Think It, Do It, Blog it: Simple Pleasures

I am a person who gets a lot of joy out of the simple things in life: a good cup of coffee, a pleasant conversation, a beautiful sunrise. So, I wanted to share some of the simple pleasures of living in Ashland and working for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

On my very first day here, one of the carpenters told me: Working for the festival is great, but living in this area is the real treasure, so make sure you go out and enjoy it while you’re here. I wholeheartedly agree with him there; I love working in theatre, but I really enjoy the things I do outside of my job as well. I’ve had no problem taking his advice. For the past two weekends I’ve been on awesome hikes with some people from the festival. I’m really enjoying working and socializing with people from OSF, but I’ve also met a lot of people in the community through taking yoga classes at a neighborhood yoga center, or from wandering the streets of Ashland. I’ve found that Ashland is a very spiritual community, very artistic, very “intentional”, as one woman put it. The people here care very much about their community and their impact on it. It is incredibly beautiful here. Every morning when I’m walking to work, I enjoy the bright greens of the mosses and plants in the area, watching the clouds pass over the mountains, watching the mountains change colors as the day passes. I’ve included some of my favorite photos of the area.

The simple pleasures of working here are similar to the simple pleasures I find everywhere I work: the camaraderie, using specific tools to make the job easier, the job in and of itself. Here at OSF, the camaraderie is something special, though. The crew here has so much obvious affection for each other, as well as pride in their work. It is not uncommon to hear them talk of past seasons in the break room, or for them to socialize outside of work. On a personal note, I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know everyone. There is typically a lot of laughter during the work day.

There are a few tools in the shop that have made my job much easier. When painting drops, we put bridges at one end of the drop to allow for air to circulate under the drop. It helps the drying process, among other things. The bridges here are designed to be much more user-friendly. I’ve included a photo for those interested. We also took some time to create the scrim picks that Thayne was talking about in his last entry, as we’re painting scrims here, too. We added googley eyes to ours (some of that laughter I was mentioning…); I’ve included a photo of those as well.

The most obvious “simple pleasure” I get out of my job is the painting. I love scenic art. I’ve gotten to do a variety of projects in my three weeks: I’ve done touch-ups, sign painting, texturing, painted two drops, been involved on a tile floor process involving vinyl transfers, and today we started two scrim drops. After only three weeks, it feels like business as usual here in Ashland!

Kira Nehmer