December 2009 

Now six months into “Patchwork,” having been working now from June through November, trying to get a better “sense of place” about Alabama, my conception of the project is changing. I have been getting glimpses into the complex nature of the state’s life and people.

When I began, I thought that “Patchwork” would center on a podcasts series with as many people as possible answering the same questions about living in Alabama. The questions are hard ones that get at the most difficult aspects of Alabama. I wanted to focus on people doing progressive work on Alabama’s issues. The first four podcasts have been good interviews, with poverty-rights lobbyist Rebecca Jackson, outreach minister Charlie Kendall, award-winning writer Ravi Howard, and activist-organizer Barbara Evans. Unfortunately, in addition to the four people who have agreed to have their interviews published, another seven have withdrawn their willingness to participate.

So having now about one-third of the podcasts that I had planned to have available by now, I have been making adjustments. One aspect of the project that I had first thought would be minor was posting travel videos on YouTube. I had originally planned for these short videos to be mostly road footage, an example of which you can see in the first video, titled aptly “Travels #1.” Since that first one last summer, there are now eleven more on the “fdickson” channel on YouTube. 

In addition to that part of “Patchwork” that I envisioned being relatively minor, I also foresaw a blog being a little more than a supplementary word on extraneous observations. However, now with more than sixty entries in six months, the blog has become a much more integral part of the project. In the absence of interview subjects speaking on Alabama’s toughest issues, I am blogging about what I experience personally, as well as what I read in news stories and books. To look over my blog, go to alabamapatchwork.blogspot.com. 

So “Patchwork” is now about half over, and it is time to look ahead again. In the coming days, I will be continuing my work, heading to the Birmingham area in December to meet with, among others, the president of the Free the Hops effort to allow the sales of high-alcohol content beers in the state. Looking even further ahead, the new year will bring trips in January to the Tuscaloosa area to meet with two letterpress printers, some organic farmers, and a filmmaker; and in February to the Auburn area to meet with a printer/designer and the with head of Auburn University’s ECDI. Looking on to the spring, I will be traveling to the Dothan and Huntsville areas, too.