Upon our return, the community center was a structure, by definition. It sheltered it’s interiors from rain, it allowed for blown breeze and shone sun to pass in and across. It’s earth walls kept the three rooms cool in the hot days and it’s sturdy doors allowed for safe storage of goods. Even the drainage pipe, soon to be rain harvest, was flowing when rains fell.

But the vision of this project was never to make a cavern in which to stand from the rain. It was never our intention to make an elaborately constructed storage shed. And so we return, spending time finessing. Sculpting decorative window cornices, painting saturated layers of color, lathering the entire building in a sand and paint mixture, and soon to pour an earth/cement floor.

The crew is smaller and the motions are slower. There is a calmness to the productivity that lingers as we all absorb ourselves in each task. Occasionally, a burst of laughter will rupture from the low murmurs of conversation, a laughter that bounces off the curves of the dome and always seems to find a resting place in your ear. These final moments of curious children patiently watching us paint and sculpt, of calling each other over to see if it looks good, and of that crescendo from conversing to laughing, it all seems to allude to the transition of shelter to center. The transition of a sturdy place in which seek refuge to a beautiful place to seek community.