Community -updated!

I had such a fun weekend. One that reminded me how much I love my community.

I just want to add the note that back in December, I did an interview with the News Leader, and made my predictions for the 2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs. OK, I said Canucks-Habs, but Boston are an original six team that needed 7 games to knock Montreal out, so I’ll call that predition 75% accurate.

Friday evening was spent in Downtown Vancouver with some great friends, performing an unusual ritual for a life-long Canuck fan: drinking beer and watching hockey in the month of June. The sounds of the crowds downtown when the goal was scored, and when the final buzzer sounded, were amazing. I was lucky enough to be downtown during the Olympic Gold Metal Game as well, and the feeling was much the same. To be in amongst a crowd of tens of thousands, everyone throwing high-fives as they walk the street, the feeling was electric. Lots of cops in the crowd, but much like the olympics, they were present to make us feel secure, not to “keep order”, and they shared as many high-fives as anyone else. It was a great time.

It wasn’t the camera – it was actually this blurry out.

It is silly to try to explain it. Generally and really large crowd of like-minded individuals is inherently a dangerous thing, but the feeling was so positive. Why? Because, as XKCD so eloquently put it, a weighted random number generator just produced a new batch of numbers. Why care if the Professional Sports Franchise in my hometown is superior to the Professional Sports Franchise in another town? Is the only benefit to all the time and energy we put into ultimately meaningless entertainment just about feeling good, collectively, once in a while? Is this a better way to spend out time an energy than curing cancer or writing piano concertos?  Is this community building?

It occurred to me on the SkyTrain home; it might have been the beer.

Saturday was mostly a garden day. Putting out a lot of the plants that I started indoors: the peppers, the tomatoes and the cucumbers, along with a few squash plants I was gifted from a friend. The radishes, lettuce and spinach are already out of the ground and into my salads, but with the cool spring we had, everything is starting late, and I have to fight the slugs, aphids and cutworms for every leaf. More bloggin on this to come, an ongoing summer project.

Finally, Sunday was spent at Sapperton Day, and it went off great. The event itself was incredibly well attended, the bands were great, the food was great (mmm…pulled Pork sandwich from the Crave/Ranch), and it was great to connect with many people I only see during summer events.

The NWEP booth was well attended, and there was lots of great discussion about the future of transportation in New West, post-UBE. We had a “blank map” to allow people to attach post-it notes with ideas about transportation in the City – What works, what doesn’t, pet peeves and points to ponder. Hopefully ,we can use this blank slate to collect ideas at all the summer events we are attending this year. It was great at facilitating conversation, and lots of great ideas were placed on the board. Notably, not all were NWEP member ideas, or even ideas the NWEP would endorse! The point was to start people thinking about transportation, as the City is getting into its Master Transportation Plan process. We hope that by starting the conversation, people will be informed and curious when the public consultations start.

But mostly Sapperton days is about getting together in the community to meet neighbours, catch up with friends, make new friends, get a little sunburned and have fun. Again, it is all about people coming together to community build.

…and have a little fun along the way.

NWEP’s cycling wildman and Ryan Kesler look-alike Pete taking a few turns on his new bike?

Leave a Reply