Thank You, Weirdly Beautiful Warehouse

I’m currently sitting here in a chair at the Speak Easy, I came in to get out of the house for a bit and after a great lunch at my favorite place.  I’m trying my best to take the day “off”, and besides replying to some work emails and dealing with social media–I’m for real not working today.

I’m still coming off a great weekend, a weekend that symbolizes so many important things to me; partnerships with great organizations, non-profits working together, collaborative approaches to different issues, seeing so many friends come out to support a great evening, seeing so many strangers come out to support a great cause, meeting new people, building relationships and sharing my passion for work with others.

We raised a good chunk of money, we put together a pretty awesome event, and while it’s impossible not to have a little bit of fear of failure when you put yourself out there for an event like this, by all standards it was a resounding success for both organizations.

Why is the fact I’m sitting here at the Speak Easy how I opened this blog?

Because it highlights the way things work out.

A year ago this week I applied to become a member of the Speak Easy and I couldn’t go to the next open house because I was going to London for Valentine’s Day weekend.  I had to wait till March to test drive the space and decide if it was a good fit for me.

I first visited the space on 3/14/13, Pi Day, I remember this because there was pie and the chalkboard said “Pi Day” on it.

from my first day here last March

I’m not sure in my wildest dreams if I ever thought that the first visit to this weirdly beautiful warehouse on Pi Day would begin the journey that this space has helped me tackle.  I surely didn’t imagine I would have a major event here as a fundraiser or have the Nine13 bikes setup here for the type of evening we just had.

I did sneak away for about 5 minutes at Wheels and Wings to go up to the loft and take in the sights and sounds of the evening.  I stood there leaning on the rail, beer in hand and took in the beauty of the support and love that was being displayed by everyone here.

I reflected on the past year, from missing that open house because of London, walking into the space for the first time, meeting people here for the first time and building those first “workspace” friendships, the meetings I’ve taken here, that time I booked plane tickets for an island far away while standing at the bar here, volunteering to help clean up the space along with others from the community, the old furniture, the new furniture, being a +1 for different events here, coming to the “Middle School Dance” fundraiser here and laughing how I’m now friends with the guy who helped put it on, many coffees and beers here, Startup Weekend, finding success and combating failure while working from here and constantly being inspired by those I’m fortunate to call friends who work out of here.

That’s an _awful_ way to write a paragraph, throw 20 things in there and use a comma to combine it all—but that’s exactly how my mind was working when I was looking out into the crowd from the loft.  A million things running through my mind, most of them totally unrelated to the event all while taking in what was happening around me.

not sure I ever expected to see this type of poster here when I joined a year ago

At the end of the day, no matter what happens in life, this space and very much this chair I’m sitting in have helped me through the many highs and lows of the last year.  12 months ago I was dusting off the passport to fly to London for a long weekend with no idea of what was in store, no idea of how blindsided I would be on some major things; but this space and the people in it have helped me pick up the pieces and be a better person because of it.

Thank you friends, thank you PiC and thank you weirdly awesome warehouse for all you’ve done for me.

-th