Splinters of the SubtleConscious Soul

The Ice Road

mello — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 04:35:41 GMT

In far northern Wisconsin there is sometimes a natural road that leads out to an island within Lake Superior. This ice road exists only a few months out of the year and is either loved or feared by the folks that live in this area. In the warmer months the several thousand summer residents that reside on the island are dependent on a ferry business to provide passage for their vehicles; during the deepest part of winters this road grants liberty from the tourists and schedules to the few hardy souls remaining on the island. This past weekend I finally took the plunge and spanned this road for the first time with friends while we still could before the spring breakup. It was a beatiful and warm pre-spring afternoon, I had been tapping maples in the family sugarbush earlier in the morning as the sap had begun to flow. We rolled down all of the windows, just in case we needed an escape route, and laughed as the water splashed into our vehicle As we forded the above-ice creek that ran over the mainland landing. Along our journey of a few miles we veered through the slushy conditions following the occasional reused christmas tree marking the road as we passed by a weinie roast party and folks going ice fishing. As we arrive onto the island there is a release of triumphant cries while reminding ourselves that we would again be taking this journey back under the cover of darkness, assuming the road will still be open. The ice road reminds me of the old saying that you can never cross the same river twice. It reminds me of the fact that choosing a path may not be for everyone, but if you choose to take it you will find others along the way. It reminds me that it is indeed possible to walk on water.

Redoing America

mello — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 06:05:59 GMT

Today is the first day of a renewed America. Today I watched Barack Hussein Obama's ignauguration party as the 44th President of the United States on the tell-a-vision. I was watching it live from a kitchen where I somtimes work, in the capital of a surviving and sovereign First American nation. I was at the distribution center for USDA Commodities Foods, in a kitchen that I had helped to renovate for their nutritional education program. This place is known as "Commods", the modern-day interpretation of food access rights in ceded territories set by treaties between Chippewa chiefs and American presidents in the 1800s. I was sitting with three Anishinaabe citizens that I have gotten to know over the past year as an AmeriCorps volunteer through organizing a youth conference/pow-wow, learning the arts of wild and industrial foods, being a part of America's only Mobile Farmer's Market, and just joking around. After the kitchen and warehouse closed for the day, I went to the border to my favorite community center on top of the ridge where I continued to watch the party in D.C. with a handful of kids and adults. We were watching for glimpses of native representatives dressed in full regalia on horseback between the marching bands and floats. I wrote down a dream in my journal a couple years ago about being able to live off of making compost. In the past few months I have been fleshing out a modest organics processing facility to serve two rural counties and two native nations that could be financially independent within a few years. It could employ multiple people full-time year-round by making and selling topsoil, and teaching their community how to do it at home too. We would be able to reclaim tons of organics every day from landfills and the collapsing recycling industry. By saving on the public and private costs and energy impacts of current disposal practices, it can grow topsoil and sustainable jobs. Just think of what that could do for local foods. Obama could easily make this dream a reality depending on the details of his upcoming economic stimulus plan. Enough with the economic growth, we need some economic decay to complete the cycles. Is Obama ready to wake this country up?

US Troops Deployed on Home Soils

mello — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 23:01:40 GMT

There's a lot happening these days... I just became aware that a brigade of US troops was deployed here on home soil on October 1st. The first deployment of its kinds since the Civil War. These troops are directly controlled by the President... not Congress. The army's version of the story: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/army_homeland_090708w/ Another interpretation: http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/09/24/army/ CNN's report: http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/10/03/army.unit/

Hope my friend is OK

mello — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 03:54:58 GMT

An activist friend of mine and several others were preemptively raided, arrested, and being charged with conspiracy to further terrorism against the Republican National Convention held in the Twin Cities. Many know him as an incredible dumpster diver, gardener and composter. Below is an excerpt from an article about the eight activists that are being charged: http://www.minnpost.com/community_voices/2008/09/16/3523/first_they_came_for_the_anarchists_ First They Came For The Anarchists By Mordecai Specktor | Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2008 My son Max was arraigned at the Ramsey County Law Enforcement Center on Wednesday, Sept. 3. He's in serious legal trouble. In the aftermath of the Republican National Convention — and the arrests of more than 800 protesters, journalists and bystanders in the Twin Cities — Max and seven others, the alleged ringleaders of the RNC Welcoming Committee, have been charged with conspiracy to commit riot in the furtherance of terrorism. That's right, terrorism. ... Lurid allegations The complaint in the case of the RNCWC 8 (shades of the Chicago 8, from another political convention brouhaha) contains lurid allegations about kidnapping Republican delegates, throwing Molotov cocktails, attacking law enforcement officers and burning tires on the freeway. The allegations are based on statements made by police plants in the group — CRIs, "confidential reliable informants." "The charges in this case are supported only by allegations of paid confidential informants," Nestor told the reporters. "A number of the attorneys here have experience in investigations with the use of informants in political cases. We are concerned about the potential use of provocateurs, people who purposely plan and bring up discussions of violence, in order to get other people to respond and then report back that those discussions occurred. The confidential informants are paid based on the value of the information they provide. They have a clear incentive to exaggerate and lie about the information." Nestor added that the allegations of kidnapping and violence, the "most outrageous allegations" made by the authorities — and the basis for the Aug. 30 SWAT team raids on three south Minneapolis homes — "are not supported by any evidence other than the statements of the confidential informants, they're not supported by the evidence seized." Which brings us to the pails of urine. Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher proudly displayed 5-gallon pails of "urine" at a press conference following the raids. The anarchists ostensibly were fashioning IUDs (improvised urine devices) to use against cops and Republicans, according to the police authorities. The search warrants for the Aug. 30 SWAT team raids specified "urine and feces." However, Nestor said that the "urine" seized was mostly "kitchen gray water" and had nothing to do with any of the defendants. Nestor also noted that "common household items" — glass bottles, rags and charcoal starter fluid, found in different locations in various houses — have repeatedly been referred to in news reports as bomb-making materials. Warrant items not found "We have search warrants seeking gun powder, explosive materials, Molotov cocktails, none of which were found," Nestor said. "We have the sheriff displaying a single plastic item, which he claims is a shield; as if, somehow, one shield was going to protect demonstrators from 3,500 armed riot police who have projectile tear gas weapons." Nestor concluded that the authorities have recklessly wielded the "terrorism charge" so that any political activist involved in planning civil disobedience could be labeled as a "domestic terrorist." Attorney Larry Leventhal told the reporters that the complaint does not allege that any of the defendants physically attacked anybody or even "broke a window." The complaints against the eight defendants, according to Leventhal, weave "a narrative of various meetings that they claim occurred over a number of years. … We have, basically, [the authorities] saying, Here are some people, they've associated with other bad people, and those people have done bad things. If we were to accept the standard that people who associate with others who may do bad things are subject to arrest — and that certainly should not be a standard in a civilized society — but if that were the standard, there's a lot of delegates who are in the Xcel Center that have been associating with bad people who have done very bad things." Leventhal termed the case a "political prosecution," which is characterized by people being targeted and arrested for "their thoughts, for their ideas — which may be different from the reigning political powers' — rather than for things they have done."

My American Dream

mello — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 07:09:08 GMT

"2008 Art Theme: 'American Dream' In 2008, leave narrow and exclusive ideologies at home and carefully consider your immediate experience. What has America achieved that you admire? What has it done or failed to do that fills you with dismay? What is laudable? What is ludicrous? Put blame aside, let humor thrive, and dare to contemplate a larger question: What can America contribute to the world?" - burningman.com In 2007 I went to Burning Man on a Green Man dream in barter for my participation in open source education, to tell others about a mud mix called cob. I still carry my Gift ticket stub everywhere along my path to remind myself that right here is a living dream, to sate my nomadic spirit for know that I very well could have followed another path to an American Dream known as Black Rock City right now. Last year I got two burns for the price of none, last year some would argue that the only way to make the burn greener is to stay at home, this year I did just that. This year I have followed a different dream closer to my heart within the sovereign nation of the Anishinaabeg, where the watershed I grew up in meets the world's largest lake. This freshwater estuary is the largest and possibly most pristine remaining on Lake Superior. Just a walk away from the confluence where the sloughs thrive with manoomin at this time of year is an incredible remote beach with northern hardwood forests, Black Ash bogs, grassy campsites, traditional wigwams and a modern ceremonial roundhouse. Within sight from here lies the island where the former capitol of the Ojibwa people was seven generations ago, the extraordinary gatherings of today's students in traditional cultures during these times of the seventh fire, and not least the dreams of seven generations ahead. Along this sacred beach live soulful stones unique to this area. Tradition says these grandfather stones are sculpted by the spirits of this beach during thunderstorms, following these storms are when they are found most abundantly. Geology says the concretion stones were born some 20,000 years ago within these red clay banks lining the shore in a host nucleus, often organic, such as a leaf, tooth, or piece of shell or fossil. Their myriad of unusual shapes and sizes are described as marbles, dinosaur eggs, cannonballs, pumpkins, peanuts, monster eyes, various animals, ripples, warts, round people, miniature planets, or extra-terrestrial debris. Whatever their origin is they are known for not wanting to leave the beach after enduring such incredible journeys to be there. At this time last year I shared my dream with tens of thousands for an artistic experiment in community on the playa, this year I shared my dream with a gathering of less than a dozen dozen to share traditional earth based living skills on the Kitchi-Gami. My gift to this community remains the same, sharing the knowledge of making modern concretions known as a cob-creation from the soils, fibers and water of the lake itself. This past week a loving earthen oven was born along with this tradition remembered through our spirits participating intimately together. Perhaps someday around the year 22,000 AD someone shall walk along these same shores and wonder about the cob-creations and dream about the curious forces that created these. If art is whatever I can get away with, then may I not live a better American Dream than this.

Further adventures with straw/clay

mello — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 02:03:06 GMT

"This year Bonnaroo got its own United States post office, complete with a festival postmark, operating from a hut made of clay, straw and recycled tires." ~ The New York Times 6/16/08 http://blog.burningman.com/?p=1936 http://flickr.com/photos/zeibler/sets/72157605641433526/ http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080613/VIDEO03/80613125 Affordable Green Housing in Indian Country http://www.affordablegreenhousing.org/ http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=3288451874703984763

Cheesehead culture

mello — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 16:48:10 GMT

Walking through the woods helps to clear the mind. Before venturing out I dress in a few layers and throw on some blaze orange so that none of the neighbors shoot me. Today's snow is squeaky. I read the fresh snowfall and interpret the tracks and scats of rabbits, birds, squirrels and deer, and then follow myself back home before dark. At night, going to the bars helps to meet the neighbors. The parking lot is full of trucks with dead bodies in the back. I enter the local saloon around dinnertime and walk into a sea of people fully dressed in blaze orange with serial numbers on their backs. Hunters come and go from the establishment as they refuel on burgers and beers over stories describing today's hunt and the memorable carcasses of yore. The buck board on the wall in the back is full of local names and catches. Occassionally the crowd wanders outside to see the newest buck to pull up. A couple of dogs running around inside probably breaks some health codes but nobody cares. I haven't been hunting yet in my life, but I do help the neighbors in exchange for venison. I go over to their basement and find three dead deers hanging from the floor rafters. We skin the deer, take off the legs, and remove the back meat. The meat goes into the freezers, the skins and heads go to the back porch for storage, and the head-legs-skin-less bodies go to the back yard for the dogs to chew on. Later in the winter, after more hunting and skinning, we will get together again to butcher the legs and process the venison before distributing to family and friends. If it weren't for the sexy orange fashions and dead bodies everywhere, life here in the northwoods could seem boring. November 12, 2007: DNR Advises Hunters Not To Transport Firewood November 12, 2007: More Wisconsin Hunting Accidents Involve Younger Hunters November 13, 2007: New Steps Being Taken To Ease Tensions Between White, Hmong Hunters November 16, 2007: Gun Deer Hunting Season Starts Saturday November 17, 2007: Deer Hunt Opens With Good Weather Forecast November 19, 2007: Hunter's Wayward Bullet Narrowly Misses Teen In Parked Car November 19, 2007: DNR: Successful, Safe Start To Gun Deer Hunt November 19, 2007: Amid Ongoing CWD Concerns, Gun Deer Hunting Season Begins November 20, 2007: Thermal Imaging Used To Track Down Missing Hunter November 21, 2007: Merrill Man Sells Hunting Rifles To Buy Turkeys November 21, 2007: Illinois Man Killed While Deer Hunting In Wisconsin November 22, 2007: Hunter Listed In Critical After Shooting Self Twice November 26, 2007: DNR: 3 Hunters Killed, 3 More Wounded During Gun Deer Hunt November 27, 2007: DNR: Hunters Register 343,644 Deer Over 9-Day Season

Community of Chequamegon

mello — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 06:44:21 GMT

Today's sky is cloudy with a few geese migrating to warmer regions down south. The air is crisp with fresh fog emitting from our lips with every breath. Except for the evergreens, all of the trees in the northwoods are now bare with only the hardiest of leaves and apples still rejecting gravity. The grass, still green, is dusted with the first snowfall of the season from yesterday. The axe that I used last week to chop wood is now being used to cut and temporarily remove the grass from a plot of ground. As we place the strips of grass aside and begin digging deeper down with shovels, a child looks up at his parents and curiously inquires "What are we making?" Ten of us gathered today to dig a grave for Pam, a loved member in our close-knit community. Her funeral will be at home, held outdoors in the field at her wedding site. Her burial will be down the road, near the community home-schoolhouse. As we dig, snowflakes begin to fall, seemingly attracted to our warm conversations. To keep us warm between shifts a small campfire is made from birch bark strips and branches from the ground nearby and releases a smokey scent that brings back my childhood memories of boiling down tree sap into maple syrup. A vehicle approaches, and the driver emerges with a spread of food to feed us. We all talk about how incredible the potluck benefit at the local saloon was on Saturday night; all of the food and silent auction items were donated, and about 300 rural northlanders came together and raised over $10,000 for this one incredible woman. One person's overalls are still bloody from butchering a ten-point buck last night in preparation for the upcoming funeral feast. Another vehicle arrives with the son and son-in-law, they have just finished building a divine coffin using wood that I had helped to harvest. They came over to see if they would be needed for this task, but their community has already completed it, and instead they are offered a beer and warm spirits rather than a shovel. The most uplifting aspect in my process of celebrating and remembering her life and her impact on us is seeing how interconnected and resourceful our community is. The most painful aspect for all of us is doing these preparations while not knowing exactly when the funeral will be as she is still alive. We still talk about a miracle happening, that she will beat this cancer yet again, but her cancer came back quick and hard. Her physical form is now in a state of jaundice, but her spirit is as beautiful and compassionate as ever as she speaks now of making her final journey within the next few days. Everyday there has been at least a few of us over at her homestead, helping inside to keep her comfortable and nourished with love, and outside to be ready for the winter, and most importantly helping each other to prepare all of us for her journey north. Community.

Child of Chequamegon

mello — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 04:35:36 GMT

Cresting over Spirit Mountain brought me to where the St. Croix river forms the source of Lake Superior dividing Minnesota and Wisconsin. This stretch along I-35 offers visible signs of our western civilization, including a casino on the Chippewa reservation, yet they are insignificant to the awesome presence of forest and freshwater at this vista point. The trees have already peacocked with their fall foilage and only the hardiest of leaves still stood tall when I arrived two days ago. After four days of driving cross country, I am finally in an environment and climate that feels completely normal to my senses again. The next hour flashes by as I head due east towards Bayfield county, into the heart of the Chequamegon bioregion along the south shore of 'Da Lake'. I arrived in time to help out with cutting and stacking firewood from trees that I had helped to collect when they had been knocked down in a windstorm two years ago. I am with family and friends again; not merely visiting as I pass through to my next adventure, but instead to stay and live by them for at least through the long and harsh winter season. I was born and raised here, and the land and the community that it supports now calls strongly to me. There aren't many of us up here, just barely 15,000 call this county home at the rate of ten people per square mile. Glaciation was the largest influence on our geography, providing us a rich natural heritage to share. Maybe there are so few of us here because the annual temperature here hovers at 40 degrees. Aside from our 'Skahnsin dialect and being posted on the bar's wall of fame for swallowing live bait, widespread environmental consciousness is probably our richest cultural heritage; I grew up influenced by dog sledders, falconers, trackers, maple syrupers, farmers, surveyors, foresters, basket weavers and all sorts of other naturalists and wildcrafters. It is easy for a visitor to see the beauty in this region but the cost of failing to keep hands busy is the western vice of Brain Drain. I was doing amazing where I was in northern California, working among natural builing activists working on projects that I wanted to be part of in communities that I loved, so why did I return? I feel that I can also do/apply/create what I love here as well, being here now feels right though I came back at the wrong time of year to prove it. First frost was already a month ago, and the migrations of birds signify that snow is almost here. I'll be lucky to keep myself busy with any kind of work here through the late fall and winter, especially what would be ideal to me, but that should give me ample time to get prepared for next year. So far the car hasn't been unpacked yet and I am already doing worktrade at a neighbor's cordwood and post & beam workshop being made with 100% free reused wood. Through the grapevine from today's volunteers I hear news of a few strawbale homes in the region, and this gives me hopes for my journey to create my niche here. To share what I have travelled coast to coast to learn is what I aim to do in these sleepy woods, and this is how I aim to coevolve our community and battle Brain Drain. A winter looms ahead, and spring awaits.

Eclipsing Man

mello — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 03:27:40 GMT

I wonder if Paul Addis saw me as he climbed up the Man to set him on fire early Tuesday morning? I was in the Green Man Pavilion down below when it happened. I didn't see him. I had just met Kachina Katrina, a major force behind the Green Man theme, minutes before. I was standing by the Open Source Green Lab installation, right by the glowing red object in the above picture on the left edge, gazing upon the full moon eclipse with the Man behind my back. I had been scheduled to offer knowledge about natural building systems and resources to anyone who wanted to lend an ear earlier that afternoon, but the whole Pavilion was closed off because a nearby artist hadn't finished using a forklift and welding his metal tree together yet, and didn't open until after Satisfied with having stayed up until early Tuesday morning to witness the highlight of the night, I started heading back to camp for bed as I noticed an odd energy grow around the Pavillion. As I began to walk across the open playa I watched an emergency vehicle weaving through Black Rock citizens and heading out straight towards me. They passed right by me on their way towards the general direction of the Man. I turned around to see where their destination was and my breathing paused. I didn't see the Man burning. I may have glanced at something on fire when I turned around, but that didn't interest me. What immediately seized and held my attention was Orion crawling over the mountains along the eastern horizon. The first sighting of his annual rebirth is always a special moment to me, and I hadn't seen Orion since the springtime in Costa Rica where I had figuratively burned my own man. Feeling even more grateful for the celestial activities of that night, I continued onward to rest upon my dusty bed. I didn't find out that the Man had burned until breakfast. Oh well. I'm sure that it would have been amazing to actually NOTICE the Burning Man when I was still standing within range of Him falling on me, but He had been eclipsed by the beauty of the bigger picture at that moment. I heard Mr. Addis did it because Burning Man was letting the Corporations invade with the Green Man theme, because of what Burning Man had become/lost over the years, because it needed to be reclaimed/redefined in the true spirit of radical self-expression. I was gifted a ticket to Burning Man in exchange for hosting discussions on natural building systems and resources for the Open Source Green Lab. I even got on the playa two days early to help set up the Green Man Pavilion. On Monday the whole Pavilion was closed because an artist was still building a tree. I had been looking forward to hosting my first session that day, as well as a couple that showed up just to be in it. It opened up to the public for the first time later that evening, only to be closed down again seven hours later. On Tuesday the rebuild crew had rearranged and condensed the Pavilion to make room for making the new Man. We thought we could resume the Green Lab the next day, but weren't able to until finally on Friday. We had to have the whole Pavilion cleared out later that night so that the Man could burn again the next night. Over two dozen open learning discussions on a plethora of 'Green' issues and technology could have transformed the paradigms of burners, only two actually happened on the only day it was open. How many people went to see the Pavilion and participated that day? Aside from the setup crew, how many people actually got to see the entire Pavilion in it's original state before the eclipse? To be able to walk up to the pyre and caress the bark on those giant timbers while gazing directly up at the Man? To hear all these beautiful animal sounds, and to be told by someone nearby that they are all recordings of extinct species that a biologist had recorded during forty years of field work? To witness the power of algae to digest generator fumes into oxygen and biomass? The atmosphere was powerful and serene at the same time. Everything under the Pavilion was art. There wasn't any branding or logos or ads that could be seen there, not even for the non-profit that had organized the Open Source Green Lab. How much interaction with those art pieces and visionaries was lost because one man had an overwhelming desire to impose an early burn upon everyone else? To me that whole experience was frustrating. I knew that the Green Man was just supposed to be an art theme rather than an ideal to meet while creating a temporary city of Americans, but it might have had a chance to become manifested into so much more than an illusion in the desert. But, as a virgin with a free ticket and no sessions to host anymore, how could I really complain? =)

Strawhome on the range

mello — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 18:16:19 GMT

I woke up from Dreamtime and found myself living in my dream again. These past couple of weeks I have been out on the front range just south of Wyoming on the plains building a 5,000sf timberframed strawbale home in a giant field of straw and hay. Welcome to the wild west. The deer and the antelope play, the rabbits are hoppingly happy, no buffalo to be seen anywhere, and the rattlesnakes mate in the loose straw by our feet. The sunrise is gorgeous coming over the endless prairies to the east, and the sunset is spectacular over the Rockies. The roads that I drive on here have no stop signs, or any need for them. The only signs of humans present here is the other strawbale house on this ranch along with a handful of neighboring homes that are within viewing range, I-25 humming off in the distance, the lights along the horizon at night, and the presence of wind turbines perched on a mesa near the Wyoming border. All of the strawbales come from an hour's drive(the straw grown on site is not building quality yet), all of the timbers come from southern CO, and the clay and sand for the earthen plasters come from the mound behind the house. Mother Nature is showing me that the world of humans is small yet so beautiful, and I am not one to argue with her evidence here. Every now and then I get a sense why you can see the wind turbines from here; THE WIND. Sometimes there is none, other times it overflows with abundance (enough to blow down a wall being stacked earlier in the season). The owners speculate about investing in photovoltaics, and though they do have significant solar gain here, I believe that they'd be fools if they didn't look into a microwind system first. The locals call this the monsoon season, and I doubt that they are kidding. Though it seems to usually be clear skies and hot days, you definitely need to be prepared at any change towards rain here. Plasters have been washed clean off of the strawbales on one side of the house during one particularly wet and windy day. One afternoon brought 3 inches of rain within 40 minutes, which means that it was several times harder than the worst rains that I endured in the mountainous rainforest of Costa Rica. The job site can switch from dry and dusty to a lake of mud in no time flat. This is my first time working with lime plasters and I can clearly see the advantage that it has on the exterior walls in this climate. My coworker has been doing strawbale in Colorado for over a decade and says that these are the most extreme weather conditions that he has ever built in. I would have to agree with him, and I am loving the challenge/experience. Although I just started working, I must take a break for travels west. Last night I journeyed back to Paonia and stumbled upon a patchwork of my brothers from the Dreamtime (Kazi, Trey, Makaya, Clay, Jan...). Great to be reunited once more, to resume the dreamtime, and now time to move on again. My adventure is taking back to the Russian River valley of Mendocino county, back to where I first lifted a strawbale onto a wall and stomped together some cob, back to Solfest and a homecoming. I fully intend to harmonize in the norCal vibe once more for these next couple of weeks. After that, I head back to the strawbale project to finish it up and to start some new strawbale adventures. Oh, and Burning Man seems to be along the way back, maybe I'll have to check it out and say hey y'all? So, see you soon at Solfest: www.solfest.org Maybe at Burning Man: www.burningman.com And for sure at the strawbale workshops at the Rocky Mountain Sustainable Living Fair: www.sustainablelivingassociation.org/fair/index.html

EarthWorks Expo 2007

mello — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 19:57:20 GMT

EarthWorks Expo is a celebration of solutions that enable our evolution to a truly sustainable society, coming to Denver July 27-29, 2007. A new world is evolving. A world where nature and communities thrive And potential and innovation flourish. It’s a world being changed for the better. By people like you. www.earthworks2007.com/

Dreaming the Future

mello — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 23:07:29 GMT

“I slept and dreamt that life was Joy. I woke and saw that life was Duty. I acted, and behold, Duty was Joy.” - Rabinranath Tagore Hey dreamers and joyers, Hard to believe that I have been setting up for the Dreamtime festival (www.dreamthefuture.org) for almost a week now. Life is beautiful here, I am blessed every morning when I wake up and realize that I am still in a joyful and loving dream. The community here can only be described as delicious. I've been busy transforming wheel hubs, deadfall logs and billboard ads into yurts. I look up from my duties and see these fellow dreamers around me culturing living machines, whipping up scrumptious meals, roadie-ing together stages, and plain simple kicking some serious ass to transform this beautiful ranch into a fermentation station for growing dreams to the tune of several thousand in just a few more days. If you aren't busy with Transformus or 10k Lakes, you need to get down here to experience the Love that is being manifested here! Loving, Dreaming and Flying, Mello

Bonnarooed

mello — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:42:59 GMT

"Walked out this morning, don't believe what I saw Hundred billion bottles, washed up on the shore Seems I'm not alone at being alone Hundred billion castaways, looking for a home" - The Police (photo credits to tennesseetourist.com)

Festivals of Life

mello — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 20:22:02 GMT

Just got into the civilization known as Puriscal, Costa Rica, this morning after the usual two hour bus journey of eroded washed out dirt roads. After a delightful chat about personal energies over a breakfast of gallo pintos, I wandered over to the internet cafe for my adventure into the internet world. Several hours later, I have found out that my life for the summer will be one big festival... Thought that I would be flying back home to Wisconsin at the end of June, but just got hired at the Bonnaroo music festival in Tennesee next week. Here´s a BIG shoutout to my friend, that I originally met in a dream fifteen years before we would work two (now three) summers together, for hooking me up with the gig and a free flight back to the states within a few productive hours of getting online today. So here´s a shoutout to all of you friends in Atlanta and NC who will be grooving to the music in Bonnaroo; come visit me at the Coleman station during the days and lets spin some fire during the nights! Next on my agenda will be a much deserved trip to visit the homestead in Wisconsin again... But not for too long before I head out again for the Dreamtime festival scene in Colorado for most of July. Looking forward to greening some buildings and dreaming some futures there! After that, the fates will find me busy during August over in California plastering strawbales in preparation for the Solfest madness, where my soul was reborn just two short years ago. Gonna be off-the-grid madness! After that... dunno yet. Burning Man? Bioneers? Greenfest? Life changes crazy fast somtimes like today, so who knows? Looking forward to creating and celebrating some festivus with yáll somewhere soon. PS: www.bonnaroo.com www.dreamthefuture.org www.solfest.org

Sueños curativos a Rancho Mastatal

mello — Sat, 05 May 2007 17:33:47 GMT

UNHOLY MATRIMONY, BATMAN I came to the decision that living/working with an alcoholic that abuses his wife emotionally/physically in front of me and his children and lieing to me on a regular basis was not a case study in cultural relativity, but severe violation of basic human needs. I devised a course of action to spread as much Unconditional Love to my host family as I could for almost two weeks before I quit the dream project of making a cob-bamboo wattle and daub showerhouse for the hot springs there. I made some progress with them in their troubles, but not as much as I would have wanted to. I stayed as long as was required before I was finally finished with the preparations that weren´t done for me beforehand and finally spent a full day teaching wholesome and healing cobbing with the ticos. It was also the same day that I stopped having the lucid dreams that I have been waking up to every day since I arrived in Costa Rica. The next morning at breakfast I made the announcement that I was leaving, that my bags were already packed, that this situation was violating everything that I valued in my life. I called the client to let him know why I was quitting his project, I went down to the building site to give the workers some last minute reviews and tips, and then I was gone. The next morning I woke up at dawn in a hammock to the movements of someone gathering from the baskets full of produce below me while preparing breakfast. I had survived the trip, and had arrived safely, though without invititation, at Rancho Mastatal ( http://www.ranchomastatal.com/ ) during the middle of the night. I am extremely fortunate to be able to take sanctuary here from the hell that I was in. After a week of being in uncertain limbo as to how long I would be able to stay, I am very happy to know that I can stay here indefinitely, several months if I should choose so. Once I ceased the limbo of my location, I was finally able to face the limbo of my soul. I didn´t realize the extent of how harmful that whole experience had been to me until I started crying from the flashbacks. Why am I feeling victimized? I am not responsible for what happened, why do I feel guilt? Because I haven´t yet reported the abuse in detail, because I still need to use my abilities in full to help the family that I left behind. That explains why I am on the internet today. I was supposed to fly back home this Wednesday, but I no longer know if my ticket is still good or not since the client was pissed that I quit. "Can´t you just ignore it?" was his initial reaction to my rejection of the abusive family situation during our phonecall. How and when I shall get back home again, I do not know yet. I am very fortunate to know that I have a relative with the ability to help me out when I am ready to travel again. But for NOW, I am HERE. I came to Costa Rica looking to heal my soul. Strange how I should fall into the worst, most damaging, experience of my life first before arriving/fleeing to the community that will help me start the healing process. I should be careful what I wish for. Then again, maybe not so strange. We need to reach the bottom before we can go up. In the darkest moment shall be the brightest light. I now rise from the ashes into the sky. The nightmare turned into a beautiful dream thanks to me being lucid and intentional. I am very fortunate to be spending my time at Rancho Mastatal during this soulful process, in the middle of the last virgin rainforest of Costa Rica’s Puriscal County at the start of the rainy season. The work, meals and souls here are incredible. And I am waking up from dreams once more, looking at a cob wall next to my timberframed bed next to the arched window and looking out to the foggy dawn from the rest of the open-air walls in this gorgeous volunteer-intern house. I am currently working on an elevated hybrid timberframed/post&beam gazeebo that connects to the porch. I am now able to sweat, breathe and laugh all at the same time. And to top it all off, this place is exactly the cup of GREEN tea that I have been thirsting for. Pura Vida.

(Perma)Cultural Relativity

mello — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 16:02:12 GMT

For years I have had many debates with my friends and coworkers, and especially within myself, about what the meaning of "Green" is as I dive into this crazy world known as environmental/ecological/sustainable/green/natural building. What could possibly be so confusing and controversial about such a simple concept? Either it pollutes or it doesn't. Either it is organic or not. Is a viable option or is a waste. Renewable or fossil/manufactured. Completes the cycles or breaks them. ... Right? Here I shall share my thoughts on the moral dilema of (Perma)cultural relativity by labeling something as GREEN(!®™*¡). My discourse isn't based upon my Permaculture Design Certification texts, lifecycle analyses, or Home Energy Rating Standards, but rather upon my definitions of Magic and Magick. Magic is a sleight of hand, an illusion to make the impossible become easy, a way of getting the same old thing from point A to Z without passing points B-through-Y; they are all normal mechanics, yet baffles the audience because they are perceiving from a certain viewpoint without realizing exactly what remains invisible to them. Magick, on the other hand, isn't about illusions; it is about changing consciousness through will and demonstration, about the subtle interconnectedness and influences that we create with the powers of how we choose to live and our abilities to sense the world within our reaches. I think that the best motivational speakers and healers are those who practice both magic and magick as they destroy the known world both physically and psychologically in order to help rebuild it again. But first, a little background information to let you know what my biases are and where they come from. I was lucky enough to grow up brainwashed with the GREEN values of Environmentianity and simple living by my role models so I wouldn't have to go through that painful process later on in life. My parents had grown up in cities and moved out to 80 acres deep into the northwoods of Wisconsin where they became log home builders, experimented with passive solar and greywater design, grew a giant garden, planted an orchard to compliment their natural one, stored produce year-round, made maple syrup, fermented all kinds of alcoholic beverages, raised a variety of livestock for many years, composted, chopped their own firewood, practiced woodworking and other crafts, raised my sister without electricity until I was born, homeschooled my sister for a couple of years, and went without running water until I was seven when they built a new home on the same property. Our family friends were involved with environmental education, planting trees for the forestry department, working for the DNR, racing sled dogs in the snow, falconeering, built a cordwood sauna, had renewable energy, etc. Looking back at elementary school, one of my favorite fieldtrips would be walking a mile or so from the school into the woods to tour the town's wastewater wetlands ponds and follow the process from sewer pipe to the stream trickling into the national forest. During my senior year of high school I went to Northland College, an environmental liberal arts college, and sealed my faith in Environmentianity and acceptance of the GREEN commandments. After I graduated high school I enrolled in environmental civil engineering with a focus in cultural/social responsibility of applying technologies at McMaster University in southern Ontario. I loved the GREEN concepts (though the math really bit me in the ass), but the university was planted within a city infamous for its unGREEN manufacturing of steel. I was learning what I was passionate about, but the environment around me was practically dead. I had gone from classes of 10-25 students straight into ones of 200-500 and was unable to connect meaningfully with the society that I had planted myself into. If I hadn't lived with close relatives within commuting distance, I am sure that I would have fallen deep into an abyss when I had an emotional breakdown a month into it. Because of them, I made it for three years before finding a better way. My only salvations during those years were my short winter holiday to go home again and being with my family and friends again, and my summers as a camp counselor for disabled children on 400+ acres of private wildlife refuge. It wasn't until the day of my 21st birthday that I finally admitted to myself how miserable and degenerative that chapter of my life was being for me, and finally accepted that I couldn't go through another three more years of these GREEN academics in order to get my specialized professional degree without changing anything or I would suffer a severe neurotic breakdown. When I went home for the holidays, it scared me to realize that I was starting to lose my vocal chords from the lack of using them during the schoolyear. Second term wasn't any easier for me, but it was then that I figured out how to get out of that lifestyle and still learn while healing at the same time. It took me months of searching through websites of GREEN companies, non-profit organizations, intentional communities, international study programs, costly apprenticeships, and stipened internships. And one fine spring day I had located the perfect match that would allow me to do what I loved while also staying in school to please my family; I would do a GREEN summer internship for the Solar Living Institute through the Engineering Co-op programme at my school. And that is when my real education and life began. After passing enough exams to stay in school I soon began an international cross country drive I arrived in California to begin my summer internship at the Solar Living Institute, and it was there I finally became an adult. I dove head first into the rabbit hole and ended up within the GREEN! demonstration realm of sustainable living, renewable energy, organic gardening, permaculture and natural building. I was helping to grow the soils and the bountiful gardens that grew out of them while enjoying their harvests in almost every meal. I was learning how to make biodiesel and the process behind starting a biofuels coop while selling B100 to dirty hippies, professionals, and families traveling along Highway 101 through the vineyards of Mendocino. I was learning about passive and active solar designs while working for Real Goods's solar installation division as a temp employee. I was learning and networking in the natural building world while building a beautiful and cozy cob/strawbale hybrid dorm that I would eventually live in. I was camping in a lush world that had previously been an ugly dumping site for highway rubble only a decade before. When my summer came to an end, I fought through the infamous redtape of my university and convinced them to let me stay through the fall for the rest of the year. There was no way that I could survive going back into that academic wasteland and into withdrawl after tasting the Magick of this GREEN! kool-ade from this Environmentianity denomination better known as the Permacult. So what could possibly not be so perfectly GREEN! about anything that we promoted at the SLI? After a month or so of being seduced by these ideals and technologies, enlightenment started to shine through the cracks of the dogma. It was then that I started to suspect that the sustainable value of GREEN! is almost completely irrelevant of the technology, and weighs instead upon the way it is prepared and applied. As I thought about the lifecycle debate revolving around ethanol as a fuel source I felt better when I found out that our biodisel was made from WVO (waste veggie oil), but realized that we didn't go to the extremes and offer to sell straight WVO too (probably for legal liability reasons) for converted engines or allowing customers at their discretion to mix it into their tank with (bio)diesel fuel. What could be better about our organic landscaping and garden that received solar-powered irrigation with fertile pond waters; aside from timing the irrigation and planning the entire landscape to match the arid summers in the valley that we were in, aside from planning and placing the edible flora nearer to our intern kitchen? What could possibly be unGREEN! about immediately switching to photovoltaics, except for perhaps not first 'investing' in energy conservation/efficiency and displacing the pollution from your electricity source in the manufacture of the arrays while possibly never earning a net-gain in the life-cycle of your 'renewable' energy. How can you go wrong with building with natural materials, unless your materials aren't all that local (ours fortunately were), and you leave your lovely abode during the beginning of the rainy season only to learn two weeks later that several feet of water have moved in during a massive flood thanks to it being built in a floodplain (most of the building was just fine afterwards and the strawbale walls were replaced with recycled, more flood-friendly, materials after that). It seems that some people love GREEN! Permacult Magick so much that they forget about applying it as practically enough to receive back a sufficient level of incentives. I am not being negative about these ways of living sustainably off the grid, but instead am trying to promote a balanced look at them for I deem what we use to be equally important as how we use them. I would occassionally come across people taking my tours of the SLI that would dare speak out about the supposed flaws in our 'version of' Environmentianity dogma (especially those infidelic German heathens), and soon the cracks grew bigger through enlightenment and I realized that there existed an equally powerful Environmentianity denomination of right-wing yangs to our left-wing yings. I knew that only by diving into the rabbit hole again and thoroughly infiltrating the other side of the spectrum would I someday be able to transcend the Magic(k)s of both extremes and transcend myself to perch upon that often-forgotten-yet-critical dash tying together Ying-Yang and become a powerful Demigod of Environmentianity, go bankrupt trying, or both. And so I parted from the Solar Living Institute during the summer/fall of northern California on the west/left/ying coast, blindly stepping into the looking glass to become my reverse reflection, and found myself now embedded at the Southface Energy Institute during the winter/spring for the rest of the academic year deep in the heart of Atlanta on the east/right/yang coast. I left behind the rustic comforts of my earthen-plastered strawbale/cob walls drinking sunbrewed GREEN! kool-ade with hippies, and found myself surrounded by conventional insulated-concrete-form buildings full of metrosexuals drinking sweet/iced GREEN®™ kool-ade. Thankfully those around me immediately took me under their wing as they noticed me stick out like a sore thumb with my shaggy hair, glowing tan, and unconscious instinct to turn counterwise rather than clockwise. I felt extremely lost arriving at the SEI but knew that I couldn't really be, for literally minutes after leaving the SLI I discovered a person that I was carpooling with had made the exact opposite cross-internship path by coming from the SEI to the SLI himself. I quickly became incognito as much as possible through dressing business-casual and tying back my hair, and made the switch from being surrounded by cultist Permacultural natural builders in a hotbed of sustainability activism to being surrounded by religious Professional green builders in the middle of a production housing boom. From being an intern crafting houses out of earth, to interning for the EarthCraft House program. I quickly learned that this side of the looking glass spoke in a different language in their worship and work for Environmentianity that mirrored what I had already learned, particularly in how they used the words "politics" and "science" instead of "dogma" and "experimential", in the ways that they praised energy/resource efficiency/conservation, and how they prayed to their idols in ceremonies known as "trainings" at their holy "conferences" instead of "workshops" and "festivals". They also considered insulation and thermal mass to be sacred in their buildings but in radically different physical manifestations. So began my patching of the cracks that formed in my dogma by filling them with politics. I was preaching the economic viabilities of ENERGYSTAR and EarthCraft House certifications and passing out acknowledgement to the builders that recited what I was praising to acceptable standards. I was dispelling free radon test kits and information from the EPA to all that would lend me an ear. I was learning all about how it was holy to sacrifice to the gods of Airsealing; sprayfoam to the exterior envelope gargoyles, and mastic to the interior HVAC statues. I nearly fell over backwards when I discovered the secret rituals of mulching leftover lumber and drywall scraps at construction sites for landscaping and erosion control. At work my coworkers grew salad greens with compost made from their leftover lunches, and saved their other meals of the day to privately practice their personal beliefs at home or in restaurants. I was happily living in a city for the first time in my life, and proudly telling others what GREEN®™ was all about. Not all was perfect at the SEI either though, but nothing ever really is. I recieved a harrassing phone call once from an HVAC contractor who hated how we were influencing his profession and threatened to sue us for charging fees for some of our services despite my offers to send him a legal/factual description of our finances as a non-profit corporation. One of my ECH builders would demand "Where are my stickers!?" for receiving his GREEN®™ certifications without actually bothering to try and meet the standards that he volunteered to reach for. The maps that I would hand out provided by the EPA that show in multicolors the different levels of radon that each and every county in the nation has, but with reading further information about radon testing you would realize that there is no correlation between what the test results are before and after building on a specific site, and looking back at the map you would realize that there was no description of what numbers and scientific research those colors were based on, that they created to calm the fear of the masses about radon-induced cancer, that this map of Environmentianity mass-produced by your tax dollars was in fact based on... nothing. It seems that some people love GREEN®™ Professional Magic so much that they forget it still needs to rely upon a basis in reality. Some of those at the SEI probably considered it controversial for a couple other of my coworkers covertly being members of the Permacult but had no problems with us as we were Professional just as well. It reminded me of the tabooness that the holy man who founded the Permacult alter that I prayed at back in NorCal at the SLI had himself spawned a company that became the very first to turn solar energy into a commericial commodity through his talented marketing. There are also several of my friends within the Permacult that had degrees in environmental law that are practicing as legal Professionals or through other channels. Maybe the two relatively extremes of Permacult and Professional, of Magic and Magick, weren't dualities repelling each other afterall? Maybe there weren't just two flavors of GREEN! and GREEN®™, but a way to combine them into GREEN!®™ that I could enjoy? I realized that the biggest difference between the Permacult ying and the Professional yang was not what they preached, but who their audiences were. People become believers of the Permacult because it touches the hearts of those who want to have a personal connection and empowerment with their Environmentianity, to those who want to practice Magick themselves. Being Professional, however, reached out to the masses that would rather be conventional and standardized in following Environmentianity, to those who would rather be awed by Magic. I also realized then that I needed to make an informed decision about what to do with the rest of my life: I could become a completely self-sustaining hermit in the woods and have an ecological footprint of zero, or I could help 1,000,000 other people reduce their own ecological footprints by 0.0001%; make either extreme choice and I would come out exactly even in terms of my Environmentianity with an ecological footrprint equivalent of zero for one person. It wasn't about what was better relatively for serving Environmentianity anymore, it was about what was better personally for serving my own GREEN!®™ values. Then on one fine spring day, I dove into the rabbit hole again to follow up on a dream that I had crafted for myself. I was getting used to the beaucratic redtape of my university by this point, and would fill in my academic internship allowances to the full by interning at the Yestermorrow Design/Build School resting snuggly within the Green Mountains of Vermont for the budding of trees until the fall foilage colors. Many people look at a map and realize that Vermont and New Hampshire mirror each other physically to form a square together; the same is true culturally as well, for New Hampshire is the south of the north and Vermont is the west of the east. I hadn't yet found my perch atop of the dash yet, but here in Vermont I had indeed found a beautiful mixture of ying and yang together in tall pitchers of sunbrewed iced GREEN!®™* kool-ade. I was free to wear sandals again while working in both the office and the outdoors. We were offering AIA credits to Professional architects for taking our certification courses in Permacult design. There I would meet two of my role models in natural building and find out that they had heard good things about me beforehand, and would encourage me to continue following the path of becoming a Professional Permacultist. There I would also meet another teacher who was both a building contractor and composter for a living, who would teach me the secrets of efficiently installing walls of drywall, teach me that there are fiberglass threads holding the gypsum together that don't readily decompose when being mulched but in his view that everything ultimately gets composted in the end when you take out the time factor, teach me how to make bland and weak drywall become aesthetically pleasing and structurally stronger through plastering them with conventional and natural materials, and many other Magic(k)al ideals of GREEN!®™*. Yestermorrow wasn't perfect either, but for me it was again the right place to be at the right time. All of the demonstration strawbale structures there were built a few years ago when cement stucco was thought to be ideal for that climate, but because of those decisions made before us being poor in hindsight we had the learning opportunities of breaking through the stucco to see how the bales were rotting and afterwards discussing the reasons why this was so before learning how to do it the GREEN!®™* way. The intern garden was tiny, but this gave interns the perfect time to observe, make changes and record their suggestions for its future stewards. Food prices were expensive, but we lived in the heart of the Mad River Localvor community. I was stuck in the heart of a community rich with architects and their visions, and fully realized that no design is as perfect as its creater would bullshit it to be; the joke goes "What's the difference between God and an architect?", and the answer is "The architect knows that he is God" (if you don't get it, you either have never worked/lived with one or are one yourself). At Yestermorrow I had learned how to fight for what I believed in and had earned for myself. My university somehow lost my registration papers and I had to follow the paper trail that I had left behind me over the past year in order to re-establish my official status as a full-time student away from campus to both keep my internships accepted through the Engineering Co-op program and avoid paying back my student loans when I couldn't afford to. Then I dropped out of McMaster at the end of my sixteen months of internships and convinced my family that it was right because I wasn't ready to go back yet, because I was just days away from being able to take the Permacult Design Certification course of my dreams that focused on bioregional design that matched the temperate forests that I had grown up in back at home in Wisconsin, because I would be robbing myself of the chance to prove myself alone after everything that I had learned over my new life as an adult. I need to take risk losing sixteen months of work towards my academic degree in order to earn a conceptual certification that was rightfully mine. I took that course with both extremes of GREEN!®™*ness; with married architects that designed a developed community to sell and with an artist that designed to do literally nothing with her beautiful marshy landscape. My own design ended up being more of a review of a site design as I had spent so much time with my new tools and concepts of GREEN!®™* learning to SEE that I couldn't possibly make a final DESIGN without being forced to during that time, and that was the correct end result for my PDC project. I almost went bankrupt making that decision to take a leave of absence from school, but it was the right one for me to make. I got a job lined up following the PDC course, and headed down to North Carolina after it to become a Professional timberframer not just through Yestermorrow but also through the Magicks of my past experience as a cobber in NorCal and wanting to follow my parents footsteps of scribing log homes. And there I was, a Professional natural buidler practicing Magic rather than Magick by learning how to prefabricate timberframes and heavy timber structures with power tools as quickly as possible. It killed a part of my soul, but it was the right thing for me to do at the right time once again. After several months of producing sawdust, I am now here in Costa Rica to train Ticos in natural building through building the showerhouse project. Again I got this job through a Yestermorrow contact not just because of my experiences in the Permacult but also because I proved that could practice Magic as well. Right before I left NC for CR, someone finally responded to a help-wanted ad that I casted into the electronic world of GREEN!®™* job postings. My boss asked me to be a reference for working there and I accepted. We both found out that we shared experiences in natural building internships and were equally astonished with one another; him that I had figured out how to afford and do consecutive cross-country internships, and me that he had figured out how to get one his home state of Minnesota right next to mine of Wisconsin. He saw the value of the organizations that I had learned from, and I saw the Permacult inherent in him staying local to learn. I asked about his experiences there in MN and if it a place that I would be able or want to work with in the future, and he asked about the living conditions in NC and exactly how sustainable timberframing was. My answer to him that it wasn't fully about the process that we learned these tools during, such as shipping in pressure treated timbers from the Pacific Northwest to NC and sending out the finished product to become a giant pool bar umbrella in the Bahamas, but what we intended to apply those skills ourselves once we are given the chance to decide what to do with them. He was looking for me to say that the job would be Magick, and after I corrected him about it being Magic he was convinced that I was right about what I said and went down to take the job that I had left behind. I described all of the glorious natural building technical details in my last letter to home and my mother responded with a statement that I was living within the Permacult "to the max." I can only chuckle at her words as I think fondly about the Environmentianity lifestyle and homestead that she has crafted for herself back in Wisconsin, and about how I practiced Magic(k) upon her and everyone else when I conveniently forgot to mention the dirty illusions being done down here by me on the fly. When I met the client and spent a weekend with him he asked me all about whole system design and building systems with natural materials, and that it was only after he bought my tickets and days before I were to leave that he finally gave me his final designs that have almost nothing to do with any of the suggestions that I provided him and a picture of the minimal preparations completed so far. When I would arrive, my fears kicked in. According to my ideals and trainings the foundation is too thin and tall to be stable in the long term, the walls are be too thin and flat for the cob to be strong enough to resist cracking from shear forces, the wooden frame holding together the bamboo wattle requires more nails to provide a stable bond with the cob than if the entire structure was wooden, the bamboo needed to be thoroughly coated with some green poison to survive sitting in storage for several months, the posts supporting the roofs have also been coated in poison and probably need at least one more as there are still many bugs feeding and placing their eggs into them, only now that over half my time here is over am I able to start the cobbing process because not enough preparations were done before I arrived, there is barely enough time to do the cobbing and no time to do the plastering or the sealing of the walls as I was hoping for, I am afraid that this building will sooner or later fail from strong winds just as a thin concrete building on this rancho has in the past, I feel that I will be lucky to someday have a picture sent to me of the completed project, and that all of these frustrations about resource inefficiencies and potential problems could have been avoided if he had just listened to me and designed the walls to be a foot thick or more of simple curved cob walls. It feels as if the interview wasn't about figuring out what I thought would work, but about if I would be able to make his design work or not. Maybe I am being relatively extreme with my fears regarding this first completely independent project of mine, maybe I should just buck up and fully demonstrate my Magic(k)s by doing the best that I can with the situation, make enough notes and observations for myself and the client to use in revising the designs for the second showerhouse to avoid these problems and concerns in the future, and move on before it possibly fails. Who knows, maybe someday soon someone visiting these hot springs will take a shower within this awe-inspring structure and instantly fall into the alluring Magick of the Permacult because of my Magic as a Professional, because I had become a true Magic(k)ian through the process of making it happen. I still haven't found my GREEN!®™* perch atop of the Professional Permacult Ying-Yang dash yet though. I am an adult now, but I am still very young. I give myself time for when it will be ripe to assume that position, for I don't even know what I am doing in three weeks from now. Don't get me wrong. I still love my GREEN!®™* kool-ade today as much as I did with my first taste of GREEN years ago but I know how I like it, how I don't, and why. I have advanced far beyond the elementary Sunday school concept of Earth Day, am now at the breaking point of practicing my Magic(k)s as a certified Permacultist, but still need to go back into academics to resume and complete my degree as a Professional. I still have yet to reach the integration of bioregional appropriate technologies and whole system designs (also known as the Quest for the Holy Grail of GREEN!®™* kool-ade). As my basic recipe for GREEN!®™* is sunbrewing I will someday also be freezing my spring water into icecubes with microhydro power and growing a diverse variety of local biodynamic sweetners being irrigated with the resulting stream of effluence and fed with my humanure compost. I am also trying to discover new ways to spell GREEN(!®™*¡), and to do more research for altering the basic recipe to match the preferences of other cultures to help all missionaries of Environmentianity spread our activism/politics. It pains me to see virgins to this nectar of the Environmentianity gods trying to ingest it through their noses or other bodily orifices, but maybe it is perfectly suited to their relative fetishes and who am I to judge how they enjoy their own GREEN(!®™*¡)ness? ... Starhawk advertises her services to teach people about Magick through radical activism and creating the world that they want to live in while certifing them in Permaculture design through her intensive Earth-Activist-Training sessions. Southface has an advertisement that features the Magic of a Professional man taking a nap on his lawnchair with a financial newspaper over his face in the backyard of his certified McMansion with a caption that declares "Doug is doing nothing to save the environment, but his EarthCraft House is!" Which advertisement is better for the strength and spirit of being a member of Environmentianity? Which one is relatively better, to spread Love emotionally or to pass Laws democratically? Really, without being relative, who is to judge? ... Always better than we think, yet never quite what we want. Just drink the kool-ade already and see if you like it or not.

Flying and Loving into Dreams

mello — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 18:39:48 GMT

In the Winter of 2006 as I lived in Atlanta, my soul lay dormant from the work that I was doing, but my passions grew and bottled up within me. And there I learned to dream. During a visit from family that I had lived with during the hardest time of my life, I had a lucid dream there that taught me about Jorjija and about watching for the adventures that lay ahead. A week later my adventures and art as a fire dancer would begin. A while later I also met a soul who I spoke with about my dreams. He spoke in reply about living those dreams out into my life through magick. Then spring started. I had a job interview on the Vernal Equinox of 2006 that would start me onto the path of new dreams and living into the ones that I already had as well as the ones that I was now creating. What a wonderful journey that has been, and what crazy dreams that I have been through both the astral and the physical worlds. After a whirlwind tour of the east coast since then, I found myself again in Atlanta for the Vernal Equinox of 2007 while volunteering to run the first ever composting program for the Greenprints Conference, a major green building event in the southeast, the home of the dream spirit Jorjija. It was then that I reunited with old souls and new ones. To heal my own soul and body. To dream my path yet again. It was there that I finally recieved the tickets that would fly me to here in Costa Rica. The first spring that I dreamt in Atlanta and wished in about natural building, I was severely challenged in my journeys by illusions and recieved only teasing tastes of natural building. This second journey around the sun still lies with different but equal challenges, but the illusions lay shattered around me and there is much natural building to dive into. In the past I would only remember a dream after waking up once every month or half year or so, not frequent at all. Ever since arriving here in Costa Rica I have been having and remembering at least one lucid dream every night! I am very blessed for this evolution in my astral world, and I am both very excited and fearful for what shall be born into my physical journeys because of them. Here I can only dream, and wait for what shall become of them. Since the Veral Equinox I have learned the true meaning of two quotes. - Love is a bird, you need to let it fly away. If you never see it again, it was never meant to be. If it returns, it is True Love. - Always better than we think we are, yet never as good as we want to be. Loving, Dreaming, and Flying, Mello

Hola de Quebrada Grande

mello — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 22:48:08 GMT

After a long (but successful!) midnight drive from the Chequamegon forest through the timely blizzard down to the Minneapolis airport and catching early morning flights without sleep, I have arrived in Costa Rica to experience for myself the famed Pura Vida. Many people have their first adventure in Central America as a tourist along the coasts, exploring the jungles, living it up at a hippy hostel, and/or at a cozy cottage tucked away in the cloud forests. My virgin experience is decidedly somewhat different; I am in the heart of Guanacaste's cowboy country to volunteer at a ranch and live among the macho Tico hombres. I had the good luck of coming into contact with the gringo owner of this rancho back in the states and convinced him to fly me down to train his employees in the art of natural building. My work here began almost immediately after landing in the hot humid Centroamerica, picking up supplies for the ranch and the project with my main Tico coworker in Liberia before heading out to see my new home for the next few weeks. The owner is not here, but my host speaks a fair amount of English and knows practically everybody in this region and all over the country thanks to being a tour guide for over a decade, which helps a lot since he is the only one that I have met here that speaks my language. We then left the coastal region and headed into the highlands approaching the volcanoes. Along the drive my new friend "Pollo" passed me his cerveza as he spotted a police roadstop upahead along the PanAmerican Highway, but he was able to keep on driving as he was waved through (he knew the officer) and took it back. At that moment it finally sunk into my head that I was indeed travelling in territories unknown to me and that I was entering a bold and colorful culture. After an introduction to his family and my other coworkers, I had my first of many meals to come of rice and beans before passing out on the porch to catch up with some much needed sleep. I awoke to my first full day before dawn as the sky slowly turn to light and colors, watching and listening to this new world come to life around me. After feeding the livestock (horses, cattle, chickens and pigs oh my!), I walked to the far side of this 700 acre ranch to check out my project for the next few weeks. Along the path I saw an anteater feasting in the trees, a termite nest in the crook of of a tree's branches, many birds unknown to me, and much flora to be explored. From the arid pastures, through the successional trees growing and reclaiming their forest, down towards the river valley to where I came across the familiar smell of geothermally heated mineralized artesian water surfacing to air; hot springs and sweet streams! There lies my project for the next few weeks, to train the hired Ticos in wattle and daub construction while building a showerhouse for the springs. Howler and White-faced monkeys watched me with reciprocal curiosity from high above in the riparian trees. At the fifth and last aqua caliente I finally jumped into the waters to feel the spirits of what I had come here for. The waters were just perfect at 99 degrees, akin to being in the mother's womb again. As I was getting dressed again a snake slithered by my feet. I called Pollo over and he gave me my first lesson on poisonous snakes, how not to die within half an hour should I be bitten by one like this, and how to kill it safely should I chose that response after seeing another one in the near future. When we returned to the casas I took a nice long siesta and woke up in time to watch the incredible sunset from Sunset Hill just meters behind my new home along with the view of the dormant volcanoes and the national forests of Guanacaste, and then sighed in awe of this new flavor and pace of life as I listened to the loooong echoing siren of a bird that I cannot remember the name of chicharra. I had the fortune of arriving during the Holy Week here, so my first week was work-free aside from morning feedings of the livestock and allowed me time to adjust to what lies ahead for me. Lots of time to swim in the local river, to taste the many fruits that are ripe within feets of my bed on the porch, to ride around the ranch on horseback and finding poached cattle, to realize how hot and humid it is here both day and night, to get my tan started, to see more of the culture, and to start learning the basics of a new language. At the end of the Holy Week, I went with Pollo and his family to the local small Catholic church to experience the religious side of the culture here and had an amazing experience. The sermon was unexpectedly long, three hours to be exact. Pollo said to me afterwards that this was the longest that he had been to church in his life, and that he probably would have left early if he and his wife had not been two of the five choir members. I did not mind, the geckos and spiders running around kept my attention when it strayed from the rituals and the lengthy service by the priest interejected by his helpers sharing his duties. I mused about what was being said and done by them in Spanish, and how different this would be for me had I a better grasp of the language. "How can I overcome this communication barrier?" is what I asked to the heavens as we knelt to pray. Finally the priest ended the service, and THAT was the start of my religous experience. A man stepped up to the altar after the priest and made a short announcement to those who had stayed for the full length of the service, and stepped down as four children in full mime costumes and makeup came up to the front. A song started to play, and the young mimes began to sing/sign/dance along to it in Costa Rican Sign Language, and then to another song afterwards. I was blown away by how much of what they were signing that I could understand despite having never seen this language before. For those of you who don't know, American Sign Language is my first language, written/oral English my second/third, and now Spanish as a distant fourth. Languages of the hands are NOT universal as some would guess; American and British are completely different even down to their alphabets, and in Quebec there are separate gender dialects thanks to how deaf boys and girls are/were taught in separate schools. Expressions in body language, however, are the same virtually everywhere, and that was my Rosetta Stone. Afterwards I asked my hosts to write down the lyrics for me so that I could translate them into English. Though I didn't get everything word for word (such as "Jesus", "lamb of God" and other Catholic/Spanish expressions), I completely understood the spirit and message of the songs. This was a religious experience for me; not of Catholic, but of Magick. Ask for what you seek, and ye shall receive. So here's the technical details on my project for you permacultists out there: mortared river stone foundation and stem walls, roble and bamboo wattle, cob daub, earthen plaster, and madero round-pole posts with mora/sietecuaeros dimensional beams supporting an open dual-split-level tin roof system. Two enclosed shower stalls, and two outdoor showers, with water gravity fed from the nearby river. When I arrived, it was just the foundation and stem walls. After this past week of mangling Spanglish and wood with two of the workers here, we have the posts and the wattle up as well. Next week we shall focus on getting the roofs up, completing the plumbing, figuring out final details for the interior stalls, and getting the daub started once I know the proper recipe from my test bricks of cob. The river rocks come from the nearby river, the sand and gravel come from the nearby town, the woods (roble, madero, mora, and sietecuaeros) is harvested and milled on this ranch, the bamboo comes from a local ranch (ours is too young yet), the straw (rice?) comes from a ranch somewhere in Costa Rica, and the cement and tin naturally come from evil multinational corporations. The clay (oh beautiful, gorgeous, pure clay!) is dug by hand from beneath a dried up swamp here on the ranch and transported over a mile's worth of thorny trails by a pair of oxen to the building site. Is it just me, or is it really fecking hawt down here? I am told by Pollo's wife that Abril is the muy caliente time of year to be in this region. Not only that, but the building site is down in the lowest (and hottest) part of the ranch. The riparian trees block almost all wind activity there as well. Oh, and bubbling hot springs tend to add some really hot humidity to the air for a special touch. Yo quiero nieve...

Vernal Equinox

mello — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 21:22:29 GMT

A time of balanced energies. A time to look inside for the seed/egg. A time to grow. Last year on this day I was working in Atlanta and answered the phone with "Hello, happy equinox" and started having what was an interview for an internship in Vermont that I had been hoping for since around the autumnal equinox before in California. One year later I find myself complete with the Vermont dream and having realized another dream in North Carolina, and now back into the heart of Atlanta along my journey home to envision another dream to wake into. A time to plant and spread intentions. I am going home.

Roll a mile in another man's chair

mello — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 14:45:02 GMT

I was driving along the highway on my way to lunch last week when I saw a man in a wheelchair along the side of the highway. I've seen him before pushing himself along backwards with one foot going to wherever his destination lies, and exchanged waves as I passed him by. This time I was about a quarter mile away when I saw him teeter over and disapear over the edge of the embankment. "Oh shit!" I pulled over where I last saw him and got out of the car. No sign of him. I scramble down the side of the brushy embankment and couldn't see him until I was halfway down. He was lying face down in a steam right in front of a culvert with the wheelchair on top of him. Of all of my experiences with people with disabilities, nothing really prepared me for this scenario. Pulled off the wheelchair and help him sit up out of the water. He's a lot better than I feared; some scratches bleeding on his head, wet, and shaken up a little, but he's obviously had a stroke in the past (and possibly drunk at the moment). He can understand what I am saying to him, but his condition prevents me from hearing what he is mumbling. Not sure how I can lift this man up a hill, or for more than three feet for that matter. I grab the wheelchair and some minor pieces that broke off during the tumble, and carry them up and place them in front of my car. I went back down to comfort the man and assess the situation some more when I hear a voice. "Oh Billy, I knew that you liked to play in the dirt, but this is silly!" A van from the assisted living home that Billy lived at happened to be driving by when the driver recognized the wheelchair sitting in front of my car. He radioed for a couple more people to help us out. A couple minutes later, there was four of us that lifted/dragged/walked Billy up and out of the embankment and back into his chair. The men thanked me for my hospitality, they took him back home and I went on my way to lunch. Yesterday going to lunch I saw Billy again along the same stretch of the highway, pushing himself along backwards with the one foot as usual. I waved, but he didn't seem to notice/recognize me. I'm glad to see that he is back to normal, but I do wonder... What if I hadn't seen him take his tumble? How long would it have taken for someone else to find him in front of that culvert being invisible from the road? I try not to think about it too much.

Splinters of Dreams

mello — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 00:36:22 GMT

Have you ever had a dream come true? I don't mean going to Disneyland, I mean being awake and realizing that you had lived that moment in a dream from before. I have. Supposedly we learn everything that we need to know in life during Kindergarten. During that age, I had a dream that came true fifteen years later. That dream came alive when I arrived in California to learn all about solar energy, organic gardening, permaculture and natural building. As I set up my tent and home for the following months to come, my next tent neighbor arrived and my dream restarted itself into consciousness. We built an earthen house near train tracks with moles running around in my dream, and later in life too. Since then I have kept track of my lucid dreams for almost two years now, and I have noticed a lot of them come alive afterwards as well. Mindboggling. Eerie at times. Yet exquisitely serene. It feels like the energy splinters of the astral plane penetrating within my soul. Has anyone else met the soul/energy of "Jorjija" in their dreams before? That is the only name that has been specifically given and spelled out to me in a dream, and I am still trying to decode the name/symbol.

Rise of the Sol/Soul

mello — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 00:15:23 GMT

Since October, waking up with the sun up means that I've slept in, and seeing the sunset meant that I had the day off. It was tough at first, but I quickly got into the routine of nocturnal time to the self and sacrificing the sol time to the work. I was learning! Building with natural materials! And enjoying my work! What couldn't I like about that? Sometimes on my days off, I go outside and watch the sunrise as I wake up to a day of relaxation. Ah, life. Orion used to greet me in the sky when I was getting into my car on my way to work. Now he greets me when I get home after work. I ask him "Where are you going?" He tells me the saga about his endless mortal struggle with Scorpio and how maybe, just maybe, he might be able to sneak up behind Scorpio if only he can get around to the other side of the sky faster before Scorpio does the same to him. Round and round they go, ever in search of salvation through working harder than the other. Ever notice the powerful energy of a solstice? Subtle, but significant. There was a difference in my love of timberframing between before and after the winter solstice. Before I was gaining, now I am draining. Rushing jobs out the door, meeting deadlines without planning, working more and more, barely getting any time to myself. What is going on??? Tales from the Trees answer that question. Don't rush, slow it down. My body and my soul are getting mad at me. Lately, the horizon has slowly melted away the stars and gained some colors on my way there in the mornings, and the sky has gained a lot more gorgeous sunsetted clouds to admire on my way back at night. Hundreds, thousands, of chimmey sweepers are starting to enjoy the dawn/dusk scenery and energy with me as we travel to our destinations. Last week I left work a little early one day and noticed something different; I could see the sun before it set! I am working hard, but the Sol is catching up with me. This weekend, I learned a lesson about my soul. I took an opportunity to be hired as a fire performer at a fundraiser, and quickly learned the difference between art and performance. The dance of poi is a wonderful thing that I love, but having to perform outside of my moments is a bit too much for my tastes. After singeing some hair on my head from a six beat corkscrew done without passion, I decided that I had pushed my luck and stopped. I love poi, doing a spin of fire around friends is great, and around strangers is even better, but I doubt that I'll do it as a job again. For me, the gain of money won't balance the drain in passion. I had to work the day of the performance (Saturday) at the shop, and wasn't sure if I was expected back on Sunday. I took my time in the morning and stopped sleeping around 11. The sunshine was gorgeous. Icky the cat told me not to worry and cuddled with me. Moulder the bird told me not to worry and gnawed upon my glasses. This was a magical morning. Thank Sol! When I called work at noon, I found out about my roomie/coworker being in an accident the night before, so of course I had to go back for another round in the shop. Ow, ow; the splinters were really coming out of the woodwork and into my hands a lot that day. "I need to slow down, huh?" As I clocked out at the end of the day, my boss encouraged me to come in even earlier the next day, and to bring my roomie no matter what state he was in. "We gotta get this job out." Today is Monday. We got the job out. My passport arrived in the mail. I gave my two week notice. Time to start healing the soul and getting ready to go to Costa Rica with the Sol.

Feeling chilly?

mello — Wed, 07 Feb 2007 23:41:55 GMT

Except for Kelvin, it is all relative. For example, I heard from home in da northwoods a couple of days ago and found out that it was 25 degrees BELOW zero for the third day in a row. I love and miss that temperature. Fling hot coffee into the air and watch it transform into a cloud of steam rising and brown frozen nerds falling. Blow a bubble and shatter it with your finger in midflight. Crinkle your nose and wait a minute or two for it to slowly return back to its normal state. Dance with the knowledge that you are alive rather than to shiver. When all is said and done, return to the indoors and feel your skin thaw. Feeling warm now?

Splinters

mello — Sun, 04 Feb 2007 22:24:11 GMT

"Ggggaaaaaaaaacckhhxz!" was my verbalization to a shard of timber that had embedded itself into my palm last week. In a brief instant I ripped away the three inches of wood that was visible from my thumb, but had failed to remove the tip that stayed behind within. I cut away the loose skin to where the rest was and drove myself to the nearest pharmacy to get some tweezers. "OOoooh!" was the response that I got from the elderly pharmacy ladies as they watched me pry and pull the remaining inch of wood from my hand. "What is the lesson?" was my conscious intentions sent to the timber that had put a shard of itself into me. "Is this at all related to the arrowhead that the Tree had given to me in Vermont?" The shockwaves that I felt as I pulled out the wood was similar to those that I felt as I pulled out the arrowhead, so the answer was "Yes". As I pondered this lesson, I became aware of the dozens of microsplinters that have found a new home in my palm, fingertips and even the back of my hands over the last few months. They don't hurt, but they are still there. Too often people are prone to become aware of what is going on in their lives only after they have been noticibly hurt, and not paying any attention to the small things leading up to that point. It is important to not sweat the small things in life while still trying to be conscious of them. Thank you Trees, thank you for telling me again.