Fun at the HOFF, one last time
Ten months in the making! Jennifer Winter, local kc poet and slam poetry regular took the stage for an amazing set in our August slam poetry competition at the Hometown Olathe Family Farm. After a much deserved motorcycle road trip, new puppy adoption, and space to clear her head and write. She breezed back in with new energy and new material. Jennifer has been an amazing supporter of Midnight Garden Publishing and brings her very supportive father, John, almost every month ( I promise John, attendance is being recorded) to root her on. He has been adopted by the group as our event’s dad and I pick on him relentlessly to keep him on his toes. His support of his daughter, and for our community, is heartwarming and so welcoming to all of our members. There is an ongoing joke that one of these months he will present his own poem or become a choreographed dancer behind Jennifer’s open mic poetry.
Jennifer brought her art and her A game, and boy was it a challenging game! There was a three way tie in round two which required us to drop the top and bottom score to bring an average score so we could eliminate a competitor before moving on. Then in the last round between three competitors there was a tie for first place! Dropping the top and bottom scores again, there was a difference of .7 between first and second place! We were left waiting and biting our teeth while my husband added up the scores of each round.
Unfortunately, due to being chaos incarnate, I accidentally destroyed my excel spreadsheet from auto calculating! The same month that all of our volunteer helper staff couldn’t make it! We relied heavily on my husband, Ben, to track and calculate scores, run the camera and mics, time each poet, and dodge being heckled by yourself truly! I’m spoiled and undeserving of the commitment this man has for me sometimes. I did treat him and the crowd to a love poem I wrote about him when we first met to bring color to his cheeks and adorable aww’s from the crowd. While also waiting for the final score, I stretched the time by singing for the first time at the HOFF. I sang “Dream a Little Dream of Me, “ which is a personal favorite of Ben’s. Later that night he admitted it was quite distracting as I used to sing it to our child every night until he was around 2 years old. Ben apparently has missed his nightly lullaby lulling him to sleep as well. His steadfast support was crucial to the success of the night, our marriage, and the dream of my business supporting local poets and authors. He was amazing and gracefully math’d while I hammed it up for the crowd. We also welcomed former Chancellor Palowski Moore, now Second Vice President Moore, and his husband back to our event this month. Their assistance in helping with the tie breakers was invaluable and the friendly heckling touched my heart. Overall, the evening was hilarious, the art was amazing, and the community continues to grow at our Open Mic and Slam Poetry Night.
Last night I got a call about the Hometown Olathe Family Farm. We are heartbroken to report that the farm will be permanently closed. We have truly appreciated the time we spent growing our community in their space. The staff were always wonderful to us. We began to guest host the HOFF's slam poetry and open mic event last October and fully took it over in January of this year. The community grew from 10 to over 60 members and we will always appreciate them for homing us. They will be missed.
We are currently looking for a new home for our Open Mic and Slam Poetry Competition night. Our Heart goes out to the HOFF family for their loss. We will make sure to update our community on where our event will land when we have a space to continue growing our local community. Keep an eye out on our social media and website to find out where we will be popping up next. Please be patient with us as we scramble to find a new home for our community.
