Free thoughts

Take two pretty Underwood Champions from the 1930s, some colored cards ...

... a little ingenuity, and some guts. Mix and you get Free Thoughts — a pop-up project at Xavier University today. A colleague in the philosophy department and I sat outside the main classroom building and wrote reflections on any topics proposed by a steady stream of students and faculty.

I did much the same three years ago with another colleague. What a long three years it's been! Nobody had heard of Covid-19 then. Today, I wore a mask because I was recently exposed to the virus (later I tested negative).

Before we ventured out, we tried some typing in my office, picking prompts randomly from books. This was my favorite effort:

Here are some thoughts I typed for the public: 

(Should have been "bound for a destination unbounded"!)

And here are some of my friend's thoughts. (You'll notice duplicate themes. People offered a topic and we both wrote about it.)

We agreed: this was a great experience that we will repeat!