organic peanut butter!

This should be a rant. A long, fiery, passionate rant. Because, if anything, I despise group work—and slipping this project amidst the hectic final weeks of semester only spurred me to greater spite. My group’s been great this entire semester, but with all the pressure of finals and outstanding homework assignments, we had a lot of trouble getting our schedules to match up. We traded a few emails, a phone call or two, and at last resort met last night, the night before it was due. Typical, I thought, annoyed with my own failure to pull the group together in some semblance of responsibility. It’s going to take all night and be awful anyway and why do we have to do this now, of all times? Of course, this was before the actual work began; before Bean threw the ramen, still packaged, into the pot, before Steve licked raw Bisquick from his fingers, before Chris held the dinosaur’s hand. I said should be a rant. Subjunctive. This is now a full-fledged, rave review.

We did get it done, and it didn’t take all night. Plus, it was fun. Ridiculously fun. The assignment's only guidelines were to create an eight-minute video on the topic we pulled from the pile, and we're not being graded on quality, either. Without the product to worry about, the process become one of camaraderie and creative energy, bouncing ideas off of one another as we were going, never quite knowing what happened next but tying it all together in the end. The process was such a release, such a welcome change from the stress-charged air of the semester’s end. For me, it was not only a chance to spend time with fantastic people, but make use of that time with real thought and action, no matter how ridiculous the result might be.

Surprisingly enough, we started with a clear idea, even typing up an outline and discussing the play-by-play. From the first scene, however, everything was given up for the tangential—which terrified me in the beginning. I’m a very have-a-plan-and-stick-to-it kind of gal, but the boys would have none of that. It only took minutes before I was swept up into their laughter and “go with it” attitude, and it was really enlightening. I loved letting go. This group project taught me that a little silliness is okay (which is another post entirely), that I can lay off the stress and seriousness for a while because it does the spirit good. The boys reminded me to laugh at myself, to embrace improv and forget the camera. It was liberating. Hip, hip hooray for group work (at least for now).

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Also, I love soy nuts. Can't get enough of 'em. Probably eat too many of 'em. Love that my roommates can't stand them and that the entire bag is all for me, huzzah!