Aj Schwanz

We converged! And it was *good*.

But part of the beauty of the weekend happened before we gathered: we, and particularly I, recognized my village.

It takes a village to raise a child. It also takes a village to put on a gathering. In the past I’ve planned conferences, and, as should be expected, hard stuff popped up: lack of facilitators/counselors, registration problems, transportation issues, etc. And lo and behold those happened here: but instead of falling apart (like I wanted to), and instead of having to do everything myself, I found a village rising up to help out in the midst of what I felt to be *utter* *desolation* (hmm: who’s a melancholy temperament?).

• We planned for a very affordable conference . . . a little *too* affordable. When unexpected costs arose, a few groups offered to pitch in and help. We passed the hat at the gathering, and instead of griping “You want more of our money?”, participants gladly offered what they had.
• We had four not-so-techy women planning the gathering. My sainted husband offered to set up registration, emailing folks when there were problems, getting me lists while at work, spending his free time fielding questions, and then coming up and asking me, “How can I help out?” when I was pulling my collapsing leg “this isn’t going to work/I’m so TIRED!” routine. Sainthood - right there (ask my parents: they can confirm how wonderful he can be, and the level of non-wonderful tirades I can pull).
• The facility was going to charge us a decent amount of money to use their mics. I emailed a friend who not only hooked me up with a wireless mic, but brought it to me while I was having coffee (he was just driving by), helped me when the hotel said we had to have very specific specifications (again, collapsing leg routine/wallowing on the floor that “it shouldn’t be this HARD”), and offering to drive over an hour to set stuff up for us if we needed. !!!!
• Again, my sainted husband, who took the day off to drive me up to Troutdale, take care of our son, and make sure the mic worked for me (not that he minded hanging out at a really cool hotel/winery/brewery. I only discovered that once we were there - very sneaky, he is).
• My parents who listened to the aforementioned moaning and simply gave reassurances.
• The prayer group who surrounded and supported us during our meeting time.
• The individuals who would ask: How is it going? And really want to know.
• The staff at the hotel, who helped out with our catering peculiarities, our tendency to dominate public spaces, our late check out, and other issues.
• My wonderful facilitating team, who still seem to like me, despite my severe crankiness.

I love my village: thank you for being present.