Rural Studio

I’m thinking I have about three more weeks of healing before I can start to tax my knee. I experimented a little with forms this weekend and found I still can’t transfer my weight properly so flow and power are way off. What I hadn’t anticipated with this surgery is its impact on my ability to perform push ups. The pressure in the knee is preventing me from using the leg that way without consequences. As usual I didn’t listen to my body so the swelling is a little worse than it has been so I am going to have to bite the bullet and wait. It’s already been almost three months of waiting and patience isn’t one of my virtues when it comes to healing. I always teach my students the value of patience, trust, and progressing wisely but I can’t seem to master that myself.

Three more days before I leave to take part in the Alabama Project. I am pretty excited but at the same time I am somewhat anxious over the whole experience. When I read Rural Studio, I was struck by the comments from Samuel Mockbee’s architecture students. They all mentioned how the experience removed the abstraction of poverty and replaced it with an awareness that they had never experienced.

For me this project is a frightening step. One of my biggest strengths has been my ability to compartmentalize my life so that I can handle extraordinary amounts of stress. I believe this ability has been fueled by the fact that my mind tends to mainly operate at an abstract level with very little linear or comprehensive thoughts coming to the surface until they have been already worked out at the abstract level. Journalling has forced me to bring many of these abstractions to the forefront of my mind so that I can document them. The experience has been wonderful. I have accomplished more in the past few months at a personal level than I have for the past few years. Rather than just thinking about things, I am putting my thoughts into action. I feel a sense of resolve and certainty that has been absent for a long time. However, as with everything else, nothing is for free. By putting all my thoughts down and laying them out, I am now forced to address the murmurs of my soul. The murmurs that as of late seem to be evolving into maniacal screams. I am now painfully aware of the oh so many missed opportunities to make a difference. At times the guilt can be overwhelming. Now I am involved with a project that promises to properly define yet another abstraction. Oh joy.

I can’t say enough about the Alabama project. The people involved are truly extraordinary and to be part of this is a real privilege. I can only imagine what could happen and what potential could be realized if the 100. were to have the support and the funding to truly spread its wings. 100 martial arts masters across the globe with hundreds of students each, all vigilant, committed, and ready to mobilize for a single cause. Wow, goosebumps. This is one opportunity we can’t afford to miss.

“At the studio I learned that economic poverty is not a poverty of values but a fact of birth. You come to realize it’s the luck of the draw that you don’t end up poor. You learn poor people are like you and me. You get to know them and respect them.”
- Bruce Lanier (Rural Studio Architecture Student Graduate - 2000)