One Piece of Paper

This article was originally published in the Daily Post Athenian in Athens, Tennessee on April 28, 2017.

One blustery spring day in 2004, I was walking to my World Drama class at Queens University of Charlotte, while chatting with my dad on my flip phone. He had just visited a building Athens Area Council for the Arts was considering as a permanent home. An Arts Center? My mind reeled at the possibilities such a place would unfold for “little ole” Athens. I was earning a degree in the Queens City while the AACA Board, Capital Campaign, and Arts Center Building committees worked tirelessly to breathe life into the dream to provide our community a creative home.

In 2007, I spent half the summer at home and worked as an AACA intern. By that time, The Arts Center was already a vibrant place for creating and experiencing the arts, and I was amazed at how it had improved the pattern of life in Athens in the few short years since I left for school.

One gusty winter day in 2012, I was walking from my office to the Times Square Subway station, chatting with my dad on my iPhone. He had just been with Ellen Kimball, AACA Executive Director Emeritus, who had officially announced her plans to retire. At the intersection of Broadway and 42nd  Street – I saw my passion and experience coming together in a certifiable “dream job.”

One sunny spring day in 2013, I sat across the Executive Director’s desk from Ellen, who was recounting the day she dreamt up this Arts Center idea. At a conference she was overcome with inspiration and retreated to her room to draft the first vision statement for The Arts Center. She shared that vision with a few key friends, the AACA Board, and in a few years Athens had The Arts Center.

Our Arts Center is a prime example of greatness born from friends working together toward a common purpose. If I think too long about how fortunate I am to help lead an organization that was fundamental in creating “me,” I’m overcome with gratitude. If I think too long about the proposed elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts and the precarious state of arts funding, I’m overcome with worry. But that’s when I visualize dear Ellen bent over a laptop typing feverishly. I take a deep breath and reflect on the spirit of a community that took one piece of paper and built our Arts Center. Then, I look through my window at the water dancing out of the fountain in the Marian Biddle Trew “River of Life” memorial, and I believe anything is possible. We are fortunate to work in a community that upholds our mission, supports our programs, and helps us realize our dreams.

One sunny Thursday afternoon in March of 2017, I sat around a table with several members of AACA’s Teen Advisory Board and saw the power of The Arts Center at work in our next generation. In that meeting, two members proposed a project that would give our teen volunteers an active leadership role in Athens Community Theatre, and allow them to inspire and develop budding performers even younger than themselves. One young actor had an idea, which he put on a piece of paper and showed to a friend. She shared his vision and helped him develop a thoughtful, well-researched proposal, which they shared with me and then their peers on the advisory board. I don’t know if that piece of paper on which Ellen typed her idea mentioned anything about a Teen Advisory Board, but I believe the conversation that took place that afternoon embodies the essence of what she envisioned might occur in the place that would become “The Arts Center.”

I’m fortunate from my Executive Director’s chair at Athens Area Council for the Arts, to see a great deal of good at work in our creative community and I look forward to sharing with you more stories about the artists, volunteers, and friends – within and outside the walls of The Arts Center – who give rhythm to the “art beat” of our community.