“Today is the day that we no longer run,” Danielle Egan announced over a megaphone, standing atop a picnic table in Golden Gate Park.
More than 150 San Franciscans gathered at Hellman Hollow early Saturday to “celebrate the art of sitting.” What started off as a joke among a group of friends turned into a community meetup for sitting enthusiasts.
The Sit Club, organized by Egan and her co-chair Mackenzie Sharp, was inspired by taking “the best parts of [a] run club, which is the meeting people, and eliminate the bad parts, which is the running.”
Sharp said she went on one running date before, but it just didn’t land with her. “The only time I’m running is if I’m being chased,” she said.
Egan’s speech about standing up to Big Run elicited an eruption of cheers from Sit Club attendees. The morning started with a few light warm-up exercises, like squats, lunges and leg stretches. “Make sure those hips are really open so you can sit leisurely for long extended periods,” Egan instructed the crowd.
An intense game of musical chairs followed.
“Being in a wheelchair, I expected that I was immediately gonna win musical chairs,” Andy Wu said. “Lo and behold, I won musical chairs.”
Wu, who works in tech, said it was a perfect day to be outside, doing anything but tech.
“I’ve been sitting for like the last 10 years,” he said. “So I think I have a lot of expertise on how to sit.”
By noon, Hellman Hollow was buzzing with sitting enthusiasts. Many people came alone to the event, finding their way into groups, and bonding over a mutual fervor for staying put. They toted stools, couches, beanbags, dining chairs, inflatable seats, and other sitting vessels to the field.
Russell Coleman and Arnav Mohan, friends of the organizers, lugged a couch through Hellman Hollow, applause breaking out when they set the grey loveseat down on the grass. Mohan said that they had to order a double-XL Uber — a feature he didn’t know existed — paid the driver to let them load a couch into the car, and carried it through the park. “I ate shit about twice,” said Mohan. “And now we’re here.”
“I’m trying to think of my favorite kinds of running,” said Mohan. “Running water, running for office … that’s about it.”
A few patches of grass away, Jack Yallop reclined on a chair, and said he rallied his friends to Sit Club after seeing a flyer of it posted to Reddit. The group had brought a Moka Pot to make coffee for fellow sitters, along with an inflatable couch, which they bought for $30 from Amazon for the occasion.
The group said it was a new experience for them all, and that they wanted to join in on something that seemed funny. Oxama Arafeh said he was at Sit Club as a “counterprotest to run clubs.”
Despite the running slander, a brave group of runners showed face at the meetup.
“I think the running groups are a little too big,” admitted tech worker and runner Adam Mendonca. Not only are the clubs overflowing, but they’re also starting to miss the point of running. “I think you see a certain type of person who’s there just to be in the dating scene,” Mendonca remarked.
Anna Zheng, an attendee donning a “Midnight Runners” shirt, said she was booed out of the crowd for her outfit choice. “I wanted to express that I was an ally. I can be both a runner and a sitter, you know […] we shouldn’t let these labels define us.”
“Runners are the best sitters,” runner Eric Fan chimed in, “because when we’re not running, we’re always resting our legs.”
Ellen Fetherston, an avid sitter who was courageous enough to extend her picnic blanket to the runners, said her husband found a flyer for the “Sit Club” while he was on a run. Fetherston believes that it’s high time for runners and sitters to form an allyship. (Her husband, who is training for a marathon, couldn’t make it to the event because, well, he was on a run.)
As the afternoon rolled around, Egan and other organizers set up a karaoke machine for the crowd. Pure joy emanated through Hellman Hollow during the event.
Attendees played instruments, made origami fortune tellers, shared snacks, and talked about all the ways in which sitting is misunderstood.
“What’s the most memorable sitting experience you’ve ever had?” asked Maria Lopez to a group of like-minded sitters she had just met.
“My first breakup happened while I was sitting,” Myles Stremick chimed in. “I was, like, 15.”
So often, anytime bad news is being delivered, people are asked to “have a seat.” “This is a nice rebranding of sitting,” Mat Allen said.
Allen and Stremick brought along a bean bag, which they hauled all the way to the park from Haight-Ashbury in an Uber XL. Stremick urged Allen to attend “Sit Club,” because he loves to meet new people. “It’s the best thing in the world: an event where the premise is to come meet strangers,” he said. “I was like, ‘Yeah.’”
Most of the attendees were tech workers, in true Bay Area fashion, and work was still top of mind for some. Paayal Maheshwari had to take a break from sitting to take a call about a job offer. “I feel relieved,” said Maheshwari, who could now enjoy Sit Club stress-free.
Another attendee, Anton Piskunov, thought the event would be the perfect place to pitch his startup brand, Tatopad — an outdoor sitting pad which you can loop around your waist — to sitting enthusiasts. Piskunov pitched the product to the organizers, but was unsuccessful.
“I don’t think we’ll host something like this again,” Egan said.
Egan’s mom, Sophie Kim, showed up to support the tomfoolery. Kim said Egan was “always my mischievous child.”
“Now as a grown up, she’s found an outlet to channel that energy,” she added.
Egan and Sharp have hosted similar shenanigans in the past. The duo is committed to getting San Franciscans to connect the old-fashioned way, by posting flyers for events they create across the city. Last year, they threw an “Alextravaganza” — a party to help their friend named Alex meet other Alex’s in the city.
The two are on a mission to become the most immersive comedians in San Francisco — and they are succeeding at it. Many attendees wanted to keep in touch with the two to see what other shenanigans they’ll get up to in the future.
“Living in the Bay Area, it’s like, there’s such a conditioning that everything you do has to be to make money, it has to be to put on your resume, or, like, apply to college,” Egan said. “So I find there’s something so joyous and doing something that is completely pointless and has no end goal, and does not further my life in any way other than, like, the joy at the moment.”