Ruby Waldo is a pedestrian in Pittsburgh, PA.

coo / thrum / whirl: lullaby as collective action

was a virtual workshop held at dusk in November 2021. The workshop was structured around a series of exercises to consider how the lullaby might be a model for organizing collective care.

A week after the workshop, I reached back out to participants to hear what might be lingering from our time together and to ask the following questions.

RW: I wanted to reach back out to see if you have any follow-up questions, daydreams, or revelations? Or, were you able to carry anything with you? Here is a song I keep coming back to when I think of the definition of a lullaby. I keep this song in my tool belt. It’s helped me on countless occasions. Often I play it when I’m trying to calm a toddler down or to soften the atmosphere of a young person’s hectic morning. Do you have any similar songs dear to your heart or any songs you can count on for utility, for atmosphere, for lullaby?

What resonated most with me last week was listening keenly to the voices of people I was meeting for the first time, and getting to know them just a little bit through the qualities of their voice.

I know that workshop will continue to inform me throughout time. It was fun to make doodles with words. And it was kind that you helped that process. It is nothing but a pleasure to offer you my time and contemplation. Yes, thank you for organizing that opportunity for vulnerability! I was just thinking about Penguin Cafe Orchestra. This album really helped in one of my toughest times. Some of the softest and most gentle music I’ve heard.

The workshop absolutely resounds in me still. In particular, the acceptance of and flexibility in our collaborations, and how I can impart that empathy going forward both as a listener and a speaker. Here’s a song that I refer to to give others calm.

One thing that stuck with me after the workshop and subconsciously stayed for the rest of that week was a feeling of warmth and comfort but also vulnerability. There is something about hearing the vulnerable and faithful voices of people that stays with me. Would love to share these two songs with you! The first translates to Seeing Myself As a Waterfall at Night and the second to Island of Refuge.

The lullaby’s job is to soften, to provide a little ease in a time of transition. Sometimes a lullaby is simply a song. Other times it’s a stone left in your pocket. Counting the squares of the sidewalk as you pass over them is also a form of lullaby. It certainly never hurts to hum to yourself, but, what if lullabies were our shared responsibility? Each time you feel called to sing yourself a lullaby, you are also choosing to practice for the next time you might sing with or for others.

In the fall of 2021, Bao Nguyen approached me about being part of a curatorial project they had been envisioning about lullabies. As we spoke about acts of care, ritual, and performance, I found myself returning to past experiences of organizing. Throughout the year, I had been working closely with my colleagues on a union campaign at The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. The framework that Bao was building to explore the concept of the lullaby relied upon close listening, ongoing participation, and shared vulnerability. In my experience, each of these elements has been crucial to mobilizing and maintaining organizing efforts. These simple acts of care had grown in scale from one-on-one phone calls to weekly meetings to rallies to a public hearing. It was out of these smaller gestures of listening closely, sharing stories, and staying with each other that our union campaign has emerged.

Workshop participants were led through listening, observing, and question-asking exercises before collaborating on a lullaby score to be performed and shared broadly.

Later, the content from the workshop and the resources that shaped it took the form of a syllabus. In the spring of 2022, it was published on The Syllabus Project.