I didn’t know much about Dale Harkins last summer, but what I did know I didn’t like.  Harkins had purchased the Irving Theater, effectively putting the kibosh on plans to turn the former movie palace into an all ages live music venue. Though he lived in my neighborhood, I only had secondhand recon. That is until my wife and I met him at an Irvington Development Organization meeting last year.

Because of my work with the Star and the Indiena Handicraft Exchange, Harkins knew who we were. My wife confronted him with what we’d been told and we had a conversation about why he purchased the Irving and his plans for the building, including restoring original architectural features and hosting a variety of performing arts and community events. I wasn’t completely sold but at the end of the day, a successful Irving Theater helps my ‘hood no matter who owns it or what they do with it. Since he had no experience promoting events I offered to lend a hand if and when he needed it. Amanda and I exchanged pleasantries with him, got in our car, looked at each other and said, “I dunno.”

Harkins called that favor in last week and I met with him today at Lazy Daze, a neighborhood coffee shop located in the Irving Theater building. What I figured to be a quick chat about who he should send press releases to and when became a sprawling mess of conversation about the relationship between Harkins and the building, the building and the community, and the physical and online worlds.

At 11 a.m., I told Dale that he was letting other people tell his story, that he needed to let people see and hear the passion he has for the Irving and what it has meant and could mean to Irvington. Three hours and three large cups of organic Peruvian coffee later, he was explaining how I wasn’t telling my own story well enough, with enough focus. In helping him define his mission and methods I added depth and clarity to my own.

We walked out of the coffee shop with more to think about than we were counting on and in my case, a greater appreciation for Harkins and the project he’s undertaken. At a time where I feel pressed to push more intake and output into the same amount of time, it was a relief to let a conversation expand and contract naturally, bring the conversing parties to conclusions they would not have reached had they stuck to a tight timeline. The overarching lesson of the afternoon is that you can spend days, weeks, or months creating networks of friends online, Tweeting your fingers raw and blogging until you’re blue in the face, but real influence and lasting impressions come from conversations without character limits.