The Failure Tour Round 1: Muncie, Indiana

JR and Hannah Barnes at Prairie Creek Reservoir, 28th May 2010 (photo by Donna Goedhart)

The whole reason I am creating this project has become increasingly clear as I attempt to float a cake in Muncie, Indiana. Nine Fake Cakes and Nine Bodies of Water is about many things but one important entity is thinking positively about where I am and trying to make the best of it (immersing myself in something that makes me happy). So... the search for the ideal location in Muncie, Indiana has resulted in learning that it does not exist. I want there to be something attractive about this town because I live here AND swimming on a regular basis is a large part of my life. I can't float the cake in the Downtown YMCA pool because nothing about the lighting and atmosphere bodes well and it doesn't fit into the plan of photographing all of these in the great outdoors.

I had high hopes for Tuhey Pool as I swum laps there my first summer in town but alas, it is closed yet another year in a row for construction.



In a rare turn of events, I had a local newspaper in my hand on the 26th May when there was an article published on where one could swim over Memorial Weekend since Tuhey Pool was closed. I decided that I would visit each one of these locations if they were outdoors. Ironically, only one of them is located in Muncie. My preconceived notion is that they all would fail and I would end up driving to Hartford City and float the Big Spiral in Scott and Kim Anderson's backyard or a neighbor's kiddie pool. Surely none of these places in the newspaper would yield clear and enticing water. The quest now begins on whether or not I was right.

First stop: Prairie Creek Reservoir. I've always heard of this place and have certainly seen my fair share of student photographs taken from the shores of Muncie's reservoir. When my cousin Donna was here for a week, I took that as a perfect opportunity to find it. Hannah offered to come along because believe it or not, she had actually been there!



One thing I am learning as the cakes are photographed in natural bodies of water is that close up images are hard to take if you want to capture the blue and enticing water in the distance. Hence, everything looks brown and unappetizing (the reason this cake was chosen for Indiana has a reason!). This location failed precisely because of that (see also the Dog Park Lake Michigan float below). On a positive note, the water was a nice temperature and I would have jumped in it had I not been carrying my camera.



Of course the photographs that I ended up liking best were not taken in the water but in front of or on blue locations that could have resembled water if I stretched my imagination.





Another aspect of this project is that it is an excuse for going to places I've never been and making long overdue visits to see my friends in far reaching places. I finally saw the reservoir and this week, I will drive to New Castle and Anderson - all nearby towns I've only raced by on the freeway never dreaming of stopping. The Failure Tour continues.