Beyond Beyond Well Being

It's fun to consider nature's patterns. Water returning to the ocean in the Santa Monica bay, branches of a tree, river deltas, mountain erosion and glacier flows.

Chinese medicine's original insights remain shrouded in an unknowable past who's scholarly roots continue to nourish new branches, tributaries, schools of thought, and therapeutic insights.

Even the branch that describes Chinese medicine observations in biomedical terms is just one more branch that can flourish or die on the tree depending on culture and market forces. But is it right for a branch to be embarrassed by the tree from which it grows, to demand that we no longer explore that tree, that we banish what is not yet proven by biomedical thinking because "modern science has it all figured out"?

Will this new branch of Chinese medicine become like the Prussian forest so regulated by science that the resultant lack of biodiversity led to the death of entire forests that continues to impact Germany even a hundred years later?

I'm not sure what my American Indian friend's history is, but I've seen him shacked up in a tent on the sand south of the drumming circle. When the circle's size is smaller and more manageable, he likes to make announcements, usually asking for cooperation in sending out blessings of love to the world at large.

Right on.

The alpha male is an important component in the properly functioning drum circle. Now that's not to suggest that one needs to have outdoor plumbing to hold the rhythm, there's actually a Hispanic woman who is quite alpha in her own right. But for now, I'd like to present a few alpha males who were at the circle the evening that these pictures were taken.

The black gentleman in the center is an alpha male. His drum is deeper and more pervasive than most, but more importantly, he can hold a rhythm. Most can keep a rhythm, but they can't lead. Alpha males can lead. Unfortunately, he was leading a bit too well this evening as there was, at the other end of the circle Los Primos who team up to make their own alpha male.

Having two alpha males in one drumming circle can be great, provided they honor each other's groove. That doesn't always happen, though and they'll go off on their own tangent, unable to hear the others', creating two competing rhythms that make it next to impossible for the dancers to really let go.

Los Primos (Gary y Edgar) are pictured below wearing the sunglasses.

So Greg had all this footage of his toy robot, and I had a few evenings free. What resulted from our collaboration is a nice music video about how even technology seeks transcendence.

Continue reading "Haiku Review: GLOW - Public Art and All-night Groove-in" »

Took me a few months to get this uploaded, but this was taken on Memorial Day, adjacent to the Santa Monica pier where every Sunday an organization puts up a wooden cross for every soldier killed in the War of Terror (sic). They call it "Arlington West".

No image manipulation here, those are some bright wild California poppies. My traveling companion for the day takes in the majesty of the high desert's brief but intense blooming of the poppies. Poppies... poppies... poppies...

Cherry blossoms in bloom at Lake Balboa, a park in The Valley. Here I am waiting patiently for fairies to appear.

Had some good rains in early 2008 in Southern California. While they did little to alter the long-term drought we're experiencing, they did have a positive effect on the potency of the wildflowers this spring. Sorry I don't know what these flowers are called, but they smelled like a candy store.

There is no end to the props that people can dance with in the drumming circle. Martial arts weapons and provocative or dangerous kicks are prohibited, but now and then when there's room, you can find someone dancing with something that breathes a whole new life into an old toy... such as the hula hoop.