Correction, Connections and Collaboration

http://gapingvoid.com/2006/04/17/the-inner-fire/

A correction

We are back to ask Ruby to once again aide me in the compositions of word whirls and translations. Ruby, is our laptop long-provider of those steps and leaps from flitting thought to virtual page, and cyber-connections. For those of you who noticed, yes, the 'ole cycle that follows the Full Moon(s) is a three (and not a 4) day and night phase. Pete corrected my miss yesterday, so here we are ready to be productive after three days of restoration, rest, reconsiderations, recouping.

Connections

I had fun during the 'ole days, a very fitting way to rest and restore for a constant thinker like this old dear. In spite of the frigid temp outside I have been taking walks around our Everett city encampment. Bundled in my characteristic ball-shaped wrap, it's my round brown eyes and glasses that remain uncovered. My hand-made fleece scrap scarf serves me well when a sniff tells me dryer sheets! If I take myself into the frigid area after the sun's had a chance to warm things, the wood smoke is minimal and I enjoy the luxury of outdoor movement.

New to our side-bar are a few 'Earth Sourcery' links I enjoyed during the 'ole nights and days. These new virtual spaces include an Ecologicalartist and two new astrology blogs. Both the art forms fuel the need for gentle and creative forms of being with 'Aina (all the nourishes) with protocols and processes that require commitment. In our growing understanding of the Economy Wee, life from the golden wagon VardoForTwo happens inside a very small space while being with the great bigness of Earth.

Auntie Moon
Sky Writer
EcologicalArtist

Collaboration

I'd also like to highlight two links that collaborate with the whole picture of being responsible, doing good, staying connected. War and Homelessness ... is happening in more places than ever. Both human conditions sadden and anger me in alternating moments. My heart breaks. Women to Women International is a new to VardoForTwo link. Real Change News Seattle is not a new link, but the story that's featured in this week's Real Change News is a good example of doing good closer to home.

Women to Women International

Helping women in war-torn countries rebuild their lives is the mission of Women to Women International. Similar to programs like Kiva, the concept of personalized giving makes Women to Women good work. More than a million men, women and children in the Middle Eastern Countries alone have been killed in the name and activity of war. I heard a song yesterday that says it all for me. The lyrics were, "I ain't gonna study war no more..."

Those of us who live daily lives of environmental refugees know a fraction of the despair and horror of life with military occupation and bombs. I know the emptiness of loss and sickeness that fills my being when I am exposed to the chemicals of 'normal American life'. Re-building lives is the common solution I share with the women (and men and children) who are living with the effects of war.


Real Change News Seattle

This article about a local partnership of good work, appears in the Seattle weekly newspaper focused on the issues of real life homelessness and activism/support in the largest Northwest city closest to our vardo encampment.

Constuction Co. Offers Winter weather gear. Here's a snip from that article. Click on the link to read the entire article.

"Ten years ago, Patti Dunn and Michael Grabham realized they had cooked too much food for their Thanksgiving dinner. They were living in the Eastlake area, and knew of two homeless men who sometimes slept nearby. They brought out the extra comestibles to these gentlemen. As the cold weather had already set in, the men also asked if they had any spare socks or bags to give as well. Patti and Michael saw the need for a new yearly routine...

If you're in the Seattle area and would like to contribute, click HERE to find out how to help out.

To finish up, you might like reading and being reminded of the freedom we each have. This from gypsy Woman.

What has fueled your inner fire, and inspired you during the three 'ole days and nights just passed?

Molded by the Moon, Kanaloa and Kaloa Akua of healing, planting and `Aina

The eye of Kanaloa
Photo Credit and the excerpt below: Huna.org

Kanaloa was the god of the ocean, a healer god, and the close companion of Kane, the god of creation. They would journey together, share the sacred drink of 'awa, and use their staves to strike the ground and cause springs of fresh water to burst forth. Rare statues of Kanaloa feature him with round eyes, unlike those of any other representations of the gods. According to a Kauai tradition, if you could look into the eye of Kanaloa you would see the pattern above . In the Hawaiian language, "kanaloa" is also used as a word that means "a sea shell; the young stage of a certain fish; an alternate name for Kaho'olawe Island; and secure, firm, immovable, established, unconquerable." A root translation of the word, ka-na-loa, means "the great peace, or the great stillness." The word also has the connotation of total confidence. In the esoteric tradition of Huna Kupua, Kanaloa represents the Core Self, or the center of the universe within oneself.

Pete and I have an affinity to Hina the Moon. With each cycle of the moon our life from the beautiful wee home VARDOFORTWO seems to be molding us in wonderful ways. Small space gives us an intimate relation with the "fewer" things we cart about and then there are is ALL the rest. Last night was the night of 'Ole Pau ... the third night of rest, restoration and weeding. One of our dreams of connection and community grew when we went for a drive to find organic, local and green growing food. Our compost raised beds are growing beautifully with squash blossoms that promise more zuchinni (we ate our first) and winter squash of unidentified varieties. It's the organic green and leafy goodies we need. We met Greenman (Claude Mahmood) at the Shelton Farmer's Market a few weeks ago and knew HE DA MAN! Our promise to find his organic farm where Claude practices Earth stewardship( malama 'aina we call that in Hawaiian), help with gardening chores AND talkstory about building a gypsy caravan for his girlfriend finally came together yesterday. At the end of a Dead End street in the woods about an hour's drive from the Ledge we found The Greenman, The Herbalist and gardens growing in beautiful red-brown loaming dirt. I was on a mission for greens and left home without my camera. So I must trust my fingers to write a picture that will satisfy you dear ones. With an intuitive sense of the general directions, and a name that "I'll recognize when I see it" we sought the farm. A slim young man in royal blue sweats with yellow hair like fresh whipped butter was getting the mail. I called to him, "Hi! We're looking for the guy who grows organic greens." "Oh ..." He walked toward toward the road and pointed back to the end of the road. "He's just there!" We thanked the gentle man and backed up. The huge fanning leaves of rhubarb was the obvious signal we were there. Pete walked ahead calling. "Hello ... Claude?" From the shoulder high vines of raspberry vines a voice called back. Claude and his girlfriend Kirsten (sorry if I spell your name wrong K.) had berry baskets round their necks picking the ripe inimitable raspberry colored fruit. We were there unexpected, yet not unwelcome. The fruit is delicious, the vines abundant and the stewardship heart-warming.

Patches of berries and vegetables grow in domiciles of beautiful dirt. A plow and hand tools evident along the fences that run one side of the gardens. We had come for greens: lettuces in particular to make green smoothies to alkaline my herbicide exposed kino (body). Claude grows and sells to a small lucky grow of local families in a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) relationship in the Shelton, Washington area. CSA are one of the most vital and effective forms of farm to table, person to person growing and eating models on the Earth today. We've been part of that CSA model as helpers with an Oahu based CSA called "Just Add Water." Claude The Greenman got us into that same helpers mode yesterday. We walked and talked through the gardens, ate peas off the vine, gobbled raspberries, nibbled at dill growing wild between young corn stalks and then we set to planting our garden-starved old feet into the dirt as we bent over to weed.

The day was gentle ... the first rain in a long, long time had watered the gardens. It was an easy weed. Amaranth, Lamb's Quarters and an ocassional cilantro plant were part of the 'weeds' ... Pete wanted some of the Lamb's Quarters for the Green Smoothies. Truth be told, by the time we finished pulling and tending the two long rows of lettuce most of the Lamb's Quarters remained in rows of weed mulch when we left. The rhythm and movement of weeding was better than any treatment I could have sought from the city. I wore my cotton mask because I am at a higher level of sensitivities to -- whatever. The mask eventually caused warm clouds to fog my glasses, so I tucked my glasses into my sweater to continue. The round heads of lettuce rose beautifully on the red-brown dirt. Still stretched like a tipi over the rows my legs and my okole (butt) muscles left the twinge of exertion. Good work! It was my hands that were the art though. Both Pete and I looked down to see and feel the miracle of Kanaloa, healing Akua of 'aina at work in us.

Claude wondered what we were doing out there for so long, "Must be getting a lot of Lamb's Quarters." When we finally made it back to the raspberry vines where Claude and Kirsten had filled a flat of the berry beauties, our reward for weeding had cooled from the garden warmth of being freshly harvested. Three heads of dark green lettuce, a fist full of beets for a fair dollars exchange made our 'Ole Pau weeding time just right. We're going back again to Greenman's Garden, on Friday to help pick blueberries so he can sell them at the Saturday market. Claude has a trailer he thinks might work for Kirsten's apothecary wagon ... a vardo for the herbalist, what a perfect way to start helping others built their dreams on wheels. Pete's excited to see what Claude's got brew'n.

Last night as Pete slept next to me Hina the moon asked for my company, keeping me awake for a stretch of the night. I said my prayers of thanks to Kanaloa for the day we had spent in 'AINA (the land, that which nurtures), pulling weeds. My dear old kino vibrated with the nourishment of food and work from the land. The dreams were healers, too and today is Kaloa Kukahi ... the first of three moon cycle days and nights where good planting happens. Bless the farmers who tend without chemicals, plant by the moon and share information as comfortably as they pluck ripe berries.

Link here to check out Greenman's Garden website. We've also put him on the sidebar for everyday, anytime connection to that great resource of Earth stewardship and great gardens.