Author's Note: A Fond Farewell to Craig
After nearly 9 years supporting across St. Andrew’s social media and events, Craig Anderson is passing the torch to our Event’s & Communications Officer, Kat.
He’s shared some of his favorite memories and reflections in a heartfelt note:
Well folks, the curtain falls. The lights go out. The applause has ended, and the crowd has left.
Hi, my name is Craig Anderson! You might remember me from such projects as, St. Andrew’s receptionist, St. Andrew’s social media worker and the photographer for a lot of our events.
Well now the time has come for me to pass the torch onto someone else. I’ve been the person who managed most of the social media accounts for the centre since 2017. I remember it like it was yesterday. Mary was heading on one of her globetrotting adventures and needed someone to watch the page while she was away. And I was the youngest person she knew. Slight ageism aside, I agreed.
Now nearly 9 years later (The holiday days here are more than fair) Mary has returned and I’m passing on the torch to the amazing Kat, who many have already met from our last couple of events.
Working in St. Andrew’s was an honour for me. While I might live in Crumlin, I’ve been a Fatima lad all my life, and Rialto was always one of my favourite places. Over the years, I’ve had chances I never thought I’d have. From social media opportunities to cataloguing art for resident artists, it’s been a wild ride.
I wanted to take a few minutes and share some of my favourite moments from throughout the years I’ve been here. An honourable mention is the time we held an opera in the garden. The day of I saw the caretakers and General Operative all trying to sing ‘Just one Cornetto’ from the ads. They had to keep their day jobs unfortunately. I still say it’s the opera’s loss.
Back when we did our first murder mystery night, we decorated the centre accordingly. The foyer was turned into a bar, the corridor to the hall a back alley, complete with knocking shop and very realistic skeletons around the place. The skeletons were the work of resident artist at that time, Mark Holburn. I’ll never forget what he said when we asked if he could help. The grin on his face as he said, ‘I’ve two bags of bones out me back yous can use’ I wanted to call the guards for that one.
International Women’s Day 2018 will always be a funny one. During the break one of our volunteers took the time to bring tea over to several ladies in their 80s, to save them the trek as a good Samaritan does. Only then her face fell as the break ended and those same ladies started line dancing. Still one of the best days we had for IWD.
During my years in the centre, I’ve been involved in a multitude of different projects. The first one is probably the Facebook page itself. When I joined, our Facebook sat on around 86 likes. Now it’s over 2,000 likes. From posts about events and the day to day in the centre, to some random items that occurred in the area, St. Andrew’s Facebook page has become a special kind of time capsule for the area and remains one of the longest pieces of work I’ve ever done in my life. Add in our Instagram, which we started just at the end of 2019, still naïve and thinking we had a year of events coming up instead of the year 2020 ended up being.
The second thing is the website. Ah, the aul website. What you’re probably reading this on. I built our first one on Wix. It was a multi-month project and aged me about two decades, but it was a great experience, and great craic with the staff. Little did we know that Wix was held together with popsicle sticks and a prayer. It wasn’t a lasting solution. My design still sits on our shiny new Squarespace site today though. A shining legacy to the months trying to get that one paragraph centred.
The final project is our events. I’ve been part of the events committee since I believe 2017. Over the last near decade, I’ve had the privilege of meeting all sorts of folks from all sorts of walks. From local Rialto and Dolphin’s Barn folks to choirs from America and all the communities that make Ireland the best country in the world, I can’t name the number of groups I’ve seen in my time, or we’ll be here forever. But you have all made Andrew’s the place it is today. From line dancers in their 80s to the crowd singing ‘Sweet Caroline’ in the garden for the Ritz Brothers. You’re all legends, each and every one.
Now don’t fear! While I may be passing the social media to Kat, I’ll still be part of the events committee, and you’ll still see me around and about. I love the place too much to go away for good. And someone has to be there to take your tickets at reception.
Craig Anderson
Chief Head-wrecker