For about the last two weeks while the weather was getting nicer, I'd been thinking about the possibility of going on an Alphabet Walk. I got more and more amused as I kept telling people that I was going on this walk and getting blank stares in response. See, the thing about an Alphabet Walk (and the reason I hadn't heard of it before this project started) is that it is pretty much only a photographers thing. It is a pretty common photography and photographic illustration exercise as it combines creative picture taking and awesome collage making skills.
Friday was about the most beautiful day of all time. It was gorgeous outside and I had planned on sitting at home and sewing for a couple hours (needlepoint was going to be my thing of the day). But... two things happened. The first is that needlepoint looks so hard. I decided I'm going to hold off on that for a while. The other thing is that the sun came shining into my living room with such brightness that it was almost obnoxious. When I looked out the window at the perfect cloudless sky with a slight breeze running through the trees I realized that staying inside on a day like that (if you don't have to) might actually be sacrilegious.
So I drove down to central, downtown Ann Arbor (the gorgeous Main St. area) and suited up. That's right. I didn't carry a purse, like a wimp. I went handbag-commando. Like a badass. Honestly, I felt so cool. I know this is the dorkiest thing ever, but I felt like an Indiana Jones style photographic explorer. I attached my keys to one belt loop and my camera case to the other. Then I tucked my phone and business cards into one side pocket and my wallet into the other and I walked around feeling completely unburdened by stuff and things.
Even if you're not super into taking pictures, I would highly recommend doing an Alphabet Walk at some point. It forces you to notice the beautiful things around you in a different way. I never realized how delicate the chalk lettering outside the Japanese restaurant looked before or how retro the lettering on the window to the ice cream shop looked. I didn't realize just how many different signs and books and letters there are around us all the time.
Epic.
Finding the letters took about two hours of walking around, but I was being very picky. I found every letter of the alphabet rather quickly, but what I didn't find right away was every beautiful letter of the alphabet. I mean, if it were an Alphabet Slack instead of an Alphabet Walk, I could've had A, D, F, G, H, I, L, M, N, O, T, U, and V just from that sign. But where would the fun in that be?
About 3/4 of the way through the walk I found myself delighted to have run into Krista and her friend Ashley. Not only did they help my find the last five-six letters for my walk, they were also totally polite when I accidentally led them to a Chinese restaurant in search of sushi. Its not that I thought a Chinese restaurant would have sushi... its that I didn't realize TK Wu's was a Chinese restaurant. It happens.
The thing that was so nice about running into Krista and Ashley (other than Krista's obvious awesomeness, of course) was that being out and about and doing something as relaxing and low pressure as the Alphabet Walk made it possible to stop and chill with them for a while. I'm usually such a scheduled person that my first instinct was "ok, make thirty seconds of conversation and then get back to work". That's when I had the realization that this is not now, has not been and will not ever be... work. Even if the clock hit midnight and I'd only gotten to T, I still would've done the walk... and having not seen Krista in something like two-three months... and given that she is, as I mentioned before, really awesome... how ridiculous would it have been to make small talk for thirty seconds and then walk away?
Besides - if it weren't for Krista and Ashley putting a new set of eyes on the walk, I wouldn't have gotten the cool X and Y that I got for the collage. In addition to being along the route that we took to get to lunch, they were also letters that I wouldn't have thought to look for. Krista and Ashley both immediately started looking for letters when I told them what I was doing and found so many that I missed.
I think it goes without saying that Friday was a great day. I got a nice reminder that I need to slow the hell down every once in a while and smell the friendship (so to speak). I also got an environmental slap in the face to get me out of the house for an afternoon. And last, but not least, I got a nice reminder of the power of this project - that it puts me in places where I get to meet new people, do new things and see the world in a way I didn't before. So, without further adieu, here is the Main St. Alphabet Walk collage.
Also known as the best collage ever.
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