plant seeds sing songs

Gallery: How the Earthsoundz

lararaine — Fri, 3 Apr 2009 15:00:00 GMT

How the Earthsoundz

lararaine — Fri, 3 Apr 2009 13:23:00 GMT

The indentations on my fingertips almost match the horizontial lines snaking across the hillsides in the distance. Even the color, slightly red from the pressure applied to new guitar strings, suits this arid landscape. There was a big afternoon thunderstorm a few days ago that added excitement and depth to the drum circle that I was participating in with Luix and two friends in the workshop outside of his house. Wind rushed through some broken panes in the floor to ceiling windows, while hail bounced off of aloe plants, nopales, and dry, dusty earth.

Apart from that particular day, the clouds have only blown by in the afternoons, hardly cutting the already intense heat of the springtime sun. Now I am watching the hillsides turn pink as the sun slips behind the ridge on the opposite side of the little valley in which Malinalco is nestled. I can hear the Saturday evening music pick up in the plaza downtown from the hammock of my rooftop perch at Luix´s house, and I am reminded that I have been here one week. Last Saturday, however, the music wasn´t floating lazily on the evening wind. Instead it was rattling the windw frame of my hotel room overlooking the plaza as I tried feebly to block out the streetlight with a blanket and find sleep. I was disoriented and lonely.

Now, I understand the space and the community that fills it a bit better. Although Luix told me via email that he didn´t have much work at the moment, he also said that I was welcome here if i needed a place to stay. None of the other farms that I contacted had space, so I took a plane from Puerto Vallarta to Toluca (an unpleasant overnight stay in a strange city) three days after Mom flew home to Tennessee. The next morning I took a two and a half hour bus ride through a seemingly empty, arid landscape dotted with rocky ridges, brown rolling hillsides, and giant agave.

I spent two days exploring Malinalco, its Mexica (me-shee-ka) ruins, and a small museum in which I learned that the town is named after a plant called malinalli. This comes from the verb malina, meaning to twist. So malinalli means twisted herb. The Mexica (who spoke Nahuatl, also spoken by the Aztecs) believed that this plant was the medium between which the planes of the universe communicated: the underworld, the terrestrial, and the celestial. Through the malinalli the currents from above and below (the two extremes of the cosmos) twist together on earth. The plant is the expression of the two opposite but complementary worlds. The Nahuatl belief is that the current that flows up from the underworld is cold, aquatic, and femimine; while the current that descends from the celestial world is igneous, warm, and masculine. Between these two extremes is the earthly world where the life of humans unfolds.

Education is amazing! I left the museum feeling as though I had cultivated a sense of place by learning a bit about its history. As I walked back to the hotel, the streets looked more familiar and welcoming, and Isabel, the proprietor, greeted me at the door and showed me the view of the mountains from her living space. Malinalco felt more real.

Earthsoundz believes that through drumming, and the creation of rythym within a group, personal learning is achieved. It is the manifestation of Luix´s personal paradigm and the realization of his dreams. He builds drums out of all sorts of organic materials, including: bamboo, gourds, animal skins and bones, seeds, ect. He sells his instruments. He also facilitates drum circles, traveling all over Mexico and beyond. He works with groups as varied as corporate executives, the staff of spa resorts, Montessori school groups including parents, students and teachers...all in one circle. He volunteers in prisons, drumming with inmates. He also leads traditional sweat lodge ceremonies in a cob structure called a Temazcal, built by previous WWOOFers. I will be helping him lead a ceremony for a Mexican family of 13 people. I will help manage the fire (used to heat the stones that go inside), deliver the stones to the lodge from the fire after brushing the ashes away with a eucalyptus branch, fill buckets of water to pour over the stones, and provide sips of a sweet anise tea and drumming inside the sweat. I don´t know what to expect, but I knowthat Luix believes deelply in this process, and sees the sacrifice of personal comfort in the heat as a prayerful offering to the well being of the world. Sounds good to me.

We have become friends easily, and Luix says that he feels like we look like cartoon characters when we are together- often laughing as we go back and forth between Spanish and English (both of which he speaks fluently after 13 years living in the US). He grew up in DF (Districto Federal), a chilango, as people from Mexico City are called, and we took a two day trip there so that he could buy supplies for upcoming projects, and pick up some drums that an american drum company called Remo donated to his prison drumming project.

The road trip took about three hours total, with a detour through a town called Tepotzlan- new age mecca and home to frequent UFO sightings- to pick up three huge bags of hard shell seeds that a woman he knows there had collected from the hills. We also had an amazing lunch at his favorite market stand: a ¨mexican pizza¨ called a sope. You gotta love a hippie town´s spin on mexican favorites. The muchacha working behind the large round tortilla pan patted out fresh dough balls and fried them over hot coals. Then we chose our toppings- salsa roja y verde, potatoes and mushrooms on one, and steamed squash blossoms and huitlacoche (weet-la-ko-che) a popular mushroom that grows on corn. They were topped off with Oaxacan cheese (a stringy, white cheese) and crema. While these were cooking we walked a few stalls over and bought fresh fruit juice. I got piña and Luix got alfalfa...sweeter than you´d think. On our way back we bought an avocado and sliced it on top of the sopes. De-lish!!

I picked up a strong little coffee on the way out of town, my first cup in a while, and we shared it and talked politics and philosophy with caffinated enthusiasm for the last hour of the drive into DF in Luix´s little maroon VW bug. We parked at the house that belonged to his late father, and the home where he had spent the later part of his teenage years. A short walk and a ride on the metro brought us to El Centro, downtown, where Luix helped me pick out a small guitar, which I bought for 455 pesos, about $40 dollars US, including a case. It is a quinto, or fifth, which means you count up 5 notes from a regular guitar...I´m still wrapping my mind around that little bit of music theory. Meandering home through quiet neighborhood streets, Luix said that I needed to name it. Since it is a small guitar, in Spanish they say "guitarita" and so I named her Rita. Rita la guitarita. Luix laughed approvingly.

The next morning Luix dropped me off at the metro with specific directions on where to change lines and where to get off for the Anthropology Museum, and he headed off to run business errands. I navigated the metro easily, with a little help from a generous face, and I didn´t once feel nervous or uncomfortable. On the contrary, everyone was smiling that knowing smile reserved for greeting a visitor to their city. I even got a few handshakes.

The museum was amazing. I spent the whole two and a half hours in the Mayan room. I realized that I had to focus my efforts, and just plan on coming back some day to explore the other rooms dedicated to: Introduction to Anthropology, The Population of the Americas, Preclasic Times in the Central Altiplano (nomads in Mexico´s central highlands), Teotihuacan (the Aztec city where Mexico City now resides, and the most powerful city of that time...the Rome of Latin America if you will), Las Toltecas (before the Aztecs), Mexica (the Aztecs), Cultures of Oaxaca, Cultures of the Gulf Cost (more aftican influence), Western Cultures (Pacific coast indigenous cultures), and Northern Mexican Cultures (which were a bit fluid with southwestern US tribes). You could spend a week at least in that museum.

Luix picked me up outside the museum at 2pm, and before hopping back into the VW bug, we watched the flying Veracruz dancers...very impressive (see my flickr page for photos). Mushroom soup (sopa de hongos) and quesadillas on the road, and a yoga class in a friend´s studio in Malinalco concluded the road trip, and we are back at the Earthsoundz home base. I have been helping Luix organize and clean his workshop -a wierd love of mine, as some of you know, and something that the space desperately needed. Because of my knack for cleaning and organizing Luix has called me a jewel and his hero.

I am looking forward to moving on and starting my work on a farm about 30 min from here in a town called Chalmita. It is a certified organic farm with an orchard, and they make and sell juices and jams. However I am grateful for the two weeks I will have spent here at Earthsoundz with Luix, another beautiful twist in the road that has enriched my experience and my circle of friends.

As always I don´t know what to expect from the next phase, but I strive to find peace in the unknown, learning my lesson of the hour, patience, over and over again. A phrase inspired by my lesson and invented in one of many mealtime conversations has become a motto around here: la paciencia es la ciencia de la paz.

Patience is the science of Peace

*****

Alice came to a fork in the road.

"Which road do I take?" she asked.

"Where do you want to go?" responded the Cheshire cat.

"I don´t know," Alice answered.

"Then," said the cat, "it doesn´t matter."

Gallery: trading aloha for hola

lararaine — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 09:15:00 GMT

Trading aloha for hola

lararaine — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 08:01:00 GMT

(Thanks Cody, for the inspiration)

"Do you realize? that you have the most beautiful face? Do you realize? We´re floating in space? Do you realize? That everyone you know someday will die, so instead of saying all of your goodbyes, let them know you realize that life goes fast, it´s hard to make the good things last, you realize the sun doesn´t go down, it´s just an illusion caused by the world.....spinning ´round" -the flaming lips

The last few days on the farm were perfect (of course, nothing is ever easy,is it, and leaving is no different). I had finally achieved that sensation of feeling in synch with the place-the space-the island-the farm-my friends.

Saturday morning harvest was often preceeded by smiles and coffee and a quick breakfast in the kitchen, and often followed by smiles, coffee, and pancakes in the kitchen. (this became a ritual with one kindred spirit- partners in crime with an indulgent streak that we nurtured with salty hashbrowns and honeyed banana walnut (and sometimes chocolate) pancakes)

My heart was warmed by the potluck jam session that was publicized by Marta, supported by everyone, and attended by all plus some. The food was amazing: pasta with fresh veggies from the farm, salads of all types, guacamole, and even veggie burgers with homemade ketchup. The flavors of the desserts blew my mind and put smiles on everyone´s faces. The creators are true raw food artists, and why not? Food can be-should be-is beautiful and inspiring in its simplicity.

We jammed for hours without fear or shame, moving on to our spirits now that our bodies were nourished. I sang (sort of) I played drums and a cheese grater, I fumbled around with a mandolin, and I even sat down at the drum kit once things were dying down. Even as all of those wonderful and now familiar faces wandered off into the dark night of a new moon, back to their corners of a farm that is perfectly mapped out in my mind, I could still feel the unity of our opening circle. Six of us were going forward (the only direction we can go) into the world, and everyone present vocalized their appreciation for the space and time we shared together........

One rockin´ beach party and a small pizza dinner later, I suddenly found myself in LA. It was great to hang with old family friends, and Malani, Rachel, Jonathan and I all decided that we might as well be siblings. (If you find yourself enjoying someone else´s famliy album as if it were your own, you know that you are on the right track)

They showed me the town all right, and I traded in my flip-flops for high heels (when in Rome...) I went out dancing with the gay boys of WEHO (West Hollywood) cooked wondefully homey dinners, drank wine and had an amazing movie marathon. Four days, that´s all. And now I am in Mexico, mom just left after a week of non-stop fun and adventure the likes of which many mothers and daughters will envy...to be continued.......

Gallery: chargin' it

lararaine — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 13:21:00 GMT

Chargin' it

lararaine — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:11:00 GMT

"You cannot stay on the summit forever, you have to come down again. So why bother in the first place? Just this: What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above. One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know." ~Rene Daumal

When did "it" all start? When I saw someone surf and didn't even know that I wanted to do that? When I saw someone surf years later and I knew that I'd like to try that...somewhere in between?

When was the first time I paddled out? In 2007 when I took a surf lesson? The week before last when I went out without the saftey net of friends by my side? When I go out sola? Pues, the love affair with the waves has begun, and I am totally intrigued by their mysteries. I want to hang with them, to play.

It's hard to keep up with my new friend though, and her mood is different every day. There is a certain intuition in the soul surfer- that person who paddles out with all the love and care of someone going to spend time with an old friend, and the understanding that with effort, focus, and intention, you sure can have a lot of fun. I have found myself frantic in the endeavor to calibrate myself to the mood of the waves, on many levels: One or two of the first mornings that I knew that I would surf in the afternoon, I locked myself into an intense stream of phone calls to all new friends on the island, trying to figure where that perfect wave for me would be at about 4:30pm; I have paddled out expecting the worst and discovered something much better; I have paddled out thinking that I would be able to impress, and gotten my butt whooped (1st encounter with the reef). Ahh, the surfer's intuition. I think that goes hand in hand with a surfer's resilience to circumstance when the intuition fails...

Relax, don't fight it once it gets you. That's the advice for getting caught on the inside (of where the waves are breaking). But first some great moves to try are paddling like mad to the shoulder of the wave in the hope of floating by intsead of getting caught underneath the peak where it is breaking. You could also try to duck dive if you have a short board (push you and the board underneath the wave with your knee..i think) or turtle roll the longboard (grab the rails or sides of the board and roll underneath it, pulling the nose close to you as the wave washes over top). I have had varying degrees of success with these while trying to manage myself on the inside...better just to pay attention and stay out of the way.

It's all about timing and positioning out there it seems. I am learning everytime I go out, watching more seasoned surfers- scoping their moves if you will. Just like with climbing (which is why I love these sports so much) I find myself re-living my sessions, analyzing my split second choices and actions and brainstorming the possible outcomes of trying something different in that moment, should it arise again. And although that particularly specific moment probably won't, I will again refer to my Cumulitive Theory of Life Experience and be completely flabbergatsted and amazed by the fact that I seem to be building up an inventory in my bag of tricks and pulling some moves that are really fun!

It's really true that you're gonna go where you look.

Let's all take a moment and broaden this concept to encompass our whole lives...

But with waves it's really true too. So at first my goal was to catch the wave and get a push. That means moving forward. Oh and also not to "pearl" the board by plowing the nose underwater as I try to stand up (then you flip over...). Due to these goals I had been looking down (nose) and srtaigh ahead (forward push). Now I am seeing though, that the surfer doesn't just want that simple push. I mean, we're talking about communing with an old friend here! The surfer wants to stay with the wave, not just get pushed out ahead of it. The surfer wants to play.

Now, as I see the wave rolling off of the horizon towards me, I slide back on my board and twirl my legs to spin my board around to face forward. I start to paddle like hell, but controlled, not sloppy, digging in to my shoulder, keeping my thumb tucked in, and actually pulling my hands ever so slightly under my board instead of just down the side to propel myself forward. I look back to see where the wave and I will meet. When I feel the momentum of the wave underneath me I lift my upper body like the yoga pose seal/upward dog to keep the nose out of the water, and I look to my side, down the line of the wave. I give a few more good hard paddles as I feel the wave lift me, and then I grab the rails (eyes up!) and pop to my feet. My body is crouched low and I lean back on my back foot (left - I'm goofy)and swivel my hips to turn the board down the line.

Little movements back and forth the keep the balance, the water rushes underneath me as the wave moves me forward. As tanglible an expression of the earth's energy as I have ever experienced. I am surfing.

don't panic, it's organic

lararaine — Mon, 9 Feb 2009 12:13:00 GMT

My days are starting to take on a rhythm. Not so much in the sense that I do the same thing each day, just that I am tuning into the rhythm of island life.

Work is part of that life, but the work just feels different. I love what I am doing! I am stimulated and learning, plus, it's just fun to spend your morning picking veggies. Yes, it is still hard for me to hear the alarm at 6:15 each day (4:45 on saturdays) but I always give myself time to go to the communal kitchen and make a stout and thick to gritty cup of cowboy coffee (the secret is to let it boil for a few) and, lately, a gigantic pancake. I am living in the midst of a pancake epidemic at the farm. We are all hooked, and so anytime that one arrives at the kitchen, it is likely that pancakes are being cooked. And that's just a tough thing to ignore.

The harvest starts at 7am (5:30 on saturdays) and Marta can be found at the work station taking daily orders on her cell phone for local restraunts and natural food stores. There is also the farmer's market produce to harvest, and she makes the call on how much to send with Josh in the old white dodge caravan. All of the seats in the back are out, and five days a week Josh sets up the tables out the back in different towns on the north and east shores of the island, and sells the produce to the people!

But it all starts in the early morning silence of the fields, the sun's first golden rays piercing the sky, Kauai's many wild roosters making their announcements, my new farm friends and me shuffling along the rows, snipping and clipping and laughing or just thinking. I like to let my mind wander as my feet do, searching out the perfect leaves on each chard plant, allowing the others to stay and soak up sun to fuel the next young beauty. It is very meditative time.

Thirty-five chard bunches later I bring my load to the wash station -two large tarped areas with a long bench, wash tubs, and so on. The wash station is a hub of activities, the best spot to look or wait if you need to talk to someone who is out the in the 29 acres of veggies and fruit orchards. The local radio station is usually on, a lot like KBOO in Portland, a gem that helps me tune into the pulse of the community I am living in. Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman, hawaiian music of all varieties, local events, and the surf report are a sampiling of things I like to hear on this station.

Everyday I get to learn how this farm harvests and preps the food for delivery: how big to make bunches of things (beets, chard, kale, cilantro, basil, oregano, mint, rosemary, arrugula) how much the bagged items should weigh (green beans, baby greens, corn, broccoli), how to cut and shuck the corn, how to hut for bright green worms on bright green broccoli (people still have a hard time with the idea that their organic produce might have non-dead organic bugs on it, but that is totally healthy as long at the pest population isn't unhealthily high)

The wash station is where I have gotten to know the people that I am sharing this space with too. It is such a mix of flavors and that suits my spicy taste just fine. There is Holly, the surfer chick from England who just recently graduated from MTSU; Greg and Margaux, fantastic and unique humans; Josh, Morgan, Zaph, Ned and Marta and their two kids Si and Iesha, Cody, and as of yesterday Caroline and Phil who arrived from BC, and will stay until the end of the month....Phil wants to try to catch a wild chicken and eat it. He'll have to do it at his camp though, the kitchen is vegan...

Gallery: don't panic, its organic

lararaine — Mon, 9 Feb 2009 10:48:00 GMT

a brief orientation...

lararaine — Mon, 9 Feb 2009 09:36:00 GMT

This is a quick post to explain how I plan to utilize my electronic resources to share with all of you a slice of my existence as of late:

I am using www.flickr.com/lararaine to post all of my pictures. This site stores the pics at full size, a feature that this blog site does not offer. So I will describe all of the pics on flickr, then I will put some of them in a gallery on this site, and link it to my journal entry. The gallery will have the same title as the journal entry.

(trying to keep it simple baby! Man, just listen to all of that lingo I'm throwing around; "link" this site, that site) Ooo! Just had the idea to divide up the Kauai pictures on flickr into sets with the same names as my journal entries on the blog, yes!

Ok, so Im sure you get the idea, i am open to feedback, ect...

living aloha

lararaine — Tue, 3 Feb 2009 08:50:00 GMT

Well, as many of you know by now, I am not in Mexico! I found an awesome farm on Kaua'i, and it all fell into place for me to stay here in a matter of two days! I am trying to proceed through this adventure by following the signs instead of sticking to a rigid plan made months in advance when I had no idea of how I would feel in the moment.

As my departure date crept up on me I was learning to surf, making new friends, and traveling about on the island on my own via bus, ect while Kaya and Mike worked. I experienced the sensation more than once in my solo endeavors that the island loved me, and wanted me to stay. In a more practical sense, I had the thought that there was a lot for me still to do here.

I started calling farms out of the phone book, and I was directed to an organization called Malama Kaua'i. Malama means "to care for" and they are working to create a network of sustainable projects on the island. The gal there gave me the names and phone numbers of several small-scale organic farms, and the farm I am now living on was one of these. Actually, Marta, the farm owner, was the only person who answered my call, and she said that I could come and work the next morning.

This was Monday, I went and worked on Tuesday, and moved into a tent on the farm on Wednesday...the day that I was supposed to fly to LA! It just all fell into place. That is a motto for how I want to live my life right now. If you are fighting too hard for something, then maybe it's not what you actually need, but if you let things just flow, then the right things happen. I am still looking forward to heading to Mexico in March. I will meet up with Mom for a week in Guadalajara, what better way to start! Then I hope to re-schedule my stay at the bio-dynamic farm in Michoacan.

I am still figuring this blog thing out, but i have some pictures to add to this entry. One of me waiting at the fruit stand out on the main road for my new friend to pick me up for surfing. (I have been loaned a long board, 9.2 feet) ...i will dedicate a post to my surfing soon. A picture of my camp on the farm (29 acres of fruit trees and organic veggies, we harvest every morning but Sunday and sell at farmer's markets, to grocery stores and restaurants) A picture of my farm friends/"room" mates at the park after a saturday afternoon bike ride into town for ice cream.... A picture of the communal kitchen and the kitchen garden.

I am finally starting the understand the lay of the land on the farm after two weeks, and as I discover the special places and "see" the farm for the life it holds, I find that it is more and more beautiful to me. I just made a contribution to our kitchen garden by planting several cloves of garlic for chives. The bulbs don't really ever grow here, fungus get to them, but chives will be lovely to cook with! Ok, i am getting shifty in front of the "oracle" as mom calls it, so i gotta go! Love to all, and more to come!

Aloha, Lara

Gallery: living aloha

lararaine — Tue, 3 Feb 2009 08:35:00 GMT

holidays

lararaine — Wed, 7 Jan 2009 15:53:00 GMT

here are some random pics from the last couple of weeks. Erica is teaching me how to rock this bitch out...........so it's a practice run.

xoxo

holidays, weddings and a new year

lararaine — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:32:00 GMT

Well, I am at Mom's house in Murfreesboro, the best place I can think of to spend the holidays. Christmas Eve and Day were spent on the soft carpet in front of the fire, with my feet as close to the flames as I could stand. Alanna and I watched as Mom opened the quilt that we had been coordinating with our cousin Lisa for months. Lisa sewed the quilt using some of our favorite shirts of Dad's. It was so fun to recall the occasions that each shirt made its appearance in our lives. I caught up with a few old friends, and tonight, New Year's Eve, I will watch my dear friend Sarah Mack get hitched. A lovely way to celebrate a new partnership: celebrating a new year. I will be heading back to Portland to box and store my life there, hug my friends, and then I will head out on my adventure. I go first to Kauai, courtesy of my hard-earned Hawaiian miles card.... I will visit my sweet friends Kaya and Mike for the last time before they move back to Portland in June. From there I will fly straight to LA, tag along on a climbing trip to Joshua Tree, and then I will turn south, the perfect direction to wander.................