Forty-six

“THAT IS ONE BIG FUCKING CANVAS,” Jim Schroeder commented as we stood in front of the wall. Jim was one of the several volunteers from PCAD that had come out for the start of the mural project. Doc had vetted all the art volunteers standing with me. Jim was a senior and had been a focal point artist on one of Doc’s murals three years ago. He was one of thirty volunteers wearing hardhats and huddled under umbrellas as we walked out of the Athletic Pavilion to go look at the wall we were going to paint.

The volunteers weren’t the only ones to show up. There were two television crews and some other reporters there. This had somehow turned into a kind of ground-breaking ceremony. Everybody had to have a part in it. President Haywood, Mayor Richardson, Dean Peterson, Cary Randolph, Clarice, Doc, and half a dozen other people I didn’t recognize were joining our crew of thirty volunteers in white hardhats. I was wearing my red hat and Bree was in her yellow hat. It was bad enough to be starting a project this big; I didn’t expect to have to do it in front of an audience.

“President Haywood,” I said as the man came up to shake my hand. A bunch of camera flashes went off.

“Are you ready, Tony? This is a big day,” he said.

“I didn’t realize there was going to be a ceremony and reporters. Do I have to do anything?” I asked.

“Everyone wants to say something, but we’ll try to keep it short so you can get started. Ah, here comes Claudia so we can get started.” I saw PCAD President Claudia Watts headed across the sports field toward us. Bree had a hardhat held out to her as she came to join us. Apparently, Bree was better informed about this than I was. Thank heavens! “Claudia, welcome to SCU,” Haywood said.

“Thank you, Preston,” she said. She turned to me. “Tony, I’ve heard great things about you. I haven’t been able to talk to you personally before, but I want you to know that PCAD is very proud of you and is throwing all our support behind this project.”

“Thank you, Dr. Watts,” I said.

“Let’s get this started so Tony can get to work,” Haywood said.

“Okay, volunteers, listen up,” Bree called. We’d made it through the formal part of the opening within half an hour. I knew, though, that news people were going to want interviews as soon as they could get them. I just wanted to get people to work. “You’ve all received the initial briefing. You can identify Tony by the red hat. All artistic and production questions go to him. Yellow means crew and volunteer coordination. That’s me. Do NOT forget to sign in if you are a volunteer and sign out when your shift is over. We received word this week that the Gary Ranson Foundation is matching every volunteer hour on the site with a $15 contribution! You’ve got that, folks. A thousand hours will add up to a $15,000 contribution. But we have to document it accurately. You guys rock. Tony,” Bree waved at me to get things rolling.

“Thanks for volunteering, guys. While you are on the job, don’t forget to meet and get to know other volunteers. While we expect that PCAD students will probably sling the majority of the paint on the mural, SCU has some fine artists who have also volunteered, and there are going to be a lot of jobs on the site that will have volunteers from both schools and the community. That includes a lot of the heavy lifting, clean-up, and most importantly, fund-raising,” I said. Okay, enough rah-rah. Let’s get to work. “We’re starting with six teams to grid the building. Four small teams are charged with measuring and marking. We start with ten-foot markings and then subdivide to one-foot markings. Jim Schroeder, Eric Barnes, Melody Anderson, and Amy Garnet will use three people each to do the marking. Doc Henredon and Kate Holsinger are in charge of chalking teams. Divide up so you know your teams.”

People shifted as the team leaders identified themselves. There was some more shuffling as teams figured out who was afraid of heights and needed to work at ground level.

“When the major marks are laid in, we’ll start doing the one-foot marks. And then the fun begins. There will be thirty-two hundred grid units on the wall. Those of you who have done grid transfers for the theater know that’s a huge amount to keep track of. Every grid block gets numbered,” I said. “I know it sounds like busy-work, but this is one of the most critical parts of making the whole wall look right. Take your time and measure carefully. And be careful on the scaffolding. There’s an eighteen-inch gap between the scaffold and the wall. Don’t step into space. Take questions to your team leader. Let’s get to work.”

In spite of the fact that I had my Sharpie in my hand ready to go, I couldn’t. Doctors Haywood and Watts took me to meet Mayor Richardson and the press. Fortunately, Clarice was right beside me. We answered a bunch of questions and I smiled for the cameras. Whenever I had the urge to storm off so I could just go paint, I’d catch a glimpse of Wendy and Lissa standing with the boys. Damon and Drew didn’t understand everything that was going on, but they were proud I was the center of attention and their eyes never left me. I could only do my best. Clarice took over for me and started doing her thing. Thank god!

At last, I managed to shake hands with the officials—more flashes—and escape toward the wall. On my way, I scooped up both boys and gave them a hug with a kiss for Lissa and Wendy. More flashes. Shit!

I walked all the way around the jobsite and said something to each team. The misty rain that had started early in the week picked up again. It was only February eighteenth, and while we had scattered sun-breaks a few times a week, we were still going to get a lot of rain. A huge canvas awning had been erected from the top of the pavilion out across our scaffolding, so unless the wind started blowing toward the building, the wall would stay dry. It was forty-six degrees, which was fine for marking things, but was less than we could tolerate for painting. Everybody was pretty bundled up.

When I finally got to the top left corner of the wall, all the horizontal major chalk marks had been laid in and Doc and Kate were setting up the vertical strikes. I pulled out my Sharpie and wrote in the top left corner of the wall, ‘11-001’. I moved down to the next level on the scaffold and ten feet below where I’d written the first notation I wrote, ‘21-001’. It took thirty people nearly four hours to mark and label the 3200 grid units on the wall. We were started.

The presidents provided pizza and sodas for the crew this first day. It was a nice gesture and they coordinated the delivery with the end of our first phase. Most people went home after lunch. I was lucky that Amy could volunteer this morning, as she usually has roller derby practice on Saturday morning. Today was a bout day, though, so there was no practice. I had a ticket for tonight’s event. I’d missed her first bout and wasn’t about to miss this one. The afternoon left just seven of us on the site. Bree was committed to stay the full day today, though she’d introduced me to Deb Carlisle who was shadowing Bree so she could take over volunteer coordination when Bree couldn’t be on site. Then there were Doc, Kate, Jim Schroeder, Maggie Wright, and me. Maggie had been in Kate’s and my figure drawing class and was another of Doc’s star students. She was a junior and really happy to be on the team. This was going to be the tricky part. We needed to sketch the entire painting. It was going to take us the rest of today and at least all day tomorrow to lay in the line drawing that would ultimately become the mural. The drawing could stretch out all the way till next weekend. We had clipboards with reference pictures on them that were done with the digital camera and computer rendering software.