The Art of Community

Before leaving for Wakarusa I went to Michaels to get glow sticks.  All things are better with glow sticks.   On my way to the restrooms I noticed they had their canvas sales on.  7 Canvases for $14,99.  Each canvas was 12 inch square.  I also noticed the sharpies near by.   Well the idea stuck and I went for it.  I got a set of 12 sharpies with paint brush tips and a few more accent colors not in the kit.   I figured I would put them on the table in camp and let people go nuts.  Well it worked.  

We started the festival with two canvases and people did small drawings of things happening.  Slowly those got busy and more came out.  Sunday night pretty much every inch of space had been filled by over 100 people.  One of the panels became a signature page where people put messages or left their mark. Friends. Contributors, Artists, Musicians. Poets, They all stopped by and were intrigued by the project. 

Strangely with the mud we stuck closer to camp this year.  People stopped by visiting each others camp and sharing hospitality of snacks, drinks, tunes and stories.  The canvases made their way around the people with little details filling in.  The paint brush sharpies were wonderful.  They just kept going.  Seriously used them to extreme.  

I got kind if fixated on them to be honest.  Spending a bunch of time working on them. Enjoy. 

These pictures turned us all into artists, children, and critics.  I guess you can take my kids out of the scene but you can't take the mom out of me. Juice boxes anyone?  

Mudarusa

What a time.   Wow. Wakarusa this year was a great but very different experience.  I did get to relax and recharge the batteries. I will probably share several posts about this wonderful time. I will share with sarcasm and joy. I did have a fantastic time with challenges adding to the fun.

Going through something like we did this time is a wonderful thing that takes you to your edge on many levels.  This was the year of the mud, rain, tornado storms, mud, rain, smell, sharpies art, oh did I mention mud and stank, real terrible smells.

I know my nose is on overdrive from yoga, but really wow.  Just wow.  20000 people, mud, and hay smashed into mud... wow.  The people were not the worst of it.  The waist, the rain and mud was out of this world.  

It started raining about an hour after I got there and rained and rained hard.  That was Wednesday night, Thursday and into Friday morning.  By Friday it was mud up to the ankles of various consistencies.  Many people had mud boots.  I did not.  I now have an item I will add to my camping list.  Mud boots.  I don't even own mud boots.  But I will soon.   Good treads,  I am on it.    The shows continued in the venues that had coverage.  The rain continued to make mud and the people continued to dance in the mud.  It was like a scene from exodus. Movement of the people.  Making bricks for Egypt's monuments to their kings and gods.   

Then Friday night the stages stopped around 12:30 and we prepared for the real Storm heading our way.  It had already touched down in Oklahoma City and up north several places closed to home like Wentsville, St Charles, and St. Louis.  We were lucky to be in the woods with tree coverage.  Trees slow down the wind, as long as they don't fall, that is.  The big open field in front of us that housed the majority of the campers, was like the community below deck on the titanic, tying things down and hoping for the best.  They then started chanting and having fun like at a baseball game taking turns cheering on their areas.    

The storm hit at about 2:30.   Those that had not ran for their cars or tents were hanging under an easy up.  It was lowered to the bottom and staked in well.   We hung out listening to the wind and watching the waves of rain until each of us hit our level of, well that is enough, and headed for shelter.  The worst of it lasted for about 45 minutes.  And then it rained till about 9:00 am.   There was minimal damage, mostly easy ups laying around like dead spiders their legs in the air, practically twitching at the sky.   Later people piled up those easy ups making art out of destruction .

This did however add about another 5 inch's of rain to our mud.  Yup.  More mud.  They brought in hay and let us further stomp that into the mud.   The smell only amplifying with the hay.  For once I was questioning this new found sense of smell.  It should have buttons like the side of my iPhone.  Full on smell at the top and hippie festival level right near the bottom.  

Mudarusa 2013. I found I am not all that into mud at this point. I am not talking about a mud mask or exfoliate scrub.  I mean walking through the stuff until your hip flexes scream, mud. I am officially over mud. I missed much opportunity to see music because I could not slosh through it again.