more attention to where I put my efforts – people are getting to know that there’s another helpful chap around.  I am, sooner or later, going to have to get used to disappointing people and saying no, but not quite yet…

  • We “processed” 24 babies at the baby clinic.  To be clear, I don’t do any of the actual weighing, measuring or advice-giving, I just say hello to the parents, make them tea and encourage them to stick around to talk to each other.  3 families had arrived before the nurses got here – word is spreading that if you want to get in and out quickly, you need to be early.  Nonetheless, people really appreciate a no pressure cup of tea with an environment in which they can chat but also feed comfortably and do a change if needed.
  • After that I did my first Lunch Club where I was down as a helper but couldn’t do much until after 12.30.  I did lend a hand serving and clearing and washing up, oh and eating, obvs.  Lunch Club is our monthly meal for older people, mainly for members of the congregation but we don’t enforce that too strongly!
  • I’ve also had my introduction to the plans for “Holiday at Home” which is a whole day, in August, of activities for our older friends – there’s also talk of a Church Outing in the air…
  • We had a visit from a Church member and her family to take infra-red pictures of the church to see whether there were obvious places where insulation is missing or not working.  My favourite images are of the underfloor heating snaking around in the sanctuary.
  • I introduced some collaging to Sunflower Café on Wednesday, although I had to play hunt the pritt-stick first.  We keep trying different things to stimulate people’s minds in different ways.  Just picking up scissors and cutting a complex shape can be a stretch, in a good way.
  • Meanwhile nextdoor we had 180 or so people for Bach to Baby – this month was a piano and flute recital.  It’s a relaxed event, so no need to worry about a little one who gets noisy or needs to move around.
  • I had a good chat with Liz Slade from the UK Unitarians.  We’ve met before through Dougald but since then we’ve both started working in churches, although she’s facing national issues in contrast to the hyperlocal that I experience.   It was good though to talk about how you go deeper than the small talk that can often fill church activities and make rich connections between people.
  •  No bowls club as it was half-term, but the tea-dance went ahead.  I’m still working on how best to engage and involve the students from the university’s Ballroom Dancing Society and bring a bit of intergenerational zing to the proceedings.
  • Speaking of which I went down to the Intergenerational Music Making “hub” at the Electric Theatre on Friday to see how they were getting on.  They’ve started writing a song together and I joined in with getting a melody together.  I’m hoping that we can support them more, there’s a bit of crossover with our dementia-friendly work but there should be other ways we can collaborate too.
What I've Been Doing, words, work

Singing For The Mind

IMAG0868[6732]

I wrote this, and my manager Graham kindly read it, for the service last Sunday about the music work we do with people living with dementia and their carers.

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.” Twenty voices in unison releasing for a few minutes the individual identities we brought into the room. On Wednesday mornings at Singing For The Mind we put aside whatever descriptions we arrived with: “person living with dementia”, “carer”, “community worker” and lift our hearts in song together, joining in an act of communal music-making.

It may sound obvious, but singing together is different from talking together. On alternate weeks, we do talk informally together over games and crafts, coffee and biscuits and those conversations are important to help people remember who they are and get to know each other better. It is good to talk. But we try to balance that with the opportunity to all do the same thing at the same time, to transcend the separation that comes with this illness and lose ourselves in the one-ness of group singing. It is not only a rare opportunity for physical expression of the spirit but also an affirmation of our community.

Half of the people in the room may struggle to remember what they did yesterday. The other half deal with the challenges that this condition presents, some of them with loved ones that they’ve known for half a century.

Together, we not only create a bigger sound, but we also create a space in which the strongest can carry those who are feeling physically or mentally weaker. Working with familiar words, melodies and rhythms awakens parts of us all that we might ordinarily allow to doze off.

There isn’t any hard work to be done, the music is simple and the sounds we make are not always sophisticated but when we join in song we join in spirit whether that’s singing along to a rousing gospel choir’s “Amazing Grace” or just joining in with the “clap, clap” in “Glad All Over” by the Dave Clark Five!

weeknote, words, work

weeknotes 02/2020

I started working as Community Worker at Guildford United Reformed Church in the middle of last November.  It was fun trying to find my feet working in a church for the first time in the weeks running up to Christmas.  I’ve settled into a bit more of a routine now and started writing weeknotes, primarily for the members of the church to know what I’m up to and what I’m thinking about.  But I’m going to share them here too (hopefully earlier than Tuesday in future!) for you, the readers of ye olde perficked patthe weblogge, whose thinking continues to help make my thinking.

Weeknotes for week 2 of 2020

A brief summary of the week beginning 13th January – I aim for brevity but that can end up opaque, so if there’s anything you want to understand better, please do send me a message or pop in and see me at the church. I’m mostly here weekday mornings.

  • I like to start the week with my friends from the Bowls Club who come in on Monday morning to play Rummikub or Scrabble. There’s always room for more, especially for keen Scrabble players, and I’m sure we could make room for other games if there was enough demand. Bowls proper happens on Thursday mornings in the hall, regularly attracting at least a dozen players.
  • I took part in an Older People’s Network meeting organised by Voluntary Action South West Surrey. Very interesting for me to see how many other people are wrestling with similar issues and heartening to know that there are lots of potential collaborations we could do.
  • I’m starting to think about how to build further on some of the things we do and how we know that we’re doing the right things as well as doing things right. I’m looking at all of the activities and trying to see how they could be even better, as well as building some rigour into how we assess the success of activities. I like to frame that as “what’s the best that this group could possibly be?” to stretch our imaginations about what can be achieved, even if we never quite reach perfection!
  • I spent Saturday in Safeguarding Training, thinking about ensuring the well-being of all the people who use the church. While not wanting to drown myself and others in paperwork, there are definitely things we could be more clear about and be better at including it in the process we go through whenever we set something new up.
  • This Sunday was Church Meeting, which is a great chance for me to see people from the congregation that I might not get much time with in the day to day work. We had a very interesting discussion about being a more eco-friendly church and this is a strong theme in the work I want to do. I believe it can be an important bridge, especially between the generations. The challenge is to create opportunities for us to do our bit on climate change without pushing all the work onto members and volunteers who already have more than enough to do. So I’ll be thinking creatively about how we collaborate with others and bring new people in to help around this important issue.