by Sophie Sokolov, Social Media Coordinator for the North Shore team
It starts with a little banjo picking in the mornings, some tunes to pull us out of sleep. By lunch, half-sung half-remembered lyrics tumble from our lips between bites. It follows on our heels into Lowell, past vacant old trains and tree-name streets to the Arts League of Lowell, a community art gallery. Resting somewhere within the dimples of clay dragon sculptures and just below the surface of a drawing, between the paper and paint, there is a quiet buzz. Here, we have walked into a community of creation, one that we must learn from and connect with. There is a temptation to utilize this creativity, to put it into frameworks and use it as a tool for our own work, but by seeing art merely as a strategy, we sterilize it. What is powerful about art and music is that they communicate in ways that words and logic cannot. When we come back to the Pawtucket Congregational Church, it whistles out our ears.
Ben, our resident banjo picker.
And then, it bubbles out, when I open mine and you open yours and we sing. There is something stronger than words about this shared music, about flying away, about swinging low, about blowin’ in the wind. When we say that we join a community in joining Climate Summer, when we talk about being on a team, about feeling supported, we really mean that we can sing. While we can open our mouths and cough out smoke and ash, and we do much of the time, sitting in a room with others, instead we drip honey from our tongues. In this movement, we spend so much of our time pulling apart what is wrong, but in moments of music and art, we are truly able to build something beautiful.
During this Climate Summer training, we’ve been trained on how to lead, how to listen, how to tell stories, how to cook, how to plan, all the building blocks of a movement. With all of these, we could build a house for our future, we could maybe even live in it for a while, but what would hold those bricks together? Between them, we must lay down that which is soft and supple, musical and whimsical, we must integrate the art and creation fully into our work, or when storm hits, the bricks will tumble. We cannot approach horrible human tragedy through simply utility and measured response, we must allow ourselves to feel and to create.
Pedal Posts from the Road 