A story of anxiety, relief, and a cup I didn't know I needed filling

Back in November I had been booked to go teach at A Frayed Knot in Louisville. I was coming up to teach two different classes and to be the kind of honest I try to be in this space, I was incredibly nervous. It had been almost a full year since I had the opportunity to teach in a rope space and this would be the first time I would be teaching outside of the Nashville community.

Anxiety

So Friday evening Honey and I drove up to Louisville. Once there we spent the first little bit putting together the zines I had designed to be class handouts. Even these I was a little nervous about. I like to have class handouts, but I was worried this would be a lot of work and that people wouldn't care for the format. Come the next morning I was nervous enough to not really eat anything going into our classes. Honey talked me into a strip of mango and some applesauce but I couldn't handle the idea of anything more.

Relief

The first class of the day was my photography class and we started with a short overview of some technical aspects of photography. I'm glad we started there because when I started speaking I felt myself relax into the subject matter. After the technical overview we started into the techniques and drills. First I demoed what I wanted, and then I gave the class some time to work through it on their own. At first things went as I expected as pairs split up into tops and bottoms and started practicing.

A cup I didn't know need filling

And then something I wasn't expecting happened, one of the pairs switched, and then another, and another. In turn almost every single pair that came to my workshop tried the drill from both sides. When we gathered after that first drill they spoke from both experiences almost universally. This trend continued in my second, larger class as well. Seeing everyone so free of assumptions and expectations was something I had no idea I was in search of.

There were dozens more of these little moments throughout the day and the play party that evening. I cannot be more thankful for being given this opportunity to talk about things I love deeply around rope, for being welcomed into such a bright community, for getting to be reminded what all this is for.