This writing wirkshop was entited "Write down your stories with sensations". The person who facilitated the workshop was in the Netherlands hackerspaces camp and he had scheduled a whiskey tasting meet up at their camp the night before. Their camp also participated in the camp tour, which happened directly after the whiskey tasting time slot. As you may have observed, l am whiskey. l could not find their camp before the tour and missed the tasting. l decided to go to the camp the next morning. l am racialized, AFAB, NB; the camp is vast majority cis yt male except one woman who indicated at the tour that she is from Turkey.
l enter the tent; everyone bury their heads further into their screens, tapping faster on their keyboards. The smell of suppressed morning b.o. stays just below the offensiveness threshold. It's something l've seen many times before, as if l have "reparations now" written across my chest.
A glance of recognition of my presence is acknowledgement of debt.
They can feel the air compress toward them as l approach, like the draft moving the hair on their arms and legs from a 20ft tall subwoofer. They were prepared to avert their gaze as l enter, like they put on earplugs before the music begins. l look at my mirror, then selfie cam. No resting bitch face, in fact, l look well rested and am smiling slightly from the bliss l had been feeling prior to entering.
l see a bottle of whiskey and l help myself to a splash in the glass l already had in hand. The bottle felt warm, and did not imply premiumness, but it looked acceptable. Single malt Dutch whiskey is not something l have even heard of before. l did not even have time to have a whiff of the stuff before a man calls out, "is that your whiskey?"
l said, "no one acknowledged l am here, so l helped myself. It came from over there," pointing to a table in the corner.
This man says, "this is not nice, you are ruining the mood. You need to leave."
l have also heard this before, and l said to him , "No one asked me to come in, and l will leave."
l step outside, at first looking for ice, because l went into the tent due to thirst, knowing that this place had advertised drinks. But then l thought that l should feel anger, and l can start that process by pouring the liquor onto the grass, to put emphasis on the emotional garbage from this hate that was casually thrown at me while 10 people looked on without reacting. And so l did, and the anger set in, and l allow it to bud and flower throughout the course of the day and blossom into this story.
My existence ruins this middle age Dutch yt guy's mood. He then ruins "the" mood and blame it on my existence.
At the workshop l asked to read this to the facilitator and told him that l wrote it for him.
After the reading, several people said that they really felt the emotions and senses. The facilitator just said good.