Last week, a few kids in the Arts & Smarts program decided to put together a domino run. It turned into a two-day project with the first day filled with sorting and organizing the dominos as well as discussing and planning the run. The second day was time to get down to the business of setting all the dominoes up in an interesting pattern.
Anyone who has built a domino run knows that there is a serious danger of losing all your work if one stray bump or a lone vibration sets the chain reaction into motion before you’re ready. To guard against a complete loss, the three kids working on the domino run left gaps between each of their sections. Only when they were ready to topple the entire domino run did they fill in the gaps.
As Jane Vickers and I watched this slow and deliberate final step, she observed, “You know, that’s a lot like Patchwork. Filling the gaps.”
I agreed with Jane as I watched the final dominoes lowered carefully into place. So much of what Patchwork does is like those final, key dominoes. The gaps filled aren’t large, but they’re enough to stop someone’s momentum. We help fill the spaces and bridge the gaps between so many other services and resources in people’s lives. Our contributions may not be large, but they carry the momentum onward so the chain reaction won’t stop. Hopefully with our help people will move into better, more stable times in their lives.
Once the domino run was complete, everyone gathered around to watch. One of the kids set the chain reaction in motion and the dominoes started to fall. We discovered that the alignment wasn’t perfect in a couple spots, but that was ok because there were plenty of people available to help things along—yet another similarity to Patchwork and what we do within the community.
Soon the dominoes had all fallen. We’d made it to the end. Everyone cheered.