I'm hoping that it doesn't start with an earthquake. And, I'm knowing that it definitely began with birds and snakes, Oh my! So, the end of the world is here as we slip and slide into the holiday season of 2012. Who woulda thunk it? This morning, my bodymind is filled with nostalgia as I remember the last end of the world - when Y2K was our collective fear as I stood on a rooftop in Berzerkely, California, singing Stype's song while the sun went down on Prince's "(I'm gonna) Party like it's 1999."
Back in 1999, I was a recent college graduate, strolling the streets of the Bay Area and feeling absolutely overwhelmed as to how I was going to re-create the flourishing village feeling that I had just emerged from. Thirteen years later and the bird song in my heart - a tune that cries for harmony - remains. Funny how some things just don't change. While watching REM's live version above, I also reflected on SD's Michael Stype-impersonator, a musician who has his own rockin' sound and successful band and a peer whom I just so happen to share the same day of birth with. Thus, I think of him, and the many other talented, brilliant souls that I consider myself lucky to bee surrounded by. My marriage to music is a millennium-old, ancestral call.
As an artist myself, I intuitively understand the desire to reach throngs of people. I empathize with the feeling of having a message within one's Soul that screams to be heard. And, I see this reflected back to me in my musician brothers and sisters. I know they feel compelled to fly 'round the world singing their songs of hope and sweetness, of loss and tragedy. And, I guess with the end of this 2012, I am wondering what that future will look like: will we continue along our same path, as the technologies we create eventually merge with our human biology? When I was twenty-three, what I prayed for most was the end of repetition - the 9-5pm slog of 365 days a year felt so very stifling and deadening. I am not a robot - my Spirit doesn't do vacuous routine. Yet, I look around and I notice my neighbors with their heads down, as they distractedly finger-pluck away the present moment. Now ask yourself, what world is ending? And, what world is beginning?
Innocently, I had been excited to attend an annual pre-Thanksgiving event at a local author's ranch in Oceanside yesterday. Only, I arrived there and I immediately missed my friends who surrounded me while there last year as well as the embodiment that we, the Soular Power Brigade, brought to that day. I left early, with some heaviness in my heart, only to return hOMe, to Las Raices, where some of SD's finest activists (of course I am bias! Duh. ; ) were gathered. We sat together in the front living room, drinking homemade ginger beer and eating vegan Boston Cream Pie (WOW!~), as we each spoke into and shared about what fascinates us. Again, I reveled at how fortunate I am to look upon others who have been living intentionally with the land as well as with each other (while also helping to plant seeds and grow food for local San Diego) for years now and to call them 'friends.'
In regards to what fascinated us, the day's topics ranged from spiders to a genetically-modified goat that weaves webs, from bows to soap, and from there being more than one human race to the privilege that we take for granted as Americans. I shared that what fascinates me is how, as humans, what unites us is our capacity to feel - deeply. We all know pain - it need not matter who hurts more. It is our collective sadness that we can use to weave us back together into a vibrant whole.
So, here's to a start of weeks of celebrations, reunions and consumption. All I know is that the mantra that is reverberating the loudest in my chest is the words of St. Francis.
When asked what he'd do if he knew the world were to end tomorrow, he replied,
"I'd keep hoeing."
May we all plant fertile seeds of LOVE into nutritious, healthy soil/Souls.
P.S. Happy Birthday/Feliz Cumple, MAAG! I'll always love you & I am forever grateful for all that you fiercely taught this stubborn-ol' me!!! xoox.
