winter, it's still going, no? there has been snow on the ground up at the farm blanketing the baby sugarsnaps in white. there's seedlings in the greenhouse and salad and sweet peas too. it's been an intense winter both in the weather and the emotion department. eighty mile an hour winds, 80 mph on the highway to cali, hail pelting the greens, negativity pelting my heart, 2' of rain in two days, 100' of tears from november to february. oh and of course there's the good stuff too. despite all of this crazy weather we still have more vibrant healthy food growing outside than we can eat, i have enough strength to make it through my frosts and clouds.
everywhere i look there's hope for our life on the farm to get better... me and zac have both done truly amazing amounts of self speaking and listening and growing and changing. the csa in portland is going to offer us a way to keep connected with portland, we know so much better what we're doing this year, and we're going to have a new long term resident join us in june. despite all of that i keep getting mired in the fact that i am broke as fuck, still feel isolated from community, wish we had more help and local comraderie, plus the drama between me and zac while greatly improved, continues to take its course. so i guess i'm still alive is the meaning of all of that.
i've been singing copious quantities and still have daily practice dates with the fiddle. my depression has sadly leaked for the first time to my fiddle last week. it was the first time i felt discouraged, i felt like i was never going to get any better, that it was too hard and i wasn't good enough and and and. fortunately i was able to quickly stand back and remember that everyone feels this way from time to time when they're doing something challenging, and it doesn't help one bit that i've felt so low.
so kids that's the much belated update on farm life right now. also our computer isn't working at home so i'm sad to say i haven't been able to read or write any of my e-friends, sorry it'll be fixed soon-ish. here's yet another open invite to ya'll, come to the farm, spend a day a week whatever, work with us and we'll feed and house you. it's the visits that often make our month at the farm. oh, and if you live in pdx, join the csa! our veggies are the greates and there's nothing more that we would like to do than feed and nourish the fab fae community.
love,
harlan

at long last, i have returned to my beautiful home, cascadia. as i crested the ridge that drops you into the willamette valley, the dividing line where the temperate rainforest begins and the semi-arid oak savannahs of the south fade away, my heart began to swell. look-over there alders, big leaf maple and black berries! and over there-cedars, vine maple, maidenhair fern, and the first green grass i'd seen outside of a park since i left! everything dripping with moss, lichen, water, green green green. as i stood at the pay-phone in cottage grove i looked up and saw i was standing right below a line in the sky. to my south sunshine. to the north a loving blanket of clouds. home-north. i screamed with ecstasy! as i drove into my blanket it got thicker and thicker until i was enveloped in a warm fog and finally the calm drizzle that means you are still alive here in the pnw.
i got to arcana's house, curled into his arms and promplty fell into the deepest sleep i'd had in months. at midnight i awoke to him whispering "happy new year" into my ear and with a smile i fell right back to sleep. my time in the bay was good, but lord i can't believe i lasted there more than a month, a whole twelfth of my year spent in such a phrenetic, hurting, angry place. back in portland where people smile at eachother and the cars don't race to stop lights (a race to the dead end?) i feel oh so much more at home, more in myself, less defensive-more open.
trying to make money in the bay was a bust, but thankfully i'm good at living off of nothing so i will scrape by. when's that first farmers market? may? oh boy. well at least i'm broke in a place i actually like being, that makes quite a difference. and i'm sure that it will work itself out, doesn't it always? well it's time for me to pick up some fancy food things for a feast i'm cooking for me and arcana tonight. may it be as luscious as my dreams,
love harlan
oh and kiddies, it's 2007 now! five more years... are you doing everything you can to be ready? hmmm? tick-tock...

and in here. it's been the chilliest day since i've been here and so i chose to spend it at the computer typing for far too long. eight hours. god only knows why i am typing more. delerium maybe? i've been feeling sumthin big rumblin around and i'm trying to give it shape in word form. i'll keep you posted. i can't say that too many exciting external events have taken place this week but boy has the internal scene been rockin. it's funny coz i realize now that i'm trying to make for myself the peace and quiet i find in the country here in the city. it's actually been working pretty well. the house has been emptier and amie has finally given up on trying to drag me to every event, cool coffee shop and friends house. the apartment is set back from the street so it's quiet. the tea pot is always warm and i've been luxuriating in a daily hot shower. now that's what i call fancay. amie is such an amazingly insightful young lady and we operate in so many similar ways that it's been real nice to have her as my sounding board for all the stuff rushin through my head. it's the gentle nudges in the right direction that are so effective sometimes aren't they?
i've had bouts of spontaneous dancing, grief, laughter and lonliness here with myself. they all seem to be serving their purpose. i've missed my lover boys to the north something fierce a few times now, and have felt more than tempted to just get outta dodge. feeling that has been a good exercise in just feeling something and not reacting to it. just letting it be. that said i've been smoking and drinking coffee far too much. ah so, i guess i'm still attached to my emotion filters. oh and i did decide to be out of sf by new years eve. i don't even want to know what kind of terrible sight that is round here.
work does not seem to want to come to me. hmmm... i was even looking at sperm bank donatin' for cash. turns out i'm too short. it was all a creepy little foray into the reality of eugenics today. i think even if i was tall enough i would've had to think twice about participating in industrial baby reproduction. i don't know.
anyways, me and gunther are getting along quite well this week. the fingertips on my fingering fingers (you know what i mean) are starting to push a new tougher skin to the surface. i think it might be the skin that knows where to go on the fingerboard. the e string is already coming into focus and i'm learning how to play shady grove. it's only eight bars long but it's a sweet little tune and eight bars seems to be plenty for me right now. who knows maybe the next time i write i'll have it down. here's hoping! thank you all for your love, and support and presence in my life, even when i'm in far away lands.
harlanxxoo

...where might my lonesome lover be? it's been a strange coupla' days. good, but strange. i've been trying to connect with some kind of cool community down here; but besides the house i'm in it seems like somehow that is being blocked. i think it's to keep me focused on what i'm supposed to be working on. the internal, not the external. i've had some amazing conversations over the past few days with some healing mentor men that are really strengthening me. i've been kind of raw and sad too, a little on edge. in a good way.
i've been crying some and laughing a lot. we went to the infamous glide gospel church in the tenderloin, and had my socks knocked off. the service was real, and joyful. the music was good goose bump inducing stuff, and the people that spoke during the service said beautiful and touching things. there were fags and junkies, single parents and homeless, every color and every class, singing and dancing and being told they were beautiful and loved. kind of like jesus gospel rad fae for the inner city. good mojo.
tomorrow i go with amie and another dear dear friend named devon to a sacred harp singing in berkely. the sacred harp is still quite new to me but i'm super excited about it. it's that "shape note singing" you might have heard arcana and cobb singing before. it seems like i might as well learn how to use my voice as an instrument as long as i'm learning to play a manufactured one. the last few times i've played with gunther i've been looking at my hands less and less and not sounding any worse. hoorah! but now i'm scared of the e string as i've only been playing lower octaves. the e string is the string capable of screeching in a way that will make the hair on your neck stand up. i apologize in advance to those that will be subjected to my screeching. i'll get better i swear!
well kids it's time to make some dinner with some of those veggies from the farm i'm still dragging around. send me your love coz today i feel a little homesick and lonely. be good,
harlan

i arrived a few short days ago late in the evening with our friend lucy fur. i slept well and then was greeted in the morning by my friend amie who whisked me across the bridge and into sf. amie's house and roomies are funny, and lovely ladies. i've already laughed a lot and had some really good conversations. amie is so dear to my heart. tonight i get to go to the japanese baths for free, amies treat.
since i've been here it's been nothing but sunshine warming my skin and long beautiful sunsets easing us into the not-too cool evening. yesterday i played with my fiddle, gunther, by the tidepools south of half moon bay and than ate the best tacos i've had since i moved north and west from colorado. today we went to the teeny, barely not a ghost town and hour east of sf known as port costa. a small magic gem of a town with nothing more to do than walk the railroad tracks along the bay shore and have a picnic. oh and there's a rope swing under an arching eucalyptus covered in ivy. there are flowers blooming everywhere and i ate naturalized nasturtium leaves the size of my hand on the beach. migration thus far seems like a good lesson to take from the birds.
it has been strange being surrounded by so many girls. amie is definitely a girls girl and thus far i have been secluded to her world. since they're all great i've been enjoying it but i can easily see that i need to find where ma' boyz at. if anyone has contacts that'd be great. also looking for green work... thoughts anyone?
since joining up with this whole ridiculous tribe thing i've been reading some of the crazy posts on the various fae tribes pertaining to all the gender _________ going down on the land and with nomenus. since the samhain fire i have been thinking about this issue a lot. so i wrote a call to peace that i think ya'll might be interested in. it's a lengthy rant, but i'm proud of it and would like to know what your thoughts are on the matter. love y'all,
harlan

Posted to California Faeries Tribe on 12/5/06:
For the Heartsick and the Angry Alike
i have silently observed and felt this war rage on the land and on our hearts. for whatever reason i now feel called to speak. i think it's these last two posts. aaron, thank you for being present and having the beautiful grace to see what everybody needs here. and damien, thank you for eloquently stating the undeniable connection between anti-patriarchical rage and this rage we have all beared witness to. i was raised in a family of feminists, have mostly called women my soul friends, to the point of imbalance. i see everyday the pain that patriarchal thinking is mercilessly inflicting on the lives of all that are lving on our planet. in fact i feel that most of the things that are wrong today (mass species extinctions, global warming, the class divide, capitalist economics, racism, homophobia, war, rape, on and on and on) can be traced to the sick belief systems of woman hatred.

knowing this, for along time made me hate men, and it tied me close to other people that hated men. sadly this meant that i hated myself. thanks again patriarchy. not only do all things and non-things perceived as non-male humans suffer, men suffer too. (sometimes even in the name of a feminism) in the last three years of my short life (i am 25 and have been out since i was 13) i have begun the process of healing these wounds. when i started on this journey i lived in denver and had never heard of rad fae. finding any sort of queer-male centric centers of healing/commune/magic was literally, impossible. then i found wolf creek. i was told it was a place made by and for queer men to create their spiritual tribe, their place of healing and connection. my first question was if women were allowed there, perhaps i would have never gone if the answer wasn't an emphatic yes. i was scared to be around so many men folk for my hatred of patriarchy seeped even to these beautiful boys too. and at my first gathering i spoke almost entirely to women, stayed far from the presence of medicine men. but quietly i hungered for their story, magic, and love.

now later on my path to connection and creation with other fab fae's, (a group which consists of every gendered/non-gendered definition i can come up with) i realize more and more the value that all queer male space has in my life. queer men are my next of kin, brothers on my totem that have walked our way in the past, present and future. it is at the font of cock and ass, and all the magic it entails, that my thirst is most deeply quenched. although i have plenty enough faith in myself to realize that i can and will heal these wounds caused by a patriarchical system- with or without wolf creek, my path would be much more perilous, exhausting, and long. part of that path i suppose would have to be creating some "faggot only" space in my life. but why should i have to take those pains when the life and energy to create that space has already been sweated into fruition? please do not destroy these gifts meant to be given joyfully to me and mine. this is not a call to false respect for some elders who do not deserve it. it is a call to appreciation of these gifts. and in not making me have to devote energy to creating said space i have more enrgy left to help all others create theirs.

being a true two-spirit i feel not only my body based spirit but my universal soul-at the same time. this means that i do NEED faggot only space, and just as much i NEED pangender space. i have no desire to harm or remove any of the limbs on my family tree. to do so would be to continue the suffering of all my relations (that icludes all that don't identify as gay dudes, even the frogs out my window will surely be pained) why cannot the two exist? oh, but they can! and do! when you hold two things in the space of your heart at the same time you will in fact feel your heart grow, isn't that the work?

my sweet sweet faerie tribe, please be kind to eachother. there is a place for our anger and from where i stand- at eachother is quite simply not the place. as i have watched these semi-dialogues scroll across a distant digital reality i can see how this is all just a sign of where we're at as a human collective in time and space. alas our culture and our way of being in this world has not been healed. by simply creating this sanctuary we have not fixed the problems of the world all around us, and so our sanctuary does reel from that truth. as it should. we are all from this place. but just as you should not hate the logger but the system that allows that kind of destruction even thinkable, we should not hate eachother because of the unjust and dying world we were raised in. to do so is not only counter productive but really, really harmful. and sad. it hurts, real bad. that is why i would never think in a million years of demanding to be part of a sister/mother/daughter/crone only circle. that would be some unbelievably fucked up patriarchical shit right there! my sisters have suffered enough! so, can we see that to do the same to queer men would be just that? the same-unbelievably fucked up patriarchical shit. suffering at the hands of anothers dominance/coercion/violence is what i'm trying not to do, and not to do to others. i move in this direction to stab a knife in the heart of all woman/trans/child/animal/land haters. and i stab it with just as much love into the hearts of all who hate men, for we too have suffered enough.

i am a fierce warrior and will no longer be silenced by my own fears of being labeled a misogynist etc. etc. pig. i have devoted so much of myself to my she comrades, and will continue to do say for the rest of my days. but i will also stand for my needs and the needs of many of my male family. we do not all need this fag space, that is so true. and just as i would not tell them that in fact they do when they don't, i refuse to have the ability to fulfill my needs dictated by anyone but myself even when it's in the name of equality etc. anarchy to me means that ALL of our needs are met. it does not mean the ability of one group to destroy another in the name of its ideology (x-tianity anyone? US of A? sound familiar? crusades? conquests? imperialisms black heart beats there- look closely now). all of the land is beautiful and sacred, not just the soil beneath what white people call wolf creek. we can celebrate our unique individual universality in every way conceivable, in every land. it needs only to be conceived. something has been conceived in my name, let us help you conceive something in yours too. in everyones name. i'm sorry it hasn't already happened. sadly for most that is truth. for me fag only space is strong medicine that gives me more power and strength to share with all of our fae family. please, i beg you, do not fight to take my medicine away but brew more medicine, the kind you need... and if only you ask kindly, i will joyfully help you however i can, for i love my family each and every one. i want your needs to be met just as badly as my own.

and to my dear angry/anarchist/destroyer/dark beauty brother that first started this post and all the others that know this anger in their hearts... you and me my sweet are kin too. very close family more than likely. i too come from the place of the destroyer. i too call myself by many on the names you used, anarchist etc. i know that my power lay in the rubble of sick structure destroyed. but i know that that power must be tempered by two other important elements, creation and preservation. without the forces of all three working in harmony you end up with something terrible and nasty. i have found that i am my most effective at manifesting intention when i work in concert with all of the elements. i know this all sounds like woo-woo bullshit to our ears that burn from so many lies but i am sure that below the rage it rings true. and ain't nobody (especially me) telling you to vanquish your rage. to the contrary hun! it is your gift, your ally. hold it dear, for it is your strength. and dammit everyone should be pissed! our water and our air, our landbase, the thing that keeps us alive-Big Mamma is being raped and tortured to death right before our very eyes! thanks again patriarchy! so help me to not be a priveleged white male capitalist pig. help me by allowing me the medicine i so desperately need to walk with you on this path.