Yellowstone National Park

ONCE IN EVERY LIFETIME . . .
Everyone should visit Yellowstone National Park at least once--it is truly spectacular. Roaring, howling steam vents, boiling bubbling springs, and shooting fire-hose geysers are other-worldly surprises in the otherwise glorious mountain landscape. I had the honour of being (slightly) splashed with boiling white mud! Yellowstone was the climax of the road trip from New Hampshire to Alberta, for Ken & me. Yup, my sweetie drove 2700 miles across the continent to be there for me at my graduation in Wilton, and fetch me back home! August 1st, we 'did' New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York State, and enjoyed dinner at the Moosewood Restaurant in Ithaca! August 2nd, we left New York State and 'did' Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa. That night we spent in the town of LeClaire, Iowa, on the Mississippi River. August 3rd and 4th were South Dakota--we loved the Black Hills, the Missouri River, and Badlands National Park. We shared the road with bikers everywhere, in the area for the big rally in Sturgis. August 5th and 6th were Wyoming, Montana, and the fabulous Yellowstone Park--you go there! By August 7th we (and especially Ken) were thoroughly tired of motels and motel breakfasts (even cook-your-own waffles can wear thin after awhile), and we pushed on home to Alberta.

So happy to be home!

Closing a Chapter

WILTON IN JULY
singing; juggling; cycling in the dark; fireflies; drawing; clay modeling; javelin; discus; flowers; gymnastics; eurythmy; games; science demonstrations; essays; skits on adolescence; rain & heat; coyote spotting; thunder & lightning; the art of speech; hummingbirds; Gregorian chant; lectures & readings; GRADUATION; good-byes; great food; great friends; great fun

My soul and the great World are one.

GLENDALOUGH
Such a peaceful photo, taken the evening of July 4th. You would never know we had just enjoyed the best/worst hailstorm I have ever seen at our cabin at Lake Wabamun. It was the last night of a five-day retreat with my daughter Laura, and my two grandbabies, Kaliana and Kai. We hiked through mud, we did a temper tantrum at the pancake breakfast, we ate a picnic lunch by the playground at the beach, we soaked in the hot tub every day before breakfast and before bed, and we even made our own cheese! I had forgotten how daily activities have to be wedged in between all the naps, sleeps, meals, and snacks that little ones need. Kai cut his first tooth, and Fiona the cat became less ornery and more tolerant of the kitty-loving Kaliana. Was Baba all worn out after her days with two active tots? Does Baba admit to being just a little-itty bit cranky? And how did Baba ever manage with four tots of her own, back in the day? A mystery, indeed.

NEW WALDORF PROGRAM AT AVONMORE SCHOOL
Try to imagine how excited I am to be preparing for the brand-new grade 1 & 2 class of a brand-new Waldorf program, in a new-to-me school, with a wonderful new-to-me principal! I began to imagine bright, shining, eager faces sitting in desks just as soon as I read their names on the class list! I will have 24 young charges, and will stay with them all the way through until at least grade 6, and possibly to grade 8. I have begun meeting them in their homes, and I'm struck with what a diverse group they are, with family origins from around the globe, and beginnings ranging from having been home-educated, to having attended WESE's playschool, to having attended Waldorf schools elsewhere, to having attended kindergarten or grade 1 in a public school. My dear friend Lynda, who is also one of my new Waldorf parents, asked me 1)what I am most looking forward to, and 2)what I feel my greatest challenge will be.
1). . . the oh-so-exciting First Day of School, September 2!
2). . . how will I manage my energy levels, teaching teach full time?
I feel very strongly that 'my' new 24 children have orchestrated this amazing endeavor from beyond the beyond, and I imagine them each making their way toward September 2, along their individual, unique paths, from 24 different directions. I feel that I am meeting my personal destiny, in this auspicious new beginning. Steiner must have written the following just for me:

The wishes of the soul are springing,
The deeds of the will are thriving,
The fruits of life are maturing.

I feel my fate,
My fate finds me.
I feel my star,
My star finds me.
I feel my goals in life,
My goals in life are finding me.

My soul and the great World are one.

Life grows more radiant about me,
Life grows more arduous for me,
Grows more abundant within me.

CALENDARS
The Chinese almanac has us into the last month of summer--enjoy it, folks, autumn rustles in on August 5th! Today the French Republican Calendar honours mint, glorious mint. There are more than 600 varieties of this clean, fresh smelling and tasting herb. My favorite salad uses a dressing flavoured with fresh chopped mint leaves and curry paste.

LAST TASTE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE
Just one last day in Edmonton; then I'm off for my second three-week summer intensive term in New Hampshire. Singing, games, eurythmy, the science curriculum, the adolescent, speech, and the study of 'man' (meaning everybody). Yes, it's hard to leave home again, even for three short weeks, but it will be lovely to see my New Hampshire friends, and I'm looking forward to a road trip home with Ken, after my graduation.

Rudolf Steiner's summer meditation from The Calendar of the Soul:

Surrendering to senses' revelation
I lost the drive of my own being,
And dreamlike thinking seemed
To daze and rob me of my self.
Yet quickening there draws near
In sense appearance cosmic thinking.

Home is Where the Heart Is

Yes, I've been home, home, home for a month now--aaahh!  While settling in, I felt a wariness in the part of me that wasn't quite certain I was really, truly back home to stay.  In another part of me, being in Edmonton felt so natural that perhaps I hadn't been away after all.  I felt confused about what season and month it was, having returned from a glorious New England spring and summer to Alberta's end-of-winter/early-spring brownness and barenness.  I came home to an instant life, swept into the busyness of family and events and things that needed doing, that had nothing to do with being a graduate student!  I've been dabbling in this and that since my return home, not seeming to accomplish much and feeling the lack of rhythm and regular routine in my life.  

Home is belongingness, confidence, inner peace, and joy.

FEED THE BIRDS

I'm the one who wanted to hang a bird feeder at the corner of our downtown balcony, and Ken humored me by installing it about a year and a half ago.  We watched and waited in vain to be discovered by the wee feathered folk.  This winter, the pillar poplars seemed to enjoy a growth spurt, and they are now as high as the balcony above ours.  And we have birds!  They are mainly LBJs--little brown jobs--and they are oh, so welcome, with their entertaining twittering and flitting about.

On this particular day of the year the French Republican Calendar honours the honeysuckle.  There are 180 species of this plant, at least one of which grows wild in Alberta.  It attracts hummingbirds, and some caterpillars feed upon its leaves.  May your day be as sweet as its nectar!

Our focus tends to be outward, during this season of waxing warmth and light.  (Our feeling soars into wide realms of space; we notice the ascent of the sun; inner events are experienced but dimly.)  Here is this week's verse from Steiner's  Calendar of the Soul:

To summer's radiant heights

The sun in shining majesty ascends;

It takes my human feeling

Into its own wide realms of space.

Within my inner being stirs

Presentiment which heralds dimly,

You shall in future know:

A godly being now touched you.

Good-bye, Keene!

I went for a good morning, good-bye walk to delightful Robin Hood Park this morning, placing my unfired clay modeling assignments in strategic locations, to quietly dissolve into the landscape. New England autumns are celebrated, and so should be the New England springs--this one was early and splendiferous, with blossoms bursting open like smiles on tree branches, on bushes, and in the grass everywhere.

After whining, in my last post, about being sick so much, I became sick again--so tired and discouraged with getting sick all the time, that I tended to focus on navigating through each day, rather than on my imminent joyful homecoming. But now my boarding passes are printed, my jumbo suitcase is packed to the point of zipper strain, and the rest of my belongings are question marks surrounding my smaller suitcase, open on my bed (will this fit in? will this, too?). I had to slide my big suitcase down the stairs on its belly--tip will be a must, for the taxi driver who will come for me in the morning! Bank account is closed; refund of the cell phone deposit is negotiated; public library and university library books are returned. Books and clothes are in the mail.

Yesterday 'my' Grade Fours gave me gifts, a book of hand-drawn pictures and handwritten greetings, and their individual thank-yous and wishes for me and my own students, to come. Wonderful children, and I learned so much from them and from their teacher! It was perfect to have Rose and Ze'ev visit me in Keene, this past weekend. We ate in restaurants (what novelty!), got caught in the rain on Pack Monadnock, visited the Horatio Colony Nature Preserve, and I couldn't stop talking--Rose and Ze'ev didn't seem to mind! They packed some of my boxes to the lovely house in Wilton that will be my home for three weeks in July, and carried another box to Ottawa, to mail to Edmonton for me. Thanks Rose! Thanks Ze'ev!

Rose and Ze'ev arrived in Keene on Friday, in time to join my classmates and me in a year-end pot-luck celebration--I was thrilled to be able to introduce them to my wonderful classmates, who were kind enough to say all kinds of nice things to my dear daughter and her partner, my dear friend! I'm very glad I will be able to spend three more weeks with my companions-in-learning, in July.

After I publish this post I will cut myself off from the world by packing away this computer. Tomorrow will be spent in that peculiar vacuum of airports and planes that seems to displace the traveler's connections to time and location. I will go heavily armed with novels and knitting (I've decided to take my chances with a pair of short, almost toy-like bamboo knitting needles), so that I can read and knit furiously to distract myself from the noise and hubbub of air travel. I'm expecting a painless but long day, with a big prize at the end of it all--my own husband's smiling face, and a ride in my own car to my own home in Edmonton! The very prospect feels downright magical!

Will I ever visit Keene again?

Today join the French Republicans in a moment of contemplation of the edible herb borage, with its lovely star-like blue flowers, fuzzy leaves, cucumbery taste, and its boundless energy for showing up in your garden year after year, after you first choose to plant it.

For your soul:

There has arisen from its narrow limits
My self and finds itself
as revelation of all worlds
Within the sway of time and space;
The world, as archetype divine,
displays to me at every turn
the truth of my own likeness.

Lady April

Lady April has come to town, wearing a golden daffodil gown,
All the way from sunny Spain, Lady April has come again.

Celandine and cuckoo-flower dance beside her, hour by hour,
All the birds come out to sing, Lady April a-welcoming.

April, for me, has been about preparing and presenting--in particular, my Big Internship Week, when I was handed the reins for four consecutive main lessons in Grade Four, and my beautifully illustrated botany block book, the major assignment for my Waldorf curriculum class. April has been about greening grass, crocuses, daffodils, pansies, and forsythia. It has been about the most marvelous, melodic birdsong accompanying me on my short walk to school every morning, and the return of the morning doves, with their soft, distinctive hoots. Robins, squirrels, and blackbirds are everywhere, bustling importantly about. April, for me, has been challenging due to illness, and I'm wondering whether missing loved ones in Edmonton has made me more susceptible to whatever viruses are lurking about. I am feeling much heartier now, and a lot more cheerful!

THE GIFTS OF ABSENCE
My relationships with my husband and children have strengthened, during my time away, in unexpected ways. Ken and I have relied on our daily phone calls for mutual support, and I feel a deeper level of understanding, trust, and 'common ground' between us now. One of my children has opened up to me in a lovely, new way, sharing feelings about significant life events. Another of my children has grown healthily independent, learning to stand upright and cope with life's disappointments from a place of individual resourcefulness. I've been made to feel appreciated by my offspring in numerous ways--every mother's dream! Although Ken has been in my life for less than seven years, my children have been sure to include him in all family get-togethers during my absence--he is delighted and deeply touched! And he has bonded with 'my' grandchildren all the more strongly, given opportunities to play with them without their Baba 'interfering.' After every visit I am treated to a play-by-play description of everything Kaliana did and said!

What a wonderful family I have! Shall I sit back, and let them plan our future get-togethers?

SOUL LEARNING
Although there is a 'summer sequence' program at Antioch University, enabling teachers to complete my program during a series of summers, rather than relocating for an entire school year, I chose the 'year-round' program for two reasons. First, I am isolated in Edmonton, as there is no group of Waldorf colleagues there, with which to work. I wanted a 'Waldorf immersion' experience, and second, I wanted a transformational experience. Christopher Bamford articulates what I sought and have found beautifully, within his description of the sevenfold gift of 'Celtic Christianity,' in Chapter Six of his book, An Endless Trace:

" . . . there is deep love of learning and study, study as a curriculum of the soul. Too often, learning and study are discounted, if not abused and reviled, as synonymous with intellectualism abstraction, and literalism or conceptual bigotry. When study and learning are for the transformation of the student, and not for the mere accumulation of information, what is learned becomes who one is."
"The Celtic Christians were . . . interested in becoming fuller, more realized human beings. Their learning was not something other than who they were."
"They studied, they learned, in order to love. Their theology, their religion, was always practical, vibant with life, mystical."

CALENDARS
The Chinese almanac has summer coming in next week, on Tuesday, May 5 (New Hampshire didn't wait!). Today is lily of the valley day, in the French Republican Calendar. I have always loved this tiny flower's exquisite scent. Wikipedia tells us that, "traditionally, Lily of the Valley is sold in the streets of France on May 1. Lily of the Valley became the national flower of Finland in 1967. The meaning of this flower is 'You will find Happiness.'"

For your soul:

I sense a kindred nature to my own:
Thus speaks perceptive feeling
As in the sun-illumined world
It mergest with the floods of light;
To thinking's clarity
My feeling would give warmth
And firmly bind as one
The human being and the world.

Monadnock School Nursery/Kindergarten

Yesterday, on the first hot summer day of 2009 in New Hampshire, I biked/hiked up to the nursery/kindergarten location of Monadnock Waldorf School, in its lovely rural setting. It took an hour to get there, and forty-five minutes to get back, but what delightful gardens, play areas, and views there are! Blue, blue sky and yellow, yellow blossoms--the cheeriest colour combination!

Blessings and Opportunities

Ten thousand years ago, while planning this current lifetime, I made an entry into my karmic daybook for August 1, 2008: 1:30 p.m. Eastern Time--meet a tree. Following the suggestions of my Evolving Consciousness instructor, I am now offering my heartfelt thanks to:

• the beautiful, loving and forgiving young woman who loaned me her car
• the 1994 Toyota Corolla, with its standard transmission
• my own series of, let's call them 'lapses,' leading to my inability to apply the brake in a timely manner
• the tree to whom I so abruptly introduced myself
• the overly-enthusiastic airbag that caught me by surprise (what an understatement!)
• the crash and my injuries, that opened up the opportunity to fulfill my karma and receive a series of wonderful life blessings!

I don't know who reads this blog, but no one need worry--I am fine. Glad to be home in Edmonton, resting and healing, but fine. I still feel overwhelmed when I remember the love, kindness, and magical healing ministrations of 'strangers' who dropped their plans to spend time with me immediately following my collision. I was held and nurtured by these very skillful angels, who simply took the pain away. I am especially grateful to Karen, her husband Ken, and their little boy Coco, as well as the young man who Reiki'ed my feet. In the hospital, later that day, the doctor informed me that the following day I would feel as though I had been 'trampled by a bull,' but there was very little pain, and no need to fill the prescription for Percocet that I had been given.

What in the Cosmos was going on, on August first? When I arrived at the house where I would be staying for two nights, there was a note on the table from the landlady, saying that she had been in a car accident that day, and had gone to the emergency room! Thousands of miles away, my son-in-law also bumped a tree with his vehicle! And yesterday evening my dear husband Ken--the best driver in the world--rear-ended another vehicle while driving his truck home from work!

The day after I arrived home, two of my daughters had startling news to share, and I realized that every one of my four children is in the midst of a major life transition just now. My entire immediate family is being shaken up in the Divine Cosmic Dice Tumbler. My oldest daughter, Rose, has terrific news that I feel I can report here: she has accepted her First Real Career Job, as co-facilitator of a group program for twenty-five abusive men (you couldn't pay me a million dollars to do it, but she's thrilled)!

What has Steiner got to say about all of this?

Can I expand my soul
That it unites itself
With cosmic Word received as seed?
I sense that I must find the strength
to fashion worthily my soul
as fitting raiment for the spirit.

May we indeed be strong enough and worthy enough to meet these events and carry them forward in our lives as blessings and opportunities.

Artist in Residence

When one has hearing loss, it is often difficult to discern the direction of the source of a sound, and whether it is coming from near or far. These are essential clues in helping to identify a particular sound. Due to these difficulties, I sometimes feel foolish when I hear something and make a remark about it that seems way off base, to my conversational partner. This is why I hesitated to say anything about a remarkable sound that I have been hearing every morning here at High Mowing, when walking past the gym on my way to breakfast. I wondered whether it was an owl, going, "Hoo! Hoo!" (On the other hand, perhaps it was Johnny One-Note practicing his flute, or a squeaky wheel on the air circulation fan of the gym.) Yesterday I screwed up my courage and asked my fellow student Jennifer whether this was, indeed, an owl. No, it is the call of the delightful mourning dove! Jennifer was able to point out one of these beautiful birds to me, as it stood calmly on the road, and she can even play its call on her pentatonic flute! I find the bird enchanting, and found this photo on Wikipedia. Jennifer kindly drove me to Keene yesterday, and I was quite excited to finally see the charming place that will be my home for the year.

One of the treats of this three-week summer intensive term has been my clay modeling class. We began our work together by modeling a perfect sphere. We passed our spheres from hand to hand to compare them, and then transformed them gradually, using pressure from our hands, into tetrahedrons (four surfaces, all equilateral triangles). Sometimes the hand knows more than the eye, and I particularly enjoyed forming my tetrahedron with my eyes closed. By exerting pressure on the points of our tetrahedrons, they gradually became octahedrons. Next step: press carefully on the points of the octahedron, to make an intermediate shape on the path to cube-dom called a cuboctahedron--all squares and triangles! Final step (only one of my classmates was successful in accomplishing this feat): press on all the points to gradually create twelve perfect interlocking pentagons--dodecahedron, ta-da! Plato introduced the world to the mysteries of the five platonic solids, which are fun (and easy!) to make out of paper or card.

New project: we each made a half-egg shape out of clay; then spent most of the two-hour class period blindfolded, adding little bits of clay to build up a face on our shaped bases. (That time my hand didn't seem to know as much as my eye!) And here are two more of my sculptures, the first one exploring convex and concave surfaces, and the second one expressing a twisting, out-reaching gesture inspired by driftwood. Can you tell I'm having fun already?






This week's message for your soul:

To bear in inward keeping spirit bounty
Is stern command of my prophetic feeling,
That ripened gifts divine
Maturing in the depths of soul
To selfhood bring their fruits.

Shutterbug

Thank you for peeking into my world and sharing some of my indoor and outdoor views from High Mowing School, Wilton, New Hampshire.

. . . and if these are not enough photos for you, you are invited to visit my Picasa web album, for a few more views of the area where I'm living and studying. It's been a hectic week of new faces, new places, and new classes--exciting and overwhelming, but in a good way. My classmates are wonderful--mostly in their twenties, but nevertheless very accepting of an Old Girl--and I think I'll keep them for the year! I've spent a quiet weekend of catching up on my assignments, and YES, I have a battery for my watch, so all's right with the world!

If I were to write Nature Notes this week, they would be about bats and butterflies, but I am not, so neither are they.

Words of Wisdom from The Great Guru:

I feel enchanted weaving
Of spirit within outer glory.
In dullness of the senses
It has enwrapt my being
In order to bestow the strength
Which in its narrow bounds my "I"
Is powerless to give itself.

Living my Dream.

My Adventure Begins

FRIDAY MORNING, BASKET CASE
Put it down to separation anxiety.
I'm in the condo, ready to leave for the airport. Ken loads my suitcases into my car, in the underground parking garage. Should I go down, or wait until he comes up? I haven't worn a watch in years, relying on my cell phone to keep track of the time, but now I have had my cell phone disconnected, and I have no battery for my watch. Are we running late? Does it matter? I don't want to take my keys with me to New Hampshire. I hang up my car key, take my condo key with me, and go down to the garage. Ken has gone up, and the car is locked. I go back up to the condo. Ken suggests I go back down and wait for him in the car--he'll only be a minute. I hang up my condo key, take my car key with me, and go down to the garage. I go the way I always go: I exit the building, take the outside stairs, and . . . without the condo key, I can't get into the garage. I have succeeded in locking myself out. I'm gonna lose it. I observe my own behavior, as if watching a bad movie (this, by the way, is not a helpful strategy). I swallow, and run around three sides of the building to the front gate. I dial our code, 2016. The recorded voice tells me that my local call is proceeding, and reminds me that in future I must dial the area code. I'm losing it! I'm losing it! I swallow, hard. Ken does not answer. My pulse kicks it up a notch. I dial 780-2016. The display tells me this is not a valid code. Rapid, shallow breathing. I dial 2016 again, listen to the recorded message and the ringing again, and wonder whether Ken is sitting in the car, waiting for me in the garage. I can't do this! I've lost it! I've lost it! Rapid-fire thoughts: Will he go back up to the condo to look for me? Will he think to look out of the window and see me in the driveway? Will he hear me if he's in the garage, and I hammer on the garage door? My eyes start to run. Screaming silently (I hope!) I run back around three sides of the building to the garage door. My dear, sensible husband has the car in the driveway. He sees me. I try to let myself feel flooded with relief. I try to listen as I tell myself it's all okay. I try to resume breathing. I am rescued, but am I sane?

SATURDAY
Ken was extremely understanding about my meltdown in the car, the flights were fine, the airports were fine, U.S. customs was fine, my room in the dorm is A-okay, if a little plain and bare, and I even slept well. I should have brought more food with me from the airport--I'm so hungry my tummy hurts. I went to sleep making a short mental grocery list, knowing that all my meals are provided here, on weekdays only. Oh, yes, and I'll definitely need to pick up some sunscreen, as well. I understand it's a bit of a hike into Wilton (the town closest to the school where I'm taking the three-week summer program). A lovely fellow student here, named Mary, gives me the news that Wilton has no grocery store, and no pharmacy!!! She shares her oatmeal with me, enabling me to face the morning world. It is storybook-lovely here--forest, stone fences, wildflower meadows, distant blue hills, continuous birdsong, cows, and it's fairly humid and very warm. In true May Louise fashion, I walk for what feels like well over 40 minutes before checking my course with some guy in his driveway, only to find out that I should have turned left instead of right when I left the school. I estimate (because I can't tell time without a watch) that it takes me over 1 1/2 hours to do the 40-minute walk down the hill into Wilton. I promise myself that I'll take a cab back to the school.

Hey! There's a bank open on a Saturday in Wilton, but they won't cash my traveler's cheque--I need a roll of quarters for my laundry--because my driver's license was not issued within the United States. (Do you have a passport? Sure, in my dorm room, 40 minutes up the hill.) Each time I ask a shopkeeper about a battery for my watch, I get directed to one or another of several nearby towns. There's a cafe, but it's closed. There's a pizza place open. I order three meals--one to eat there, and the others to pack 'home' with me, for Saturday supper and Sunday breakfast. I refuse to feel ridiculous. For a 'local' taxi, I would have to call one from another town (how much would that add to the fare?), and it just feels like less effort to keep walking instead. I find the art supply store, buy what they have in stock on the list of required materials for my summer classes, and head back toward the school, this time uphill, and with my backpack full. I check the time before I leave town, and again when I arrive at my dorm--a full hour!

I'm tired, my pinky toes hurt on both feet where my sandal straps have pressed on my toenails (the left one is actually black & blue), my shoulder muscles hurt, my linen top is wringing wet, and I'm superwoman!! I'm my own hero!! I've created solutions to my little problems, I've found a way to feed myself, I've returned to that bank with a ten-dollar bill and received my quarters, and although I can feel my hips, they aren't overly painful. As a matter of fact, they have carried me all that way quite admirably, thank you very much. I have a refreshing shower, and spend the rest of the afternoon smugly reading my book, outside, with my proud feet lovingly propped up on their own chair.

SUNDAY
This morning it all began, with an opening reception for new students in my own program, as well as other programs beginning here these three summer weeks. As I found my folder, labeled in calligraphy with my name, I recognized that I was experiencing what my Heart & Hands students might feel when they find their name tags at their table places, on the first day of a new school year. Someone anticipated and prepared for my arrival here. I unexpectedly teared up a little, as I picked up a bookmark and fridge magnet (no, it is not necessarily silly to get sentimental over a fridge magnet!) with the very familiar Antioch University slogan and artwork copied above--it's really, finally happening for me! Two days ago I felt like crying because I didn't want to leave my loved ones and familiar life; today I felt like crying because I am so deeply grateful to be stepping into the first day of the fulfillment of my Dream of a Lifetime.

Yes! You can make your dreams come true! And, no! You're never too old!

Swarm

I encountered my first bee swarm at Wabamun Lake on June 21. My daughter Laura, her daughter Kaliana, and my son Jonathan were doing our customary walk around the north end of Moonlight Bay on a hot Saturday afternoon. Our path took us down a grassy slope, past a tall spruce. I noticed many bees flying and buzzing near the tree, and looked for a hive or nest. It was a swarm, much like the one in the photo, about as big as my head, in the shape of two inverted cones, side by side--phenomenal! The bees seemed to take no notice of us as we passed by, and on our way back to the cabin, the swarm had merged into a single rounded cone shape. The bee swarm web site that I found informed me that "The cohesiveness of the swarm is due to their attraction to a pheromone produced by the queen. The swarm will send out scout bees to seek a cavity to nest in and will move on when a suitable nesting site is found." It suggested that one could contact a local beekeeper, to see whether (s)he would like to come and try to 'collect' the swarm. Imagine witnessing that feat!

Tomorrow is the day that I take flight, myself, on my Learning Adventure of a Lifetime to New Hampshire. For me, this early summer season has been one of sweet farewells.

The Heart & Hands family camping day on June 8 had a shaky start, with no available venue for our activities. As I stood in the wind (I'm not very good with wind), gnawing on my knuckles and feeling responsible, families gamely threw frisbees to each other, explored the open field; the frisky beach; the playground equipment, helping themselves to the good fun they had expected to enjoy together. Here I am, collecting twigs on our nature walk through the woods. And surprise! The families gathered to present me with this glowing golden quilt, with blocks designed and created by the children themselves.


The last weekend in May I was graced with the opportunity to serve as a co-leader, with four other musician/DUP (that's Dances of Universal Peace) leaders, at Sylvan Lake. We exchanged hundreds (yes!) of email messages through the winter months, planning and preparing for this event. I wanted to do my best for the retreat participants, and for our leadership team. I was serious about practicing and preparing my role, and willing to work hard during the retreat itself. I was uplifted by the glory of the music that we created together, and it wasn't until after the retreat that I realized what a gift I had been given, in terms of my own growing and stretching and connecting and receiving from the experience of working with such wonderful, open-hearted leaders, organizers, and participants. With extraordinary vision, thoughtfulness and attention to detail, the organizers succeeded in lifting this retreat experience out of the realm of ordinary every-day-ness for everyone who attended.










Our wind-up In Her Voices Pot Luck Supper and Concert was held on Friday (of course!) June 13 (it would be too, too boring to be linear and chronological), and I was SO thrilled that Ken, Laura, Kaliana and Kay chose to be there. It's a good thing this proud baba wasn't wearing a button-up shirt--I would have burst those buttons for sure, I was so full of the joy of being able to show off that grandbaby to my beloved Luscious Women! I think every single person needs loved ones in their life who are willing to let them be a Star every little once in a while. My great-hearted mother-in-law has been one of my biggest fans since . . . oh, since about 1972. wow. Thank you, Kay!

8:00 now . . . time for my Air Canada web check-in. I consider myself to be a semi-experienced traveler, and a Good Packer, but for the first time, this time I understand why people may tend to procrastinate when it comes to packing their bags for a trip. Since school ended (June 25, and it seems like months, rather than mere weeks ago, now) I've been Bothered by Big-time Butterflies about leaving. I'm caught in a surreal never-land, between My Real Life and my anticipated adventure. My life has never been better--everywhere I go, everything I do, I'm surrounded by people who have generously opened their hearts to connect with me. Everyone is a warm, sincere hugger! Why am I leaving? What was I thinking? Three weeks, yes, but a whole, long, wintry school year?

Don't take me too seriously; my mother used to call me Sarah Bernhardt. I know I'll enjoy the studying, and New Hampshire, and the people, and I know everyone here will be fine. Let's just say that the leave-taking is challenging, and leave it at that.

Here's Rudolf Steiner, with his wisdom for June 30 to July 6*:

And when I live in senses' heights,
There flames up deep within my soul
Out of the spirit's fiery worlds
The gods' own word of truth:
In spirit sources seek expectantly
To find your spirit kinships.

*I know, that was last week, but something in me wishes to connect this meditation with this particular posting.

Yoo-hoo! I'm back!

Yes, Life intervened, and it has been a full year since my last post. Sharing my blog address with 'my' Heart & Hands families this month has prompted my return to the keyboard.

This past Sunday my husband and I were joined for lunch at Glendalough (our cabin on Wabamun Lake) by my daughter Rose, her partner Ze'ev, Ze'ev's parents Ida and Ilya, and their friends Jhana and Sacha. I've decided that Ida, Ilya, Jhana and Sacha are Wildlife Magnets, after listening to their tales of Close Encounters (and seeing the Evidence on Ilya's digital camera!) during their recent travels through Banff and Jasper National Parks. While sitting at the table we were graced by a visit from a flock of splendid white pelicans. I spotted them out on the lake, and they entertained us by soaring and landing quite close to the shoreline in front of Glendalough--thrilling!

The first time I can remember seeing a pelican in the wild was in the San Francisco area, possibly in 1971. For most of my life I have thought of pelicans as quite an exotic bird, like an albatross, or a scarlet ibis, perhaps. I wondered if my imagination was running away with me, when I thought I saw one on Wabamun Lake sometime around 1997 (someone's pet pelican had escaped, perhaps?). I shared my astonishing find with a local Old Timer who confided that, sure, pelicans can be seen in the area just about any old time. Apparently, wild pelicans really do 'belong' in Alberta, nesting and breeding here each summer. They became endangered, largely due to human and industrial disturbance of their nesting sites, and provincial legislation and 'management' since 1978 have helped to increase their numbers. Today their population is regarded as stable, although their colonies are said to be sparsely distributed around the province. (See the following website for information.) http://www.srd.gov.ab.ca/fishwildlife/speciesatrisk/selectedprofiles/whitepelican.aspx

I'm trying out the notion of beginning each blog post with a Nature Note, in imitation of Liza Dalby in her book of essays, East Wind Melts the Ice: A Memoir Through the Seasons. Liza is a scholar of Japanese culture, and the author of Geisha, as well as other books. She begins each essay with a cryptic statement from an ancient Chinese almanac that divides the year into 72 seasons of five days each. Liza muses about possible origins and meanings of these pronouncements (for example, June 16 through 20, "The mockingbird loses its voice"), and discusses features of weather, flora and fauna that she has experienced during each of these 'mini-seasons,' while living both in Japan and at her home in northern California. Thus, my pelicans!

The Chinese pronouncements bring to mind the names of some of the moves in the Tai Chi set ("part wild horse's mane;" "grasp bird's tail;" "carry tiger to mountain"). Liza speaks of the interplay between yin and yang through the seasons of the almanac. She argues--and I completely agree!--that the solstices and equinoxes mark the heights, rather than the beginnings, of the four seasons. Therefore, this Friday, June 20th is the apex of our current summer--it began May 5th, and autumn will enter August 5th. Winter will come in on November 5th, and spring, on February 5th. I invite you to try it along with me--see whether your experience of the seasons resonates with this new set of dates.

Liza begins her memoir and her year in the spring, the season of the earth's awakening. So Rudolf Steiner's Calendar of the Soul begins with The Spring Festival, Easter. Here is Steiner's meditation (from the translation by Ruth and Hans Pusch), given for this, the eleventh week of the year:

In this the sun's high hour it rests
With you to understand these words of wisdom:
Surrendered to the beauty of the world,
Be stirred with new-enlivened feeling:
The human "I" can lose itself
And find itself within the cosmic "I."

Power to those Pelicans!!!