Number of participants: 10
Location: Learning Grounds garden @ de Zandweg allotment garden, Rotterdam South
Date: December 9th, 2023
Duration: 14.00-20.00 (2 pm – 8 pm)
Co-conspirators: The SPIN Collective
Ingredients: smoke, fire, cold mud, rain drizzle, fog, a heavy grey winter sky, the gravity of saturated clouds, low-lying sky and drizzling rain, vegetable scraps, eggshells, newspaper, handmade paper, late summer flower elixir, a shovel, a text on the interdependency of touch and the traces of others, a gathering of individuals holding the collective weight of their personal and systemic grief, handmade quilts, pillows, hot chocolate, spiced tea, ginger cookies, steaming spicy tamales, songs, tears, laughter
Soft Score
14.00 Introduction
Checking in
Welcome and introduction, agenda and aim for the day
Introduction to group agreements
14.15 Warming and fortifying the body
Fortifying the fire, add firewood to the fire burning in the wood stove
Warm and fortify the body, drink spiced tea, eat ginger cookies
14.30 Write to your sorrows
Take a piece of handmade paper, prepared from waste materials
Using the handmade paper, write to your collective sorrows
Write to the weight of the grief that each is feeling in the present moment
Write to the grief is arising, in whichever form or content, from the personal to the systemic
[bio break]
15.00 Readying to greet the cold mud and drizzling rain
Prepare to leave the warm dry hut
Dress warmly for the rain and mud that awaits
15.15 Reading and circling
Form a circle around one of the garden beds, in the front of the garden
Together listen to an excerpt from What World is This? by Judith Butler as it is read out loud
Listen together how touch, reciprocity and the traces of others creates a relationship of bodies to one another, living bodies, objects, earth, air, fire, and water
15.40 Sharing
Together take turns reading out loud or reading in silence what has emerged during the collective writing in the hut
Breathe and give space for a pause to what is spoken out loud or in silence
Give recognition to water vapour emerging from the exhalation of breathing, speaking bodies and how it meets with the cold drizzle and the mist
16.10 Preparing for a burial
Take turns digging a hole using one of the shovels in the garden
Introduction to the late summer flower elixir, prepared a few months ago, when the ground was dry and saturated with the warmth of the August sun
16.25 Composting
Add the written letters to the freshly dug holes
Add any kitchen scraps and other organic waste that each has brought from their living spaces
16.35 Burying
Close the holes, using bare, wet hands
Take a moment to acknowledge the slick, cold muddy ground and how it meets hands and fingers awash with drizzle
16.55 Toasting sorrows
Pass around the bottle containing the late summer flower elixir
Each makes a toast to the ground, to what was buried and now ready to be composted
Take a moment to acknowledge and give gratitude to all that has been shared, and what these experiences embody in building and fortifying the collective body even in the face of such immense, and overwhelming sorrow
17.05 Reentry
Exit the cold and the drizzle
Enter into the warm hut
[bio break]
17.20 Warming and fortifying the body
Add firewood to the glowing embers in the wood stove
Share and enjoy hot food and how it warms and fortifies the body
Drink hot chocolate, devour spicy tamales
18.20 Check in and reflection
A listening round to check in with the collective gathering
18.50 Digesting and resonating
Introduce and experiment with different practices for digesting and resonating with what has transpired so far in the soft score
Practices can include humming, singing, sharing experiences, listening and feeling into the crackling fire
Quilts, food, fire, and warmth are offered as support
19.45 Final round and reflections
20.00 End
