Dancing in the Streets Part VI

February 2015

The room was long since empty.  The only ones left were Henry Grant and Clyde Kim, the president and vice-president of the new chapter of NPAPP at Applewood University.  They figured that Quinn would be walking over to thank them, but they thought wrong.

It had been a tough two months for Quinn, trying to make sure that her own NPAPP chapter at Shrewsbury.  The NPAPP orgs on the East Coast seemed to be doing moderately better, managing to keep their members over the Winter Break.  Fred Wolff, the President of the NPAPP, was so concerned over the West Coast branches that he issued a Policy Memo (FHM-52) regarding how meetings were to be conducted.  "These standards are time-tested in strengthening the connections between the NPAPP and our local communities.  Your retention is awful.  I intend to take a tour of the West Coast and see which chapters are really committed to the NPAPP and which will be left to twist in the wind."

Quinn sensed that Applewood would be twisting in the wind soon.  "This was awful," Quinn said.  "Really, it was just awful."

Grant looked poleaxed.  "What did I do wrong?  I got on campus radio, I put up tables, I've networked as much as I can, I - !"

" - and what do I show up in?  You know perfectly well that these public meetings are the only places where we've got people's undivided attention!  People [i]chose[/i] to come here!  This might be your only shot!  You might have doomed this NPAPP chapter to failure!"

Kim looked around.  "That's a bit harsh."

"It's supposed to be.  I could be spending my weekends other ways than giving speeches to sparse crowds."

"So it's the size of the crowd then - ?"

" - no, no, no, NO!"  Quinn sighed.  "Look at this place.  Front row.  Next to the podium.  It was completely empty when I spoke.  You just let your party members sit anywhere, and no one wants to sit up front.  The people who came in sat on the side of the wall.  What the hell is that?"

Before Grant could answer, Quinn continued.  "You can't even tell if this is an NPAPP meeting!  There's nothing here that says "NPAPP".  What is this meeting supposed to be about?  And holding it at 3 pm?  When people are still in class?  Jesus!"

"So you want some sort of Broadway production?" Grant answered, sharply.

"It would be better than this [i]nothing[/i] production.  Like I said, how I am supposed to know if this is an NPAPP meeting?"

"What does an NPAPP meeting look like, then?" asked Kim.

"If you can't organize a successful meeting," Quinn said, "you should get out of NPAPP.  Fred Wolff said that.  Here's what you need to do.  I want you working with the student body president and the various campus clubs."

"They're not NPAPP," Kim said.  "They hate us."

"I don't care.  You'll find an open ear sooner or later.  There's no rule against being in NPAPP and being in anything else at the same time.  There's also no point in just having the same guys here that are here already.  You want to get agreement in people to come here and listen."

"We handed out flyers," Kim said.

"We tried that at Shrewsbury," Quinn said.  "It doesn't work.  They go right in the trash can.  You inform the school newspaper, you inform the local press.  Maybe they listen, maybe they don't.  You put up a set of fliers and posters in prominent places.  You make sure that people always know you're meeting."

"Okay," Grant said.

"Now, the meeting.  You need a podium, minimal.  Party signals.  Green banners, green flags.  Maybe some floral arrangements.  Go to the florist.  See if they're putting anything in the trash, something you can buy cheap.  Something to let visitors know that this is a special place.  March into the meeting all at once."

"We only have seven people," Kim said.

"Okay.  Then play music.  The national anthem, God Bless America, anything.  And don't step on my speech!  There should be attention paid to just one person.  Your job should be to introduce the speaker and close the meeting.  God, that ten minute speech you gave at the end just killed my momentum!  I don't think anyone here remembered a single thing I said."

Quinn should see that Grant was angry. "Don't be angry," Quinn said. "At Shrewsbury, we struggled, too.  We did all of the things that you're doing now, and our meetings sucked.  Now we're up to fourteen regular people.  People are coming in and they're hearing the message.  They know we're around, they know we're here to stay, they know that we care.  We have meetings for the party and we have speeches."

"Who speaks?" Kim asked.

"I do," Quinn says.  "I don't like to have non-NPAPP speakers speak." She still noticed that Grant was mad, so she lied.  "I [i]sucked[/i] as a speaker.  Really awful.  But after I made the changes I talked about, I felt more confident, like we had a real political party.  You could just feel the energy in the room.   At the end, we sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" and everyone chimed in.  We didn't feel stupid anymore. We mattered."

Grant seemed to be mollified. "We have a lot to think about."

"If you need any help at all, in the world, I'm right here," Quinn said. "You can always call me.  But please, please read the Policy Memos.  Fred Wolff could be coming out here and we want to impress him."

Kim nodded.  "I have a question."

"Uh-huh."

"You said that we should have 'party signals'.  The only signal we have is green T-shirts. That's pretty common."

"Okay."

Kim continued.  "I mean - it just doesn't say 'NPAPP'.  Maybe some words that say NPAPP?  I mean...."  His voice trailed off.

Quinn remembered a few times when she talked to people at Shrewsbury that asked if they were an offshoot of the Green Party.  People didn't remember NPAPP very much, either in all-letters or by its full name.  She had been thinking about that for a long time."

"Maybe I could write to Fred Wolff.  Maybe he has an idea."  Quinn had never written to Wolff before; she usually wrote to the "West Coast Co-Ordinator" who was in New York.  She had been told that all correspondence should come through the Co-Ordinator only and that Fred Wolff wasn't to be bothered on "every little bitchfight" going on in the various party orgs.

"Anyway, there's some good news.  This was so unmemorable that you actually have another chance.  We've written up some stuff at Shrewsbury that seems to work for us.  And it's my fault, Henry.  We really need to do a better job of communication."

Henry nodded. "Well, maybe I should have asked.  Maybe we shouldn't have half-assed it."

"So you'll 'all-ass' it next time?"

"Yeah," Henry said.  "Cool.  Can you speak?  I'm a shitty speaker."

Quinn calculated.  [i]Three hours in, three hours back.  Another day shot to hell.[/i]  But she managed to somehow smile and promise that she'd do what she could.

(* * *)

"Daria, you have been a real lifesaver."

It was 3:26 am.  Daria and the editor of the [i]Raft Pennant[/i], Terri Skelton, were sitting in an office of the Raft Student Union trying to prep a copy of the student newspaper. 

"Hey," Daria said. "I'm just glad you found a use for all that crap."  In her 'tryout' for the [i]Pennant[/i], Daria had submitted three articles.  All three were published the next day, and Daria had quickly been added to the masthead.

"I'm just glad I found someone who could write," Terri said.  "What was that bullshit that Maurice said?  [i]Sorry, I just didn't have the time to write this week.[/i]  I swear to God, I'd like to release one copy of the [i]Pennant[/i] that was all blank, and in small print at the bottom of Page One, write 'Compliments of the editorial staff'."

"Come on," Daria said. "You would definitely have room for your editorial."

"Yeah, but no one wants to read my political ranting," Terri said. "Thanks for giving up your cozy apartment and helping me out."

"Trust me.  I was glad. My roommate, Jane, is holding a party at our apartment.  I couldn't take it any longer.  I made an Irish goodbye.  I'll solve things with a shovel when I get back."

"Is that a death threat?"

"No, but it could be.  I meant a shovel to pick up all the beer bottles.  I guess it really wasn't meant for Jane and me to room together."

"That sucks.  I think we're in the same situation.  I'm rooming on campus but my roommate sucks.  She farts.  She's a pig."

"Terri, everybody farts."

"Yeah, but not so loudly or with such gusto.   Hey, Daria, if you're looking for a roommate...."

"Tempting.  But I can't leave Jane hanging for the rest of the semester."

"Got it.  Just let me know."

"You think I'm going to get an 'A' in Reporting I?"

"Shit," Terri said. "If you've seen the trash that walks in here with an 'A' in Reporting I, you should get a triple-A grade in Reporting I this semester, and with oak leaf clusters."

(* * *)

Quinn grabbed her cardboard paper and decided to go to work.  She ripped a sheet of dark green paper out of the tablet, placed it on her desk, and thought.  [i]What could I put in the center that would make the NPAPP stand out?[/i]

Green made sense. It stood for environmentalism, for capitalism, and actually for Islam.  (She didn't know if the NPAPP had a position on Islam, and would read the forums for a hint as to what it was.)  There had been great symbols in the past.  The swastika of the Nazis and the hammer-and-sickle of the old Soviet Union were instantly recognizable and drew up a wealth of feelings and associations.  She needed something like that for the NPAPP, but not so monolithical or creepy.

Her first attempts were based on rearrangements of the letters N, P, and A.  Too cluttered, or too simple.  Did she really [i]want[/i] a symbol that everyone could draw?  It had to be something that would recognized from a long distance away.  White was another color of the NPAPP, and something white against the dark green background was sure to work.  But what?  It couldn't be a logo-in-white circle, the comparisons to the Nazi flag would be unwanted and obvious.

She decided to look up articles about brand identity.  Some famous logos were actually quite busy.  Harley-Davidsons, for example.  Many just spelled out the name of the product, like Oreo or SyFy.  Some logos were instantly recognizable:  the golden arches of McDonald's, the bulls-eye of Target, the shell of Shell.  There were all sorts of directions to go in.

There were hours of logos to look at, and Quinn's essential problem was that she couldn't just copy someone else's trademarked logo.  This logo had to be original.  She wasn't good at 'original', she was a follower of fashion.  But she had given up fashion for the NPAPP, and if the NPAPP needed original, by God, she was going to supply original.

She looked outside at the green trees.  The grass was as green as the NPAPP's signature color.  It would be snowing at Raft, where Daria was.  White on green.  She thought of various winter-themed logos.  A stylized snowflake against a solid green background looked good - but unfortunately, it didn't have anything to do with NPAPP, unless they wanted to imply they were all special snowflakes.

Bored and anxious, she kept looking outside, and gave up.  She walked, aimlessly, through the halls.  It was past 1 am in the morning, time had eluded her and the halls were dark and quiet.

Quinn wandered, aimlessly, through the dorm.  There was a set of flyers on the wall, advertising all sorts of campus clubs, including the NPAPP.  Unlike the NPAPP flyer, some had drawings, art, mostly unsuitable for what Quinn wanted to do.

A geometric design caught Quinn's eye.  It was a set of circles linked with straight lines, the Kabbalah.  Even though each of circles had Hebrew script inside, the symmetry appealed to her.  Here was something that an ordinary person could draw and remember.  The problem was, it wasn't simple enough and she was certain that the Kabbalah diagram was well know among a certain section of the community.  But maybe, the Kabbalah could give her inspiration for something.

She read about Kabbalah and learned that the diagram was an [i]Etz haChayim[/i], the Tree of Life.  Tree of Life sounded great, better than some dumb donkey or elephant.  The primordial energy of the universe, distilled into one symbol.  Quinn smiled.  Now she needed a Tree of Life symbol which would go into the center of the flag, and that would be it.

Unfortunately, when she looked up images for the Tree of Life, they had two problems.  They were invariable Celtic Trees of Life.  The logos were invariably circular and she did not want a white circle in the middle of a green flag, because no matter what you filled the center space with, it would be ripe for parody.  Furthermore, even though the Trees were recognizable even the simplest representations were quite complex, and they couldn't be easily reproduced.  It gave her hands cramps just [i]thinking[/i] about how the hell you were going to be able to put that together.

She tried to look up "tree of life abstract".  An attempt to simplify the Tree of Life down to its very basics.  All she could find were basic corporate logos around a tree theme.

She was almost disgusted, but then thought, "Hey, if it's good enough for a start-up, it's good enough for NPAPP!"  So the design would be a very basic design of a tree.  Some leaves.  A trunk.  Easy to reproduce.

The trunk branched in two different directions at the top and the bottom.  Now, all she needed was leaves.  Not knowing how many leaves she would need, each leaf was the exact same shape, a football-shaped ellipse.  There were seven leaves at the periphery and six bunched up in the middle to make the mass of the tree.

Quinn looked at her handiwork.  "Good enough for now," she told herself.  After gluing the pieces together, she went to bed.

(* * *)

Daria returned to her apartment at 4:56 am that morning.  She'd be in class two hours later, so it basically gave her enough time to take a shower, change clothes, and get a bite to eat.  She'd deal with the rest of the day when she had to.

She dreaded opening the doors and seeing how things looked.  The place did look like a mess, but it wasn't as if the carpet had been reduced to burning fragments.  There were actually surfaces that could be considered "clean" or "clear" by a disinterested observer.

Jane's bedroom door was open.  There was Jane inside, no hookup.  Everyone had cleared out.  Daria decided to check her e-mail and then take a shower.

No new mail, from either her parents or from Quinn.  She closed her laptop and undressed, wrapped a long towel around herself and walked into the bathroom.   Placing her glasses on the sink, she pulled back the shower curtains to take a shower.

The bathtub was currenly occupied by an unidentified male.  He was asleep, dressed in a nice shirt (but no pants or underwear whatsoever) and pretty much dead to the world, unconscious.

This was not the sight that Daria prepared to see at 5 o'clock in the morning.  "JANNNNNNNNNEEE!!!" she screamed.

(* * *)

Quinn took a photograph of her work the next morning, sent it off to the West Coast Coordinator, and promptly forgot about it.

One week later, she received an e-mail.

From:  Fred Wolff
To:  Quinn Morgendorffer
Re:  NPAPP logo

This is a wonderful symbol!  It illustrates the idea of the movement perfectly!  A green background symbolizing our dedication to the environment and a white tree that provides shelter for all.  This is an idea very close to an idea that I had but you have crystallized it triumphantly!

I have thought about adding black to the NPAPP colors, as all great flags have three colors.  Black represents our determination.  And frankly - between you and I - white pants attract dirt of all sorts.  I believe we would look smarter with black pants, and I have immediately sent a policy directive.

I shall present your flag at my next staff meeting; you shall soon see some variant of it.  You shall receive some credit for it; you are clearly a young woman of distinction.

-FW

[i]Fred Wolff himself[/i]!  He had seen Quinn's flag, and he had approved!  Well, not all of it but he was clearly sympathetic!  Green, white, [i]and black[/i], and they sorely needed the black.  Quinn resolved to throw out all of her old white pants immediately.