Spaces and places

This week my occupation of crocheting was a bit of a failure. My yarn and hook are currently in my car, as I have carried them around most of the week hoping for a chance to make it over to my friend's house so she could show me the next step. And basically... it didn't happen. We talked a few times on the phone trying to work out a time, but things kept getting in the way. Such is life, I guess. And I suppose it just goes to show that this occupation is just like any other. If it isn't essential for my day to carry on, sometimes it just gets pushed to the side. 

Now for the focus of the week: how do spaces become places? What is the difference? Well, anywhere can be a space, but a space does not become a place until it becomes a "container of experiences" (Hasselkus, 2011, p. 41). Because of this, every place is a space, but not every space is a place (say that five times fast). In my experience, a special place to me is my grandmother's melodrama theater and dutch oven restaurant in Victor, ID. Every summer was full of magic. We would live with my grandma and spend the weekends down in the restaurant as my mother and aunts prepared for the crowds of people who would come from miles around to taste the delicious barbecue chicken, dutch oven potatoes, salad, and scones. For my cousins and I, it was a marvelous playground. The sawdust floor, wooden walls decorated with emblems of the West, and old picnic tables gave the restaurant a unique feel. As the evening came the crowds would file in, filling the air with laughter and anticipation. As a young teenager I began waitressing and dishwashing, caught up in the hustle and bustle of the magic. After the meal was done, everyone would move into the theater. Red carpet, an old popcorn machine, red velvet drapes, an old player piano, cherubim, the characteristic masks of melodrama, and actors and actresses dressed in the most elegant and beautiful costumes set the mood for the theater. 

I used to sit back stage and watch the cast get ready as they put on their stage make-up and wigs, the heroine placing a feather in her hair and the villain donning his cape and wheeling his cane. My mother was typically the heroine, and all I ever wanted was to grow up and be just like her, extracting ooo's and ahhh's from the audience. At four years old I experienced my first crush - on the hero. I was convinced he loved me too and would wait for me to grow up. And on my twelfth birthday, yet again crushing on the hero (a different one this time), he gave me a kiss on the cheek, as receiving a peck from the hero was tradition for all of the birthday girls in the audience. For a long time I counted that as my first kiss :)

In the fall time, even though the plays were done, the dutch oven restaurant was still used by the aunts to can everything from meats to peaches, and then make as much huckleberry jam as possible. As they canned, my cousins and I would sit on a mattress in the back watching Disney movies and eating TV dinners. 

All of these experiences, and so many more, turned this space into a place for me. It's hard for me to imagine my life without it, and it holds a piece of my heart. That is a place. When I think of crocheting, I think of my couch. Probably because that is where I have done most of the work this far. The couch is a space that is becoming a place. However, when I think of the couch, I do not think of crocheting. My first when I think of my couch is playing my guitar or sleeping. Those are the occupations I connect with that space. So maybe a space can be multiple places even to one person, just in different degrees.

Whatever the case, I'm very grateful for the places I have experienced in my life. I would hope we would go throughout our days with the goal of making every space a place through the meaning we attach to the things we experience. 

References
Hasselkus, B.R., (2011). The meaning of every day occupation. Thorofare, NF: SLACK.