By Hilary Brich, three-year volunteer

Why do I volunteer for Sunrise Yoga?

It’s pretty simple: I live Downtown, and I am invested Downtown both financially and emotionally. My people are here! My life is here.

There is a strong legacy of racism in St. Louis, and the empty city is a constant reminder of that. County businesses and governments siphon investment away from the city and then wonder why there’s nothing left to what was once America’s fifth largest city. The larger powers-that-be have made their choices about what the larger St. Louis community will look like, and it does not include Downtown. The residents of these empty streets have almost nowhere to go.

Luckily, there is Gateway Arch Park Foundation. It is a lifeline.

Gateway Arch Park Foundation is the one visible nonprofit that offers multiple venues for community to happen.

Sometimes community just needs an open space, an eye-catching monument, some shade, a place to spread a blanket. A nice view of the river and the city. An historic building that brings a city square into the larger dialogue about “Where We Are” in time and space. Some nice public bathrooms (!).

Real community starts when there is no or a minimal entrance fee. When the activities are accessible to all. When there is no showing off, when there are no winners or losers. Sometimes people just need a place to gather that’s quiet, like a temple. A yoga session may have a soundtrack, but it’s usually not any one tribe’s soundtrack, and it’s never so loud that it drowns out your neighbor on their mat. It is a huge relief to be quiet, or quietly social, amidst all the chatter coming from our devices.

Yoga’s level of difficulty is strangely equalizing: anyone can jump in, but even the seasoned yogi has to struggle. Some people may be stronger or more flexible on any given day, but there’s almost no way to see a person in a yoga pose and not find it at least somewhat awkward: the whole point is to be just on the cusp of losing one’s balance. So it’s not easy to show off. We humans have trouble being in “a pack” without trying to outdo each other. That just isn’t going to happen in a yoga class.

Community, in my experience, is something that blooms and grows from the ground up. People are pretty good at finding something to like about each other when they stand next to each other and say “good morning” week after week. Sometimes it’s as simple as that.