Dandelion Park and Arsenal Museum

On Sunday 5th September,  I decided to make a visit to Emirates – Arsenal Football Club.  I’m still scratching my head about the story and I felt I needed to make a visit on a Sunday. I was thinking this could be a good prelude considering the following Saturday I will be there to watch Arsenal play Bolton Wanderers.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I never really noticed the existence of Gilespie Park as on match days it’s closed. There is a main entrance to the right of the Drayton Park ticket office and it’s here that I decided to enter and walk up into the park area. My primary rationale for visiting was to see the home of Dandelions. It’s now 4 weeks into the Premier League, Autumn is upon us and I was hoping to see the state of the Dandelions and to get some inspiration.

Walking into the main nature reserve / park I walked past a large wind turbine that has been erected by the council as part of its green initiative.  The large blades propelling, slicing the air faster and faster as gusts of wind threw themselves against this stalky beast. I walked on further and entered the meadow and was pleased to see that there were many Dandelions still seated into their stems.

It’s quite an astounding sight to see this many Dandelions and it makes you think that at this point in time will they simply remain rooted to their stems and fade away, or will they pluck the courage and let themselves go on the next gust of wind to be taken away to far place? Are the Dandelions symbolic in some way to the character journeys that are yet to be planned for the story of the father and is son?

It was very peaceful sitting in the park. All I could hear was the gentle breeze of the wind and the brushing of shrubs against each other. I was thinking whether this should actually be the start of the film. The sounds of a kicking football, the cheers of the crowd and the Dandelion makes its lift-off from the park. I also had this crazy idea that the Dandelion maybe moves and comes into contact with the different people who will appear in the story, but it’s not until later that you realise that those scenes are yet to come – i.e. the dandelions is telling its own story through the initial 3-4 minute scene but the people it comes into contact with will have their stories told in greater detail during the 30min short.

I was getting a pit peckish so I sat on the ‘Circle Seating’ and opened a bag of crisps. Finishing the crisps I just sat in silence. To experience tranquility in London is a very surreal experience. No one was around but me.

As I sat I looked across and could see the old Highbury Stadium with one of its Art Deco stands  eclipsed by the rows of trees.

And to my right I could see the new Arsenal football club. It must be one of the very few clubs – or the only club – in which the old grounds and the new grounds are only a few minutes walk apart. All around me I surrounded by shrubbery, grass, peacefulness and then the sound of a train….

I got up and walked over into another meadow and to my right was a bank of houses whose rears backed onto the park. On the right was a high scaled fence separating the railway lines from the park. And in the middle was the meadow. It’s strange as it reminds about the layout of the Musee D’Orsay with its left and right flanks followed by a central aisle.

Looking at the Dandelions it was difficult to discern if the flowering part was still alive or whether they were truly in the throes of death. It really made me think whether in some cases plants / living creatures who are not ready for change will do whatever they stop the inertial change. Whether we like it or not, life is constantly evolving and changing but there will come a point when this will cease to happen. I was also thinking that as these Dandelions are close to the railway track maybe the force of the speeding train my influence the lift-off trajectory of some of these Dandelions towards Emirates stadium??

I also recorded some interesting sounds of my feet walking at a normal pace against the gravel ground. The sounds of breeze rustling against the plants. I also recorded a train coming to a standstill. Listening to this now (as I write this blog) is so strange because it’s the sound you expect to hear at a railway station and not near a natural park. There is something quite dramatic about this sound and the others I recorded that I’d like to use them in the script to play against people’s expectations maybe.

I walked past a father and his son who must’ve been around 3-4 years of age. The young lad was walking at a slow pace and was pulling back against his father’s arm. He looked like he was getting bored and wanted to be picked up. But the father was very gentle with his son, egging him on to continue walking a little bit further. I wondered how lonely it would be if life was just the son and father? Maybe, they had lost their mother, or maybe it was always the two of them and they had moved into the area and making new friends is always tough so for the time being it’s just father and son taking a stroll through Gilespie park. The bond between father and son is generally very strong and let’s face it our fathers always like to live vicariously through their progeny.

I made my down into the Stadium and I decided to visit the Arsenal Museum, again.

The Museum is not that big but it’s broken into two halves – like a football match! The first half concentrates on the history of the club and the great players of the time. The second half focusses on the club’s achievements and the greatest games it has played.

One of the areas I’m drawn to is the concept of passing the mantle between father and son. This concept was hammered home further when I read this piece about the rites of passages for young boys that graduated from the schoolboy enclosures (we call them Family Enclosures today) to the terraces which is described as a ‘wall-of-noise’.

So why was I here? What kind of Obs Res was I hoping to achieve? I’ve discussed a plethora of feelings about football including some abstract thinking. But, for some reason I’ve missed one very important feature – the fans. Despite the spiralling costs of attending football games, it is the fans who make the club. It is the fans who pay to see their club. It is the fans who will pass on the bastion of honours unto their own children to ensure the mantle is carried on through the generations of support. I wanted to be at the Museum to really understand and feel the passion of the supporters. My rationale that by understanding more about the history of the club I can try to relate more to the supporters – who will be in their tens of thousands at next Saturday’s game.

As I walked around the museum taking in all of our heroes that have graced an Arsenal shirt since the inception of the club back in 1886, there is a great sense of awe about how this club came to prominence. It’s no denying that had it not been for Herbert Chapman’s great eye for finding talented footballers from all walks of life and a good financial eye we would not be seeing an Arsenal today. You walk around and there is a great sense of pride at what this club has achieved. And, if you look at the great players who have donned an Arsenal shirt there is a great sense of pride. At a very basic level, this is tribalism. These are all the totems of this tribe. The great battles adorned on the walls. To inspire support, trust, faith and to remind every one of the past. Again, looking at the father and son relationship I ask myself what would happen if the father is using Arsenal as a way to get closer to his son. His son my be disinterested at first, but perhaps after a while the son begins to understand his dad and through this understanding begins to have an attachment to the club. This could be used as the anchor in which the mantle is passed between father and son, perhaps?

I spent the last 30 minutes strolling around the stadium and two things caught my eye. As I arced from the North End to the Clock End of the stadium, I could see the edge of the national park that actually encroached one segment of the stadium outer area. I could see tall thick green shrubbery covering the train tracks. It was surprising to see how close the train is to Emirates and the national park. I looked out Dandelions but could not see any. I felt relieved about this as I have this interesting idea for the opening of the film to see a Dandelion moving across from the park, interacting with characters before falling into the Emirates at the start of a game. The second strange thing I saw was the images of demolition. It seems the area around Emirates is in massive redevelopment phase. It’s quite an ugly sight and when you think about the clean lines of the stadium in the middle of a building site it’s quite a disturbing juxtaposition of images for the brain to handle. I’ve never noticed this building work and can only assumed that within the last few weeks this work has accelerated most probably to clear the way to build more modern flats in the vicinity. Looking at the demolition site you can see it used to be former houses and a small industrial estate.

I need to focus on the supporters at the next game. I think this is the area that will help me build the rounded story that I’m looking for…or maybe will it will cause me greater confusion……?