Confessions of the Weekend: Community Consciousness
This weekend Sam has been on repeat with a phrase he learned from Unique Camp: Community Consciousness. What does that mean exactly? Well, let me break it down for you via Google dictionary:
Community: com·mu·ni·ty / kəˈmyo͞onitē / Noun
A group of people living together in one place, esp. one practicing common ownership: "a community of nuns". All the people living in a particular area or place: "local communities".
Con·scious·ness /ˈkänCHəsnəs / NounThe state of being awake and aware of one's surroundings. The awareness or perception of something by a person.
This phrase was the theme for the weekend. We got down and dirty with our city and our neighborhood. We explored Atwater Village even more than our normal hangouts, we participated in CICLAVIA, and crossed the 5 to Los Feliz. Most of these journeys were made via bike but we really meet the challenge to dive into the heart of our city—so much to do and see which just fueled our inspiration even more.
The back-story on why this happened: During Unique Camp, Sam checked out Whitney Chamberlin and Guillaume Wolf's classes about branding and community consciousness. Afterwards, he shared with me his learnings from class and it was apparent that Sam was not only inspired but energized by what both men had shared. This energy continued to follow me as I went back to my cabin to meet with my bunk mates. Each of us exchanged stories of our classes that day but you could see that the spark Whitney and Guillaume ignited during their discussions was still blazing high in their students. So Sam set the challenge this week: we needed to SEE what our neighborhood and city was all about. We set out to experience the neighborhood and our city with this phrase in mind while keeping our eyes and hearts open. Doing so we jammed pack our weekend with the below:
- Met some new people; something challenging to do in LA.
- Explored the Los Angeles River. We did a grab n' go from Anthony Bourdain's favorite taco stand in LA, Tacos Villa Corona. From there we biked to a beautiful spot down by the river and practiced our instagram video skills.
- Spent time sharing our ambitions and goals with our friends. Friday was devoted to the bar crawl at the Morrison and the Roost with our new neighbor. While Saturday was spent enjoying BBQ mac n' cheese with my good friend at Hyperion Public and Sam chilled with the guys getting his jukebox jams on at Public House. Then it was all about brunch at Canele with Sarah from Very Sarie, in which we spoiled ourselves with ricotta coffee cake and a London Mary for me. (Can you believe I still managed to bike for 5 miles afterwards without a nap?).
- From there, the adventure landed us at CICLAVIA where after 10 years of living in this city, I have never seen it in this way. No cars—just everyone sharing the open road, enjoying the architecture of Wilshire, the invasion of food trucks and the Californian sun.
Now that it's time to get back to work, Sam and I can honestly say we made the most of this challenge and our weekend. Discovering more about where we live and getting out there to see what makes it tick.