Beginnings [May 27]

Lizz's dad stays around and we shuttle people, bikes and totes and bags and all, to orientation at Sunrise Community Church in Jacksonville Beach. It's been a chill morning so far, with people waking up when they want to, though I am hurriedly packing my bin, keeping this, casting out that -- Paul Tillich and Thomas Merton lay dejectedly on the ground, but I get to take Keroac's On the Road, which I bought for this trip, on the road with me. The shuttling across Jacksonville's great suburbia takes a while, but we all get there in time, and I have asked the first wave to bring a good book.

The church building we inhabit is a fellowship hall with all the chairs removed, this big, empty floorspace. Which is good for us. A tarp is spread out while mechanics from a local bike shop who donated their whole day to this tune up our steeds, there's a stack of bikes, people, people, a computer station to process our information. I'm additionally high-strung because my ordered bike gear was mistakenly sent to DC and is getting sped here by UPS, my insurance card, which should have been here last week, arrived today while I was shuttling people, etc. and I'm frantic... until in the company of life-filled, organic people. All of that busyness is taken care of up front, and I shall not worry about it for two months.

We orientate, do skits about rules (including, for "don't speak ill of a person behind one's back", we make fun of people with glasses and from Massachusetts -- I wear glasses and almost went to school in Boston), learn the rules of the road, etc. Tomorrow we build, but for now we gather our donated green Thermarests and lay in the open space surrounded by new friends and snores at the dawn of new things.