The Sheep a Day Project

[sheepaday]

I don’t remember the band playing that night, but I think it was a CD release party. I remember being thanked a lot. “Thank you guys so much for coming out. It means a lot to us” said the 30-something lead singer who tugged at the hem of his buffalo plaid button down.  

I do remember it was standing room only at the Secret Society, the dark Victorian-era ballroom lined with red stage curtains. My friends and I sidled up to a high top table with another trio of 20-something women. We were all drinking the venue’s signature Moscow Mule, sans copper mugs. “They only serve the copper mugs in the bar” one of the women at the table told us. 

I had first heard about the Secret Society from Jason, when he had asked our friend Johannes where the Portland swing dancers go on Friday nights. We didn’t go on that particular Friday, but when Jason visited for Portland Design week, we ended up at a Russian Roulette-style storytelling show held in the ballroom. I remember sitting in the very last row, long after the host said goodnight and the bartenders walked around picking up empty popcorn bags and plastic cups rattling with lime wedges and black straws. We sat there in the warm theater-like glow talking about stories and design concepts and our families. Our knees brushed together, then our hands. We shared our first kiss later that night. 

The remnants of that night, just a month before, hung my mind as I climbed the stairs to the speakeasy-like venue. In those early days of the long distance relationship, I clutched my phone, always, eager for the screen to light up with any sort of message. When I was with friends, however, I tried to be present, to put my phone away. My mind didn’t always follow. 

Maybe this is why I don’t remember the band that night. But I do remember pulling out my little Moleskine journal, talking to the women who shared our table in between sets, sipping our Moscow Mules.

November 5: This sheep artist was the one who let us in on the “copper mugs in the bar only” intel. She also seemed to know quite a bit about the band we were seeing, including where they had played previously and the names of the band members. I have no evidence to back this up, but I like to think that she had some burgeoning romance involving the buffalo plaid shirt singer. Her sheep looks rather innocent, though. 

November 6: This self-aware sheep would like you to know that it is indeed a sheep and not a pig, despite what features may lead you to believe otherwise. This sheep artist laughed throughout the whole drawing process, which is how I would probably react if a random woman in a bar asked me to put down my Moscow Mule and draw a sheep. To be fair, the lighting in the ballroom is like sitting in a movie theater right before a show starts. Not exactly museum-quality.

[sheepaday]

My coworker Doug is tall, bald, and usually smiling. The latter may be a byproduct of getting to work in the beer industry for the past couple decades. We’re all a little jolly around these parts. 

Doug is the type of person who writes that he’s “away on holiday” on his out-of-office message and regularly takes photos of glazed lamb chops and enviable charcuterie platters-- I know because I follow him on Instagram. I also pegged Doug to be a good sport about drawing a sheep, and I was right. He set down his pint glass on the edge of a shelf holding 22oz. Belgian imports and sketched this woolly, shifty-eyed lamb in the midst of a beer release party at Belmont Station, one of Portland’s most beloved bottle shops. 

“Join us for a beer later, if you can.” My invitation to this particular beer release party had come earlier in the day, directly from Rob Widmer. Rob, along with his brother Kurt, founded one of Portland’s oldest craft breweries in the mid-80's, and their office was within earshot of the desk where I answered phones and brewery-related questions 30 hours a week. It may be worth mentioning that I had originally asked Rob to draw a sheep at Belmont Station on this night. “I think I would need a few more beers to do that.” Fair enough, Rob. 

Sheep drawing, I learned, was an activity for the young, the brave, the kind, and the mildly intoxicated. My tactic when I was out at night was to approach an appropriately lively group because they would 1) usually recruit their most creative member and 2) a random stranger approaching you and asking you to draw a sheep when you've been drinking is not as strange as when you're sober. At least that's what I imagine. 

Fortunately, there are plenty of young, brave, kind, and slightly intoxicated souls out in the world, and I'm lucky to have met so many of them during this year. Thanks to Doug for joining their ranks.

[sheepaday]

Sheep Nov 3 This bearded sheep was not drawn, as some Northwest dwellers might think, by the head coach of the Portland Timbers. That's the other Caleb Porter. This sheep was sketched out by the gangly 23-year-old rolling cream-colored paint in the basement of my Portland rental. A tall, red-headed Southerner, Caleb found himself in Portland for a stint with the National Guard. After his National Guard buddy Aaron convinced him to help paint his girlfriend's basement room at the house she had just moved into, Caleb found himself in my living room, drawing a sheep. For about a month Caleb orbited our house and became a semi-permanent fixture on the blue chaise lounge in the corner of the living room. He and Aaron finished painting the basement, (I'm fairly certain the previous bright red color was one of the factors that had driven the former roommate to the brink of a psychotic break.) and suddenly our quiet home was alive with this strange new crew. Along with Caleb and Aaron, the roommates cracked open beers, made sweet potato fries, and played Mystery Date, the 1965 board game in which each player collects three pieces of an outfit to prepare for the young man about to show up at the door. Once you've assembled three pieces of, say, your beach date attire (swimsuit! sandals! smart little cover up!), you open the door to reveal your very own Mystery Date! You hope that the gentleman on the other side also got the memo that you're headed to the coast. More often than not, there seems to be some communication breakdown (why are you wearing a tux? I thought we were going to the beach, not the opera!). Either that, or you open the door to reveal the dud. The dud, we observed, looked a lot like a 25-year-old Portland guy hanging out in front of the Hawthorne Theater, smoking weed before an Anthrax show. These nights of hanging out and laughing in the living room were short-lived. Caleb stopped coming by the house, the blue chaise lounge remained empty, and Mystery Date sat on the bookshelf, collecting dust. The roommates didn't gather in the living room to spend time together. We converged in various combinations, but never all four at the same time. I never would have credited Caleb as the temporary glue of our eventually dysfunctional house, but it seems that he was. Months later we would remember that night playing Mystery Date in the living room, when we thought our house would be lively and fun and one happy family. We were wrong. That happiness wore down, that night was a memory, and this sheep artist was filed under "almost friends."

[sheepaday]

Before I met Collin I wouldn't have been able to identify the Iron Man symbol emblazoned on his sheep drawing. I had also never heard of CrossFit or the Paleo diet or people who routinely get up at 5:00 in the morning to work out. Consider me enlightened. Collin is a passionate physical education teacher, the youngest board member for SHAPE America, a podcast host, and the most accomplished goal-setter I've met. (As in, he actually accomplishes the goals he makes for himself.) He's also a great friend and my college roommate Angie's husband. But before that he was "the guy we met at church who happened to live in our apartment complex." Soon after that he was promoted to "the guy Angie is dating." This, of course, meant that we talked about him a lot. The moment I realized Angie and Collin were destined to be together, Angie and I were standing in the kitchen of our rented condo in Bend. She held up a blue piece of cardstock printed with a clipart unicorn standing majestically under an arc of Microsoft Office word art that read "Happy Birthday, Angie! May your wildest dreams come true!" "Look at this!" Angie gestured the unicorn card toward me. She didn't have to say much else. "I know!" These are the types of profound conversations you can have with someone you've lived with for the better part of five years. The magic of the unicorn card, inserted into this early juncture of their relationship, was that it was so quintessentially Angie. It tapped into this bizarre, quirky humor we had shared with our closest college friends, and a side of Angie most casual acquaintances didn't really know about. "This is like something we would make for each other!" "I know!" I visited Angie and Collin in Bend this past weekend and held their 11-day-old baby boy while their two-year-old daughter danced around the living room to repetitive toddler music videos. Collin looked over at me while queuing up the next one, featuring a cast of cute monsters who sing about jumping. "This is our life now." I think that's part of the wonder of growing up, realizing that the friends you knew before they got married now have a mortgage, a remodeling project, and two little people who rely on them for the world. And just beyond the living room where I sat with the baby and the jumping two year-old, I could see the unicorn picture, still hanging on the fridge, still standing majestically, declaring "May your wildest dreams come true!"

[sheepaday]

"Do it all! Do it all!" One of the most vivid and lasting memories I have of my college friend Julie is of her jumping up and down in the middle of my dorm room yelling "Do it all! Do it all!" This was the end of freshman year, and the floor on which Julie was enthusiastically jumping was strewn with class schedules and college catalogs and several 19-year-old women trying to make life decisions. These particular life decisions were about majors and minors and what classes to take in order to earn those degrees. At one point Julie figured out that she could double-major and double-minor in some combination of disciplines I can't quite recall. Hence the jumping. Though it didn't all add up to a double-major/double-minor situation, throughout college Julie delved into classes, taking upper level Communication Studies Rhetoric and Religious Studies Classes, just because they interested her. We both graduated with English Literature degrees. Julie now lives in San Francisco, where she's pursuing a graduate degree in social work. She's involved in a beautiful church that's deeply committed to caring for people in the city. When we get together I hear about the church services they hold at the women's prison and the way they're working to make the church more inclusive for the LGBTQ community. I've always loved being Julie's friend because talking to her is like running through the range of human experiences. We always laugh-- Julie has the most amazing laugh-- and I leave with some piece of conversation that shifts my perspective and pushes me to think differently. One of the last times we got together, we sat outside Philz Coffee in San Francisco and talked about relationships and money and social justice. And then a bird pooped on my head and we crammed ourselves into the tiny coffee shop bathroom and laughed and laughed while Julie helped me wash out my hair in the bathroom sink. At the heart of Julie's drive to "Do it all" has been, I think, a desire to learn as much as she can in order to affect change and help people around her. Julie is a shining light and breath of fresh air to the people in her little slice of San Francisco. And to me, she's the dear friend who will clean bird poop out of my hair in a coffee shop bathroom while asking about how I'm adjusting to life in Portland. She also drew this sheep.

[sheepaday]

In the middle chapters of The Little Prince, the mysterious little boy journeys to other planets in his strange, tiny galaxy. He makes visits with a king, a vain man who wants to be admired, a drunkard, a businessman, a lamplighter, and a geographer. Each of the interactions leaves the Little Prince more and more puzzled. Why do each of these men spend so much time counting stars, lighting the same lamp over and over, and making maps that no one will ever see? "Grown-ups are certainly very very strange." he says. In October of the year I did the sheep project, I started a new job, and I felt a bit like the Little Prince visiting his strange planets. Even though I was working at a brewery and there was a steady stream of brewers carrying pitchers of beer by my desk, it was the most corporate environment I had worked in. There were a lot of phrases like "gross margin" and GL codes and a mysterious corporate ladder fit for climbing. Compared to the private school where I had spent the previous five years, this was quite a change. For the first few weeks, I kept the sheep project quiet. I didn't want my new coworkers in this serious new job to think I was absolutely ridiculous. After a few weeks, though, I was desperate for sheep. I asked several coworkers all in one afternoon, answering lots of questions about the project. And here's the good news: none of them thought I was absolutely ridiculous (maybe only slightly so). I also learned, thankfully, that people are more dimensional than their jobs, even if they do use the phrase "gross margin" in regular conversation. Unlike the cast of characters The Little Prince meets on his interplanetary journey, I quickly realized that my coworkers had interesting lives outside of our corporate 9-5 ones. They were journalists and moms and homebrew enthusiasts. And they were crazy enough to draw sheep for their new, strange coworker. Work Sheep October 28: Nick, the homebrewer who held the company record for the highest score on the Cicerone test. October 29: Bill, who once stood by my desk for 45 minutes sampling all the flavors in a 5-pound box of chocolate one of the vendors sent during the holidays. October 30: Anna, a sassy and amazing amazing mom whom I bonded with over the next year during 2:30 tea time in the Graphics room. October 31: Gabriel, a follow English major who edited an online news and opinion publication for Jewish students.

[sheepaday]

My group of college friends have often joked that our friend Lori is the most likely to experience a major life event without telling anyone. We have all half-expected that at some point we'll all be hanging out and Lori will reveal that she's been married for the last three years, or has become the CEO of a small company, or bought a house, but didn't bother to share the news. She's never been one to draw attention to herself. And so her boyfriend Kevin quietly sneaked onto the scene. Whereas some of my friends have sent out email chains or group texts or spent Sunday afternoons calling everyone to share relationship updates, Lori waited several months before telling any of us about Kevin. Even then, the word leaked slowly and with very few details. We asked a lot of questions. Eventually some of us got to meet the mysterious Kevin, and we were quick to understand why Lori liked him so much (not that she really gushed about him. We just knew.). He's easy-going with a good sense of humor, a savvy business owner (and part of the Portland food truck scene), generous, kind, and the type of caring boyfriend you always hope your close friends will end up with. They also grew up together in Hawaii, which adds a sweet element to their relationship. I must have still been enamored with the fact that I was spending time with the real Kevin because I wrote "Kevin!" with a large exclamation point on the sticky note next to his sheep drawing. I think I've mentioned this before, but Lori is also a master of deflection (hence the amazing ability not to share news about herself). She diverted my request for her to draw a sheep several times throughout the year. "I'll do one later in the year. Kevin will draw this one." Classic Lori. I can see all of my college friends shaking their heads in agreement. Kevin, we're really glad to know you. Thanks for the sheep.

[sheepaday]

Ghost Sheep wishes you a Happy Halloween.

[sheepaday]

When I Googled Haley’s name the other night, I expected the worst. I knew a handful of facts about her from the poster displayed at the craft fair booth. She was a student at George Fox. She was from a small town in Southwestern Washingon. And she was battling cancer for the third time. Some of the proceeds from the day’s sales were going toward her medical bills.

I started reading the poster and quickly realized that the girl they were talking about was sitting right in front of me, smiling. She was more than willing to draw a sheep for the project.

I learned a bit more about Haley from my Googling the other night. She got married a few months ago to a cute bearded fellow. A photo of her holding a sign at a Portland Trailblazers game went viral and inspired a few articles in the spring of 2014. I also learned that Haley’s non-Hodgkins lymphoma has been in remission for the past year and a half.

One of the top Google results for Haley is something called the EFF Cancer Movement. After finding out her cancer had returned for the third time, one of Haley’s friends screen-printed t-shirts with EFF Cancer (either an acronym for Every Family Fights Cancer, or the obvious abbreviation– you decide) and sold them to raise money for Haley’s mounting medical bills. The GoFundMe page for the movement was created on October 23, 2013, the same day as Haley’s sheep.

And speaking of Haley’s sheep drawing, I really love it. I love the one fluffy sheep-cloud floating up above. And I love the girl reclined in grass, smiling, gazing into the sky. I think she’s imagining a different world.

[sheepaday]

Sheep Sometime life seems like a series of instances in which I realize I'm kind of a snob about things. Coffee, restaurants, those little wooden signs people hang in their houses that make self-declarative statements like "Queen of Wine" or "Coffee Snob." I'll tell you who the real snob is: me. And I don't need a faux distressed wooden sign to declare it. On this day in October I added "craft fairs" to my list of curated snobbery. In late October one of my childhood best friends came up to Portland to sell hand-sewn silk scarves at a university craft fair. Between stints of hanging out at her booth, I wandered through row after row of crocheted potholders, patchwork aprons, and homemade soap with kraft paper labels typed up in Curlz MT. If it is ever possible to be overwhelmed and underwhelmed at the same time, this craft fair lived in that space. At the very end of one of the halls, however, was a breath of fresh air. Well, the type of fresh air someone with a low tolerance for crafty crocheted items and a radar for thoughtful marketing would appreciate. The beautiful pieces of jewelry, colorful chunky-knit scarves, and leather bags were more art than craft. They were pieces you'd expect to find in a downtown boutique, or designs Anthropologie would copy. There wasn't a bad font in sight. I chatted with the brand ambassador Elizabeth and learned that the fair trade company employs artisans from developing countries. I spent theoretical money on a necklace I fell in love with, and justified the purchase on several fronts (fair trade/art/investment/I-didn't-buy-anything-else-that-day-so-why-not). The necklace arrived in the mail shortly after my new roommate Candice moved in. "Did you meet Elizabeth?" And because the world is small and connected, Elizabeth turned out to be one of Candice's good friends who lived in her hometown. "Yes! And she drew a sheep." I still have that necklace (and still love it) and have seen Elizabeth a handful of times since that first chance meeting. Candice and I became great friends, and she feels the same way about self-declarative signs (Live, Laugh, Love, anyone?) and regrettable fonts. She just started working for the same jewelry company, and I love telling the story of how I discovered it, the gem in a sea of regrettable crafts.

[sheepaday]

Every Monday night dozens of dancers pack into a small, dimly-lit tavern on a corner in Northeast Portland. They order drinks at the bar and cluster around tables in the cozy brick interior. Once 9:00 hits, the music-- always courtesy of The Kung Pao Chickens-- starts, and everyone abandons their chairs for a spot on the dance floor. This particular night at LaurelThirst was about two months into my foray into the swing dancing community, and I was absolutely enthralled by the bustling bar filled with gypsy jazz and smiling, sweating dancers. This was also the night someone first asked me "Do you know balboa?" Balboa, I've since learned, is a dancer's dance--which is a nice way of saying, it's not very pretty. It's danced to fast music, with quick steps that don't take up much space. I've always thought Balboa dancers kind of look like two animated playing cards pressed together and hopping around the dance floor. But it's perfect for tight spaces and tempo changes. On this October night, I soaked in the atmosphere packed into this little corner pub. I danced, nursed a gin and tonic, and asked all the people around me to draw sheep. I loved every minute of it. And for some strange reason, I haven't been back.

[sheepaday]

And speaking of the stormy business on the other side of the page, this is what happens when you draw a sheep with your eyes closed.

[sheepaday]

Happy sheep in the grass. Never mind the stormy business happening on the other side of the page...

[sheepaday]

"Scott Stevens, what are you doing here?" Scott was a student in the youth group where I volunteered for several years in Bend. He graduated a few years ago and goes to a college outside of Portland. One night I happened to run into him swing dancing in the city. I think we were both surprised to run into the other person. It almost had the effect of running into a teacher outside of school, except I've spent enough time over at Scott's family's house over the years. The Stevens house is the type of place that always has a random friend or five who just happened to stop over. I think that happens when you have a family of a dozen people-- you get some extra once in awhile. Scott's little brother Emmett drew a sheep back in March. Look at the similar bodies outlined with curly wool, both oriented the same way.

[sheepaday]

This little guy is a dead ringer for Shrek, the sheep who hid in a cave for 6 years in South Island, New Zealand. Robert, who drew this Shrek the Sheep lookalike is another swing dancing friend, and someone I met through the sheep project. Robert is the kind of friend who says hello, gives me a hug and asks if that's a romper I'm wearing (It wasn't; it was just windy). Our conversations don't extend much beyond the "Hi, hello, how are you" variety, but I'm always glad to see him and his wife Julia (who had just become his fiancee at this point, I believe).

[sheepaday]

Design Week Sheep #4: Sean the Bearded Maker On the last day of Design Week, Jason and I ended up in a shared studio workspace in Southeast Portland. Here we met Sean, the bearded wood/metal worker who drew this dizzy-eyed dancing sheep at the end of our encounter. Sean chatted with us (Jason mostly) for a while and talked about his work and Portland's interconnected design community. People in Portland care deeply about creating spaces and atmospheres where people want to gather and spend time. They care about creating and making things with their hands. They build spaces and workshops to teach these skills to other people. The Maker movement is popping up everywhere, but this was my introduction to it. Design Week was the backdrop to the beginning of my relationship with Jason, and conversations about design threaded through our time together. I learned more about Maker culture, coding, and hackathons. In turn, I talked about poets and storytelling and creative nonfiction. We bonded over TED talks and podcasts. I still felt new to Portland when Jason and I broke up, and one of the pieces of our relationship I missed was connecting on a creative level. I hadn't found "my people" yet, friends who care about art and music and stories. But a year later, I know they are here, tucked away into studios, down the hallway at work, sitting in beautifully designed coffee shops. And I have found some of them.

[sheepaday]

Portland Design Week Sheep #3 & 4: At the Letterpress Fair The Letterpress Fair was one of the Design Week events I was most excited about (along with the Kinfolk open house and a storytelling show featuring designers). We watched artists screen print huge canvases outside the rail museum (including a print of the Belmont goats, which I bought a raffle ticket to try to win). Inside we walked through row after row of letterpress, chatted with artists, laughed at ironic cards, and stopped for a longer spell at the booth of an older gentleman who read us a love poem he had written for his wife (and subsequently tried to sell us his self-published book). I came away from the fair with my fists full of business cards, coasters, brochures for letterpress classes, and a pair of sheep. #3 is from the lovely wife of one of the artists (the artist himself was too nervous to draw on the spot) and #4 was drawn by a middle school girl who volunteered her own drawing after watching #3 take place.