Ly-CAN volunteers assemble! on Cascade Hall

Theo Spurn

August 24, 2020 5:43 AM

Ly-CAN volunteers assemble! by Theo Spurn

Theo had a meeting to host! And he was ready for it! Dad had been really proud of him for supporting Ly-CAN and had helped him with a lot of the planning over the holidays. There had been two important reminders written in his diary. The first had been to tell everyone about this meeting (the diary had coughed at him pointedly when he’d let the deadline for that one slip by) and the second was to actually host it.

So, here he was. He was a host! He had thought about wearing a bow-tie but realised he didn’t own one, nor did he know how to tie one, so he was just wearing one of his favourite velvet scarves draped around his neck. He had got as far as putting it on before he realised he didn’t know what to do with it, and by that point he didn’t want to take it off again. He ran it through his fingers whilst he waited.

He had decided to host the meeting in the Cascade Hall in between meal times, because his friends were all different houses and the place that he most often saw them was here or class, and he wasn’t allowed to make class into a meeting.

He spread out the range of stickers and posters the charity had sent them so that other people would be able to see. They’d even helpfully included some streamers and balloons with the charity logo to make the booth look cheerful, so he thought they might be sorted for decorations, unless someone really wanted to do more. They did not need to do decorations but they did need to let everyone do what they were good at.

“Hello!” he beamed as people entered, “Welcome to the meeting! Do you want to do a treasure island?”

The last point perhaps didn’t make much sense at first but he began explaining - and then someone else would come in, and he would say hello, and then sometimes he picked back up where he’d left off, and sometimes he jumped back to the beginning, but by the end of people coming in, it was quite likely that most of them had got the explanation at least once. Some of them had probably got it an extra time and a half, and some people had maybe got the beginning before the end, but the idea had been put across to all the people, more or less.

“.... or we can take what’s in the mystery box! That means other people’s ideas, but the rules on ideas are that they have to be something a lot of people would like enough to pay money for, and they have to be a thing that we can make or do by ourselves, except for maybe buying a bag of lollies for prizes.” He had a visual for that. It helped him keep track and sort ideas. He and dad had practised sorting different ideas. To determine ‘a lot of people’ there was a column for group members’ yes/no/maybes because sometimes it was hard to just know that. Theo thought that most people would be willing to pay to touch soft things. When he thought about it, he couldn’t imagine that they wouldn’t be. But when they’d tested it out and recorded his aunts’ and uncles’ and parents’ answers it had had more nos/maybes than yeses, so that was that. Visuals didn’t lie.

“Oh, hello, we’re talking about a treasure island game. We have two possible ideas for the booth,” he explained. He and dad had come up with two ideas which fit all the requirements, just in case there were too many ideas or disagreements, or not enough ideas, but they had also left space in case other people wanted to contribute, “or we can take what’s in the mystery box, which means using other people’s ideas.

“Treasure island game means we make a model of an island. Hello! Welcome to the meeting. We’re talking about treasure islands. We decide where the treasure is buried and put an ‘x’ on the underneath of the model. Then people buy guesses. At the end, whoever is right gets the treasure. There are little flags.

“Hello! The mystery boxes should be something lots of people are willing to pay for and we have to make them. We could also have a bowling alley. We could make the pins something fun. Or we could do a treasure island which means making a model and putting an x underneath it and then giving a treasure to someone who guesses. Or another idea but it has to be something lots of people will like that we can make ourselves. What do you think?” he asked the assembled group.

“Oh, and there’s a schedule. We take turns helping. And we don’t need decorations because we got them already but we can have more if anyone wants to.”

13 Theo Spurn Ly-CAN volunteers assemble! 1476 1 5

Quincy Wright

August 28, 2020 4:49 PM

CAN I volunteer? by Quincy Wright

Quincy hadn't intended to do this charity. He was only going to do the other one because of his mom though, so finding out that a pretty alright kid was doing one that sounded interesting to him, not just because of his mom, made him happy. He wasn't sure the details but it turned out he didn't need to because there was a meeting in Cascade Hall. He was one of the first people to arrive which meant he heard the explanation lots of times over, but that was alright. Sometimes he would hear it and get a new thought or a new idea and sometimes he would have a new question, so it was nice to get to hear it a lot. By the time it felt like the whole thing was really open to contributions, Quincy felt like he'd thought through most of his questions and answered them himself.

"Hiya," Quincy said by way of greeting to Theo. "Can I touch your scarf?" he asked, figuring that that seemed to be the way to this guy's heart. Soft things were pretty much synonymous with 'Theo', which was helpful because Quincy was terrible at names.

"I have a question or a . . . thought I guess," he said when there was a moment for him to speak. Well, when there was a long moment, because he didn't want to speak up if he didn't have to. "If I were just attending this thing, I don't think I would be learning about lycanthropes, the charity, nothing. Is there a way that we can make the game fit the theme so people can learn and have fun at the same time?" Learning was, in Quincy's opinion, fun all by itself, but he supposed not everyone thought like that. He thought that learning was very important with charities because it would be nice if people left feeling like they could go be their own advocates or their own charities for this cause afterwards. "I don't know if that's really possible. Maybe just having information available at the booth too," he added quickly, backtracking some in case his idea was shot down or people thought he was annoying or something.

22 Quincy Wright CAN I volunteer? 1495 0 5

Theo Spurn

August 28, 2020 9:28 PM

YEAH!!!! by Theo Spurn

“Yes you can!” Theo beamed excitedly when his new friend asked to touch his scarf. He had accidentally made a touching friend! This was exciting! Not everyone was a touching person, and Friend-O had reminded him during class when he hadn’t accidentally hugged him, so he had thought that maybe his pal wasn’t so touchy but here they were! Theo liked the boy’s curly-wurly hair and he sort of wanted to rub his face in it but that was probably the kind of thing you only did with close friends so he settled for stroking his friend’s arm whilst his own scarf got touched. It felt nice. He hoped they got to do lots more touching together.

Once Theo stopped talking, Touchy had a question-comment-something. Theo nodded to show that was okay. He wasn’t sure whether he had specified questions only but if he had, he hadn’t meant that people couldn’t talk.

“Now is the talking bit,” he reassured him, just in case. It was for any kind of talking, but talking about this. He decided not to say that in case he made it more confusing and people started talking about other things. Like… cheese. Cheese was a good thing to talk about. But not right now. He liked cheese… “Cheese is off-topic,” he added helpfully in case other people didn’t know. “But good.” They were going to stick to the topic. He was running a meeting!

“Oh, I have leaflets,” Theo informed Touchy. He had put them… somewhere. He had put the balloons and stickers and other things on the table because they were more interesting. He had leaflets too though. “We could put little moons on things?” he suggested, trying to work out how they could include the theme in the game. But most people knew about werewolves and the moon. The thing most people didn’t know was not to be jerks. “Or we could write ‘Don’t be a jerk’ on the flags. We want people to learn to not be jerks to werewolves,” he added. He wanted to do that. That was important. That was what they were doing. He wasn’t quite sure how. “Do you have more ideas?” he asked his friends.

13 Theo Spurn YEAH!!!! 1476 0 5

Quincy Wright

August 29, 2020 3:21 PM

Wooo! by Quincy Wright

At first, Quincy was Not About this dude stroking his arm. That was weird and unnecessary. But also . . . it was kind of nice. It felt good and if the only reason he didn't like it was because it was socially weird, then that was a bad reason. Quincy was socially weird all the time and it made him sad when people made him feel bad about it. So if Theo wanted to pet his arm and Quincy didn't have any other reasons not to, then he'd let him. He gave a small, encouraging smile and thanked him before taking a place.

He blinked, not sure why they were talking about things that were off topic if just for the fact that they were off topic. When Theo responded that they could put moons on things, an idea formed though. "Cheese might not be off topic," he said, speaking slowly as he considered. "They say the moon is made out of cheese, right? That might be something fun if we can make it relate. Most people like cheese I think," he pointed out. "Macaroni and moon cheese," he smiled to himself. "But anyway, moons and not being jerks makes sense." The only other ways he could think of relating the two were how dogs liked to bury bones and dig, but that seemed a bit . . . racist? Was that the word? So he didn't suggest that.

22 Quincy Wright Wooo! 1495 0 5

Josephine Clyde

September 08, 2020 6:08 AM

Some assembly may be required. by Josephine Clyde

Aaaaaand done! Josie put down her quill and admired her homework. Potions wasn’t her favorite class, but it shared basic fundamentals with baking and making things was always fun. The writing part of homework was work and not always fun, but it helped with learning and keeping the knowledge firmly in her head. She stretched her arms over her head and checked the time. Oh no. Theo’s Ly-CAN meeting was starting soon.

Her homework went into its designated Potions folder and she took some time to carefully replace all of her writing tools before running out into the Common Room. She couldn’t run through her beloved library, so speed walking it was! Josie powered between shelves and as soon as her foot made it outside the library she took off running again.

Cascade Hall. Cascade Hall. Cascade Hall. Corner! Students! Door! She made it to the wide entryway of the hall and leaned against a door to catch her breath while looking for Theo’s group. It was most definitely that little crowd of people huddled around one of the tables. Breath caught Josie hurried over to the table and made it in time to hear Theo say something about bowling alleys and treasure islands.

“Hi, sorry I’m late. Homework.”

Josie settled into a seat next to Quincy and after flashing the fellow Aladren a quick smile she focused back on their leader. A schedule. Wonderful. She could still make time for the LGBT booth and this one. Quincy seemed to have plenty of ideas, but Josie was super content with letting the others take charge. She’d just help put up some decorations and maybe the bowling if they did that. Under no circumstance was she going to put herself in the position of answering Ly-CAN questions.
Hopefully, Theo wouldn’t notice her silence.

44 Josephine Clyde Some assembly may be required. 1477 0 5

Wally O'Malley

September 20, 2020 4:51 PM

My brain requires assembly. by Wally O'Malley

“Divide and conquer,” Stanley called it. Wally didn’t feel much like conquering, but he was okay with dividing a bit. He loved his twin brother greatly, but the boys were very principally different, and it was okay to separate sometimes. And this was probably the more efficient division, they had decided. Stanley had joined Aunt Peyton’s group, whereas Wally would do Theo’s. They were both interested in both, for the personal affiliations and for the causes, but it was just too much to adjust to in their very first year here. And as they decided, Wally and Peyton would be a fine combination, but Stanley and Theo…. Well, without Wally or Tommy there to dilute the energy, not a lot of productive work would get done. Thank goodness Tommy would be joining them at Sonora next year - mediating that energy was exhausting.

However, there was only so much Wally could do, especially given his own reserved nature. He could barely contain Stanley or Theo, let alone both. Similarly, this meeting of Theo’s design featured other students, and that was a lot for Wally to contend with. Theo began in his Theo way, and immediately, they were off to the races. He talked and talked, and Wally immediately lost track of what they were even talking about. He was glad when Quincy Wright spoke up - thank goodness at least someone got something out of that. Wally just let Quincy and Theo go back and forth a bit, saying nothing and just doing his darnedest to process what the two were going on about.

12 Wally O'Malley My brain requires assembly. 1492 0 5