Agreements of Support and Dissent

1. Run when you can

Can I play if I'm not a runner? 

Very much yes, and please do. You don't have to run, though you will run around, and I might be able to trick you into enjoying running. These games started in a conversational space in my mind when I was running too much and thinking too much and I saw that it could be an art form. I hope we can continue to do too much of these two things together, and maybe add feeling too much.

So no don't have to run or be a runner. However, you do need to be happy to run around. These aren't board games. 

At the same time, they aren't sport nor a workout, though I have been building them to include athletic exertion. In some moments they approximate theater games or dance, both of which can be quite exertive, but they aren't those either. "Sui generis" is the term- "it's own thing." Maybe it's best to think of three bits- a bit brain, a bit heart, a bit body. Running and having funny ruminations and mediations while running were a big part of what inspired this idea for me. I started to see some of the creative space that emerges at the end of a tired body and mind, and wanted to see how to make this into an art form. 

Behind it all, I will say this: in in these agreements/instructions/and nullifications, I ask you to run yourself without running over yourself. It's a Goldilocks problem (not too hot, not too cold.) I'm hoping to design this to make it easy for you to really run around in a way that holds your boundaries while it expands them. Most of these games/sets and pieces do ask you to move, sometimes at a high rate of speed. Many work better with running. But you don't have to. I don't want anyone to not come because of knee problems, or even a shyness about athleticism. 

My hope is to create conditions where it feels entirely appropriate and natural to move with big and exhausting athletic vigor. Go slow if need to, or just feel like it, and there remains, always, the option of pulling away. I've had plenty of times in life where I needed to slow down and pull back. 

I have also learned to push myself. I wish I had been better at pushing myself when I was younger, and am grateful that I continue to get better at it as I grow older, even as it gets harder. 

Push. 

These games may be tougher than other exercise because they're different, more disorienting, and so more tiring. Alternatively, there may be invigorating and less tiring because of this. I'm hoping that the differences make it more fun to move faster than you usually do, while making it feel more natural to do so.

 Anyway, you don't have to run, but you do have to run around. 

Push

One thing to remember from the Categorical Imperative is to treat everyone as an end in themselves, and not merely a means to an end. This is maybe the only actual pre-existing rule that I have and will enforce (and I invite you to break every other one.) Kindness and respect are essential elements of this game. People have boundaries, both physical and emotional. Respect them. This means both asking and being reasonably prudent in your expectations of what someone's boundaries are before you ask.

The Categorical Imperative also asks us to recognize the many members in the universal legislature. The other players aren't merely following whatever rules and imperatives you create. They're also creating their own. Help them, make suggestions if they ask, follow any rules they make with great gusto and joy. Be bigly supportive.

I also ask you to invite others to run the tiniest tiniest tiniest bit harder than they're comfortable with. It's good to get out of your comfort zone, to breathe hard, to be emotionally vulnerable, to take risks, to lift heavy. People appreciate a little push and like to spar a little. Respect means not only respecting another's boundaries, but the other's strength and resiliency. I ask you to push into that a little... while remembering that these are moving lines that you can stumble over. Don't be afraid to apologize, nor afraid to accept apologies. But push.

Respecting the game means three things: first of all, it means respecting Prospect Park (I will be very careful not to leave balloon fragments or any bits of trash behind, and may do a bit of garbage pick up along the way) and the people in it. Respect strangers just as you respect your fellow players, or even moreso, as they haven't explicitly consented to playing (although I do think it will be fun to ask.)

Second, follow the game, and push yourself into the game (the advice I gave above about respecting boundaries while also pressing up against them.) 

Third, please feel free to communicate to me. This is an experiment, and not everything is going to work, so feel free to help out and make suggestions. I'm also sometimes clumsy and a bit odd and rough hearted. I want to push, but if asked, am more than happy to ease back, as I am happy to apologize. I will try to do my best, and need your help to do so, and your forgiveness when I trip up.

Disobeying the game means that you can play it however you want, and can make rules to break rules (all except for the respect others rule, though I suppose, with proper consent, this one could be broken.) Jury Nullification is an essential element of it.

I will be facilitating and bringing in different versions of the pieces and sets, including sports equipment and pens and paper, and am thinking of getting a bunch of old army uniforms because they're pretty good for rolling around in dirt, and many days it will probably be me curating the sequences of games and leading the day. 

But an essential element of Calvinball is sharing of autonomy and agency. You make your own choices (maybe sometimes a coin will make them for you.) In some games, such as the meditations, your choices won't affect anything outside of your own mind. In others, such as Exquisite Corpses or modified Improv games, your choices interact with other's. In other games, such as Conductor or Silly Runner, your choices will explicitly direct others. 

But this game isn't about choices. 

It is about creation and rules. 

So feel free to run over me, interrupt, engage in the most outrageous dissent and disobedience and jury nullification. Write big weird rules, and break whatever rule in whatever way you think is best.