Ke Kuapa 'o Maxwelton Creek

  Nettle infusion-steeped oats cooked with Granny Smith apples and a scoop of Astragalus root powder. Once cooked the mush swims in Nettle infusion with a sprinkle of dried Wakame (dried Kelp), a sprinkle of Slippery Elm Bark powder, a drizzle of Maple syrup and are topped with two freshly-picked Nasturtiums for a spicy finale! "  Beautiful breakfast of river words and images. I ate them down while spooning my bowl of Nettle steeped oats with chunks of apples, a sprinkle of Slippery Elm to blend and weave ... like River ... in my internal river needing assistance in digesting o so many divergent thoughts and opinions. The stories here seep into those places where my Native instinct can tell what will satisfy me long run ... even as I age and brittle if not curious. Below my bare feet and wheels of our vardo, the Stream and Pond that live even with the cover-up of past human enterprise, comes to life again with Clouds and Rains who have an agreement to keep at the wetness that ...

 All things considered, life is pretty darn amazing. Bamboo sticks of all kinds and states of being rise from pots all around us. Some of them used to be rooted in dirt and are now simply stuck in dirt to serve the twisting vines held in place with colored ribbon.  Other Bamboo People are growing out of pots filled with dirt and compost creating flexible arches and lacey borders. Shot with a bit of slant, they tell the story of our evolving life. I've told that story many times, from different angles and dabs of attitude that might have been an exaggeration or illusion. All things considered, the stories have been at least partially truth and now?  As the Sun glows eerily with a dab of wild smoke, and I sit to consider the moment there is progress to record: And first oli in the making from across the ocean and onto the wavelengths of a phone my Ma and Daddy coulda never imagined. But yet?  All things considered, life is pretty darned amazing. 

"Life is a story unfolding. The Progressed chart is one way to track your personal story. The idea is that a person develops over time. They “progress”... Your chart progresses slowly but when a shifts occur, they’re epic. If you’re satisfied with your progressed chart, you’ll be in no hurry for anything to change. If you’re in a jam, it can be excruciating as you can be “stuck” for many years...  It’s helpful to consider your progressed chart and also to realize that the people around you are also changing. So often people want to put it back the way it was, but this is not possible. Keeping an eye on progressed charts reminds us, we’re evolving." - Elsa writing about "What Is a Progressed Chart?" My pots of Motherwort, perched on piles of dirt surrounded by pots of tiny rocks. "Growing rocks," my neighbor asked? "Yup," I told him. "I've been playing with growing rocks since I was a kid." And it's true little stones and rocks h...

"...  The bigger story is still in flux, but we’re already at a point of need for making plans for our current path. This week the Cancer Sun makes its way into trine with Neptune and opposition to Pluto. All week we endeavor to connect our personal place in the universe with meaning and also with structures outside ourselves. Sometimes this is quiet and spiritual, but sometimes what is outside of us pushes back, exerts its power and we must respond..." - Satori writes about the Week of July 12-16, 2021 We celebrated Pete's birthday, with Zucchini Chocolate Cake with Raspberries, and Created a 'not-a-wind-sock' when our favorite wind sock place said they were out-of-stock for wind socks. Oh, the supply chain. That's the creation we came up with using copper wire from our dear friend Loretta, a fishing lure swivel, and three lengths of yard-long ribbon in Pete's favorite colors. The copper is wound into two spirals, the smaller dangles off the larger. The ...

 A bit of story about Bamboo People began here ...  A long time ago they were called Sam and Sally. Their story went like this .  "Things and people have been left behind time and again. Like land turtles Sally and Sam found that only what they could carry mattered. People –friends, family and society in the main have had to decide whether the things that matter to their multiple chemical sensitive friends mattered to them. For half a year our two elder dears slept in their car and parked their mobile bedroom in beach parking lots, driveways and lawns of friends and family. Living public lives with an illness unknown or misunderstood isolates, and that is what it was like. Public yet invisible, illness and homelessness are conditions that our society denies. Political mumble is just so much dank air. The sky is falling on thousands of us every day and every night. Life after dark is a time when the goblins of entitlement and gentrification screen out and isolate the fra...

They arrived with experiences of many moves, slanting away from the reasons their neighbors would --  spray chemicals meant to eliminate 'weeds' or artificially scent and soften, hoping metaphor might find them and tell a story to carry their souls safely to places still wild with wonder. What if the stories metaphor wove were so unlikely their people -- family with the same smelling bloodlines -- questioned their sanity, or worse, understood but found it took too many steps to make room for the story.   They were not young when the adventure started, so of course, time had bent their forms and wrinkled their skin so the two were more like brown spider silk and deeply plowed sand dunes. Their strengths have been tested, and trickiness born from Mercury's search for a different way to think has led to unexpected ground.    "If I were asked what is the greatest human gift, I would say it is metaphor. A little boat of metaphor chugs across the seas, carrying a carg...

 A month before Pete and I did the final preparations to move ourselves and our vardo from Camp Bamboo to Ke Kuapa 'o Maxwelton Creek I enrolled in Oli Honua I a month-long online training in Hawaiian Life Ways from the vantage point of oli, vocalization, or chanting.  My teacher is Kekuhi Kealiikanakaole, of Panaewa, in Hilo, Hawai'i, master kumu hula/teacher, and audacious communicator committed to using the technology available through the energy of internet to empower a universe of chanters with big aloha by embracing the Hawai'i Life Ways.  "Hula & oli teaches that we are reflections of every big & little being in the world. If we dance, they dance. When we sing to them, they sing back.  And when we chant the vibrations of the cosmos, guess what?  They chant BACK!" - "About Hawai'i Life Ways" E LONO E One of the oli we were taught during the weeks of Oli Honua I is the chant E Lono E.  This is a prayer chant, and calls on the senses of a...