This week began with a day off, during which we relaxed and reflected on the immeasurably important work done by Martin Luther King, Jr. The holiday gave us a shorter work week, which meant we had to be as productive as possible during the time we had. This ended up being a bit of a challenge, though, as our first day back at Cahawba was full of interruptions. We did learn a valuable lesson that day, though: if there has been heavy rain in recent days, don’t bring a vehicle without four wheel drive.

LEARNING OBJECTIVE k_ improve ability to organize and use time effectively

Even with our frequent stoppages, our group was able to finish laying out all of the wall members in the field we were using to arrange them. As we went through the piles of wood, we checked the condition of each piece and recorded if they needed to be replaced, as well as which pieces were missing. Doing this required us to have patience and learn to work with each other, as the line of people waiting to put wood down would sometimes get backed up. The slow-downs came from the clarity of writing and attention to detail that the note-takers had to use. This was to insure that when the time comes for us to order our wood and begin assembling the walls, everything will be in order and the whole process will (hopefully) go smoothly.

On Wednesday, the two teams that had been working together at the church were divided for the two jobs we would be working on in the coming weeks, the walls and the arches. We were much better at effectively organizing and using our time more effectively than the previous day. There was much to get accomplished, and much was accomplished with the division of labor among the people best suited for the jobs at hand. Both teams worked together to move the wood from the field to the palates surrounding the church, and after that, the groups broke up to clean out the equipment trailer/site and take inventory of the new wood/joint fasteners. Everyone then got back together to load windows onto a truck so they could be cleaned in Newbern.

Friday was the first day the groups worked completely independently of one another, as the walls team worked on the church and our team, the Mindbullitz, had to procure space to both store and work on the church arches, which are currently resting on beams and being covered by large plastic tarps. We decided the best place for this would be in a field directly behind where the arches are being stored now, because we could move them easily and there is plenty of room to set up a cover. The best cover we could think of was the metal arched greenhouse-like structure that had been covering the old wood from the church for the past year. We spent the first couple of hours figuring out the best way to disassemble a small section of the structure and carrying the pieces down the street to the location of the arches. When we finally got the greenhouse reassembled and braced to a tree with some wires we found at its original location, we were told that we had to take it all down because the property’s owners were having test boring done on the land. This was a disappointment, but we realized that the second disassembly went about ten times more quickly than the first one. The knowledge we gained that morning will help us when we put the structure back up, and we were all able to get more comfortable working with crowbars, hammers, socket wrenches, etc.

LEARNING OBJECTIVE c_ Develop skills in using materials and tools

That afternoon, we went over to Perry Lakes, where the other five second-years are working for the next few weeks. We had a critique for the toilet paper dispensers they had designed for the park’s bathrooms, which was very interesting for all of us. We had never had the opportunity to be on the reviewers’ side of a critique, so it was fun to be able to take a break from work and do this for our classmates. It was a nice end to a short week, and I think we’re all getting used to the Rural Studio schedule.