A joyful game of Calvinball was the closing ceremony to an exquisite night of puppetry at Ye Olde Heart of Gold here in Chicago, IL. Blue rubber balls were provided by No Child Left Behind.

What began as a handful of people randomly tossing a rubber ball around the Heart of Gold as the bar cleared out became a delightful circle of 14 Calvinball players, sitting cross-legged on the dancefloor. Order was quickly desired by a few players, and so rules were laid out. The first rule was to create a repeatable pattern of tossing: a person would toss a ball to you, you would toss it to someone else, and the ball would make it once to each of the players without repeating. The ball cycled through all players following this pattern, so that you would always receive the ball from the same person, and toss it to the same person. This was a very difficult task, needless to say, for a bunch of drunk artists.

The ball was dropped many times, and we got very confused. But eventually we all got it down. As soon as this was achieved, someone shouted "one, two, three -- reverse!" and the pattern fell into chaos. Once the Reverse pattern was conquered, more balls were added from around the room. Further rules were introduced and vehemently obeyed, such as "continue this pattern, begin a new pattern with a second ball," and "ball may never touch the ground," and "volleyball -- no holdies!" Chaos. It was wonderful.

One player was ejected from the game for not obeying the rule to raise your hands in front of your face if you had not yet touched the ball for the current Pattern.

The bartender declared us all Drunks who cannot properly play a game of ball (which is silly, considering that not all of us had been drinking. Perhaps he should have joined us).

The game ran for over an hour, and was thoroughly enjoyed by all.

Obscurely dark photographs have been provided. Ample imagination will be required.


The Villain:

This was delightful. I had to bow out eventually, because the rules quickly got too complicated for my puny villainous brain.


Terpsichore:

I wholeheartedly concur with my villainous friend. This was a most enjoyable experience. I, personally, enjoyed the game more when there were no rules, but all in all, it was great! I sincerely hope that something like this happens again soon. So many strangers coming together in such a peculiar way to actually play and just laugh out of simple and pure joy is a beautiful thing.