Gamble everything for love!
If you are a true human being.
If not, leave this gathering.
Half-heartedness doesn’t reach into majesty.
You set out to find God, but then you keep
stopping for long periods at mean-spirited roadhouses.
Don’t wait any longer.
Dive in the ocean, leave and let the sea be you.
Silent, absent, walking an empty road, all praise.
[Rumi]
Went to Seattle for a handfasting (friends of Doug’s). He took photos of the handfasting and all that jazz. I saved up my camera work for the next day when we went exploring the city and especially the Experience Music Project, which I’d first written about when it opened and had completely forgotten was in Seattle.
The curved lines of Gehry’s work are the same as Bilbao’s Getty but with the added riot of colour and intensity of texture. My first experience of it was travelling through it on the monorail. What a wonderful shock to the system.
And then inside, it’s a cornucopia of information about music and musicians, but I could have handled more samples of musical styles.
More images behind the cut.
Christina asked me to tell her about some good things in my life. There’s nothing quite like a sunny day and water to cheer a person up.
An incredible weekend of drumming and firespinning for Beltaine weekend. For now, photos.
No, not the movie. It’s a trampoline place a little way from here and we headed there on Thursday to get some exercise in. Really, it’s quite a workout if you do it right.
Last night, Doug and I took his new toy for a wander over the mountain, on winding roads through redwood forests and oak and something called chaparral (which I’d never heard of). We eventually followed San Gregorio creek down to where it met the sea, watched the sunset over the ocean (this sounds more romantic than it was: the winds were freezing, and I huddled in the car while Doug shivered and took photos for practicing with in Aperture).
Then we drove down to Davenport along the coast in the twilight to the roadhouse, filled with organic goodness. We started with divine local scallops in a tangerine sauce with citrus greens and then “entrées” (what these crazy Americans call mains — I mean, honestly, this is one of the stupider language choices I will simply not get used to) were clam chowder and farmer’s salad (Doug) and a Chef’s Cioppino (a Californian dish that started with the Italo-American community who threw whatever leftover fish they had from the catch into a fish stew to share) for me. The stew was amazing: clams and mussels and salmon and prawns all stacked up with an aromatic soup. I tasted Doug’s Cricket Cola, an organic local cola somewhat like the NZ Phoenix cola at home, and had a glass of Santa Cruz Tempranillo, a little sharp on the tannins but good. We finished with a créme brûlée to die for and hot chocolate. Mmm.
My photos were nowhere near as good as his… but take a look anyway.
For many years, I’ve wanted to go to Michael Franti’s Power to the Peaceful concert in San Francisco. This year, I did.
On the way back from Burning Man, we dropped in to Harbin Hot Springs to relax and unwind. It was divine. Also, there was a temple they’d built which was just gorgeous and we wanted to photograph it up close but they wouldn’t let us. This is as close as I got.
It’s always bizarre putting images of yourself on the Internet…
Most of the photos of me are now in the album I made.
