The Pirate Ship in the Park

The day after I moved to Strathcona in 2011, someone built a pirate ship in the park.  It was made from pieces of torn cardboard boxes shaped into a crude thirty-foot hull, with children’s bed sheets spread over top. The mast was two lashed broom sticks from which rigging ropes, decorated with small, multicoloured flags, connected to the bow and stern. It was just beached there in the middle of the MacLean Park with no one in sight.

It was a sunny Saturday morning in July. I was across the street, inside the Wilder Snail, buying a coffee. I asked the guy behind the counter if he knew what it was. “It’s the July pirate ship,” he told me, matter of fact, like it was common knowledge. “What’s it for?” I asked. “Not sure. For the fun of it, I guess. I think they might have camped overnight.”

Hmm. A homemade cardboard pirate ship in a public park was a novelty to me. In a backyard, maybe. But in a park? Who’d think to do such a thing?  Who gave them permission? What about safety? Bathroom access?

The guy behind the counter handed me my coffee. “Hi I’m Boyd. You’re Dan, right? You just moved into Bruce’s place?”  “Yeah. Hi. How’d you know that?”  “Word gets around. Welcome to Strathcona.”

That was my introduction, fourteen years ago, to a community unlike any place I have ever lived.

Strathcona is a small neighbourhood on the east side of Vancouver B.C. At its core, it’s six blocks long and five blocks wide. Many of the houses were originally built over a hundred years ago and are still standing. It has two elementary schools, two community centres, four corner stores, a Russian and a Ukrainian Hall, three churches, intermixed with a mishmash of small apartment buildings, co-ops, rooming houses, converted “laneway” garages and “heritage homes” that range from fully restored to fairly dilapidated. There are two large, subsidized housing projects that, combined, have over 500 units and house about half of the population.

That population is equally eclectic.  There are first, second and third generation immigrants from Italy, Croatia, Portugal, Ukraine, and a spattering of other Asian and African countries. There are elderly Chinese who have lived here for decades but speak little English. There are refugees relocated from Syria and Afghanistan. There are Indigenous families from all parts of Canada. There are a lot of children and seniors. There are a lot of artists. There are lawyers and doctors and people who seem to have well-paying jobs or a generous inheritance. There are people who have no obvious income. There are drug addicts and people who sleep in the park.

But somehow, despite all that – or maybe because of it – community thrives here. It’s rare to walk down the street and not meet someone I know. Not only by face and name, but their stories. There are lots of ways to engage with people. Corner stores. Coffee shops. Community gardens. Community centres. A public park that serves as a sort of town square. People frequently invite neighbours over for a meal. When something is lost or found, it gets posted online. When something breaks, somebody fixes it. When something bad happens, the news spreads fast. When people can help, they do.

I don’t mean to be sentimental and mawkish. These signs of community are generally small and fleeting. They happen without the unifying force of a church or governing body. Without the presence of a general threat or shared identity. Strathcona is far from perfect. Some people don’t get along. Some have strong opinions about what doesn’t work. There’s disagreement as to what the problems are and how to fix them. But despite all that, it somehow functions in a way that most urban neighborhoods don’t. People feel a sense of responsibility for one another. They feel a sense of belonging. Maybe not everybody. But many, including me.

Many of us live in a world where we don’t really need community anymore. Given the global economy, with its tangled web of supply chains and multinational corporations, our food, clothing, housewares, furniture and pretty much everything else we need somehow magically appears on store shelves or web pages with little or no indication where it came from or who made it. Much of our socializing and entertainment happens while facing a screen. Churches and social clubs and local hangouts are in decline. Front porches, back yards and town squares and have been designed out of the urban landscape. Security comes from alarm codes and surveillance cameras, pepper spray and pistols. We don’t depend on the people around us. Between demanding careers, busy families and individual interests, community has become non-essential, a nostalgic anachronism that many just don’t have time for.

But this disconnection takes a toll. In 2023 the US Surgeon General released a health advisory, reporting that the nation is facing an epidemic of loneliness, particularly among young adults, that is taking a toll on health comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. The term “friendship recession” was coined to describe a Post-CoVid decline in the number of friends people have. A survey of unmarried adults in Japan aged 20 to 49 found that 34% have never dated anyone. Robert Putnam’s  book, “Bowling Alone” quantified how Americans have become increasingly disconnected from family, friends, neighbours and social institutions.

When there isn’t an easy way to get to know the people around you, they remain strangers. Being surrounded by strangers can be lonely and depressing. Not to mention anxiety inducing and threatening. When in the company of people you don’t know, it’s safer to assume the worst.

Humans are social animals. Our sense of identity and purpose comes not from deep inside us but from how we connect and interact with the people around us. We want to belong, to be accepted, to be needed, to fit in somewhere. When we lack opportunities to work together, to share stories, to offer support, we become adrift and directionless.

 

Years later, I found a photo I’d taken of the pirate ship with my phone. I decided to try to find out what the story behind it was. So I posted to picture on the local Facebook page and soon someone posted a contact for Jared Popescu. He’d moved from the neighbourhood a few years back but it wasn’t hard to track him down. He told me that two years before, he’d come home with a van load of cardboard boxes he was supposed to dispose of. But he had another idea.

On Saturday morning, he and some friends took the boxes to MacLean Park with the vague idea of creating an art piece. He started by breaking them apart to create a wall. Kids came over and asked what he was doing. He told them he was building a… what?... a pirate ship! They asked if they could help. Parents joined in. Broom sticks showed up. Old bed sheets. Kids made swords out of cardboard and tinfoil.  A small container became a treasure chest. The entire day became a spontaneous pirate fantasy. It was such a good time that Jared made it an annual event.

Jared described Strathcona as a place where “people are up to making things happen.” A decent definition of community.