vol. 2, no. 3 | Picnic
On the last day of May, you went to Cheesman Park, like so many others. You walked your dog, or rode your bike, or tore across the field on a motorbike, or played volleyball or spikeball, or basked in the sun with your friends, or sat in the shade of a few good trees. And you had one of those moments you sometimes do, where you looked around at all the other people there and wondered about them. Especially about those groups of people, just lying around on blankets. You wondered how they met, if they were comfortable with each other, and if so, how long it took them to get there. How they became close enough that their idea of a good time on this perfect, beautiful day, was to sit around eating snacks, sometimes talking, and sometimes not, looking as easy as the sunshine.
Were they friends from work? From school? Did they meet through their dogs? Through their friends? Their exes? Did they meet at a house party, a concert, a coffee shop, a climbing gym, forever ago, and just hit it off? Did they all end up at a presentation party or a storytelling, and just kept coming back? Again, and again, and again, and again?
—Ivan
Happenings
This week:
Survival Scouts: Stop the Bleed, Tuesday, June 3
Jim, a member of The Company and also a PA and certified “Stop the Bleed” instructor, along with his friend Adam, an EMT, will be teaching us how to Stop the Bleed. This course, created by the American College of Surgeons, has "prepared nearly 4 million people worldwide on how to stop bleeding in a severely injured person". This course can and has saved lives. Two cost options are available and will be used to cover the cost of supplies.
Weekly Wednesday Worknight, Wednesday, June 4
The Company is about combining creative work with good friendships. Make an appointment with your side project this (or any) Wednesday at a Worknight, where we oscillate between enforced, focused, quiet time and optional chatty social time.
$5, or free for Company and Moonlight members.
PowerPoint Party No. 27, Saturday, June 7
What’s a PowerPoint Party, you ask? Twelve people giving 7-minute presentations about whatever they’re currently into. At past parties, people have presented about roller derby, stretching time, Puerto Rican History, and cheese caves. It’s a wide mix.
It’s a nerdy and sincere crowd that cares a lot, and we’ve met some of our favorite people at these.
Want to present? We’ve got a waiting list. Want to just show up and meet interesting people and learn about what’s fascinating them lately? That’s great too. Bring a friend, or come alone and make a friend.
$10, or free for members and presenters.
Future Weeks:
Glint: Crossroads, Tuesday, June 17
True, personal stories, told live, without notes. Pretty much exactly like The Moth, except without the competition, on Tuesdays instead of Fridays, and everyone knows each other (or is about to). Our next theme is “Crossroads“, and we’ve got a few storyteller slots left.
Do you have a story of a big decision? A turning point? A time when you made an irreversible, or reversible choice? A brief moment of connection? A story about literal roadways? Whatever your interpretation, we want to hear it.
$10, or free for tellers and members.
Note: Cuppa will be open during this event!
This will be worth crossing the road for →
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Also coming up: In The Making (June 26), Mary Ann’s Book Club (June 30).
Nostalgia
Do you remember the day of the big surprise? The hard work it took to think of a believable lie? How warm it was while you waited in there? And his face, when he opened the door to too many people crammed into too small a space?
The quiet holiday, with our tiny recess?
The hurried and efficient Moonlight Report, where we committed to rooms and type and documents and going outside? Followed by the book club about Belong? How mixed we felt about the book, but how the conversation was still so good, and so related to everything about this place?
How you finally saw, that last week, that the “tell your dog I said hi” dog was still alive? That you finally learned her name?
Or that day we had to have recess inside because of the rain, and that meant another board game?
How the next day at recess we had a basketball, and it felt even more like recess than before? How attentive Alex was to his team’s stats (and only his team’s)?
The day Marcia came in and greased our door hinge? The photographer who came in to take photos?
The successful Worknight that led to a successful star ceremony?
How that was the week of Jessica’s lentils and rice experiment, and so we didn’t see her as much?
Do you remember your last day with a desk? That really long, staggered slow clap as you rolled your chair away? How Jessica shouted “I’ll remember you by your Cheez-Its trash!” and you shouted back “That’s not mine!”
How you teared up just a little walking back from helping him load his car?
Or the mending class? Lexi’s perfect needle drawing? How so many of us learned and applied and repaired? How intensely proud we were of all our newly-secured buttons?
The quiet Friday, with no Justin or Cuppa?
Do you remember that perfect day at the park, that picnic offsite that Lizzie planned? Yelling “Patrick”, converging on “bronze”; trying to learn new tarot without knowing old tarot; the hacky sack; the amazing Oreo balls; the lying around, the coloring, the easy conversation; the kite?
Bureaucratic Minutiae
Our member (and landlord) Marcia helpfully greased our main door hinge.
Our friends Sam and Elliot mentioned The Company in the latest episode of their podcast, and they articulated a lot of what we enjoy about PowerPoint Parties! Take their word for it and host your own, or come to ours.
At Wednesday’s recess basketball game: Justin and Alex each had one assist, Justin had a bucket “from downtown”, and Livvy had an assist and two buckets.
At Worknight: Ivan outlined the structure of his portfolio website, Lizzie caught up on journaling, Mary Ann B. readied Ridwell recycling, Jacob prepared his PowerPoint Party presentation, Alex summarized accomplishments for his resumé and worked on computing a new “bucketed lead time” stat from NBA API data, Mike outlined a a commercial PD, Livvy identified essential monthly expenses, Chris worked on some low-hanging edits, Patrick made colorful cubes show based on “The Internet”, and Jim chose five photos.
Over the past month, we’ve been working on putting together a community guidelines document. We really love the culture that’s emerged at The Company in the last year, and we want to formally codify, protect, and celebrate it. We’ll start holding each other to these commitments whenever we’re in the space together, whether during the workday or at events. Read the full document here: Commitments
Attendance Data (April and May)
We have a time clock. Partially because, hey, we’re a Company! And mostly because we love having a physical record of (almost) everyone who’s been in the space. People punch in and out when they visit. At the end of each month, we stack up all the cards by visit count in the Fibonacci sequence.
Here’s the belated data for April:
1 visit: 69 people
2 visits: 14 people
3–4 visits: 11 people
5–7 visits: 7 people
8–12 visits: 8 people
13–20 visits: 3 people
21+ visits: 3 people
Total people: 115
People who came more than once: 46
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And here’s the on-time data for May:
1 visit: 53 people
2 visits: 18 people
3–4 visits: 9 people
5–7 visits: 7 people
8–12 visits: 7 people
13–20 visits: 6 people
21+ visits: 4 people
Total people: 104
People who came more than once: 51
Other notes for May:
Notable moves:
Langer and Jim moved to 8+
Patrick visiting strong at 13+!
We would rather have more people return in a month than have a higher total number of visitors. This was our highest number of return visitors yet at 54 people visiting more than once within the month! The previous highest was 46. (Okay except for December which was abnormally higher because we invited a bunch of people to a multi-day party.)
A huge shoutout to the members of the 13+ column whose visit totals stack in a perfect sequence. Lexi (13), Mark (14), Beth (15), Patrick (16), Michelle(17), Jessica S. (18).
Our big love and gratitude to Justin (21+), who for a year now has consistently provided Management with the most company.
We had a banger of a surprise party for Jim! So many of his friends from outside The Company came, and we’re not sure we got all of them to clock in.
Note: We don’t generally record visitors to Cuppa if they are only stopping in for Cuppa. Many people came through the space that are not represented here!
Inevitably: incomplete and messy data.
Note! The punch clock data is corrupted for the month of May in that it is stamping 1 hour into the future! Please note this in case you are needing a believable, but inaccurate alibi. Commit your crimes soon though because we hope to get this fixed within the month of June.
Finally, a reminder that The Company is a member-supported gathering place, and if you know any of us, you’re welcome to pop in any time for free (outside of events). If you know that one of us is here and you’d like to come by, reach out and we can let you in.
Photos
Captions by Livvy
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This issue of Paperwork was written by Ivan and Livvy, and shot by Ivan and Lizzie. Photo selection and editing by Ivan and Livvy. Editorial support was provided by Livvy, Norton, and Michelle. This issue, and The Company itself, was made possible by the support of our members, Halie, Drew, Justin, Mason, Lexi, José, Mary Ann B., Trevr, Allyson, Lizzie, Madison, Melissa, Elijah, Michelle, Jim, Jacob, Mark, Sabrina, Beth, Dani, Chris, Brynn, Will, Marcia, Rebeca, Sarah, Mary Ann T., Alex, Jessica P., Jessica S., Ashley, Mike, Ben T., and Sam.
Do you know anyone in the Denver area who might be looking for creative community? Feel free to forward this email along to them. Everyone loves Paperwork.
😘