Healing Waters at Jackson Wellsprings

I wanted to share these photos of Jackson Wellsprings in Ashland, Oregon where I live. The herb gardens at the entry of the hot springs have grown more beautiful each year. I am appreciative of all the work community members contribute to make this such a beautiful place.












The invitingly delicious swimming pool is warm-- a mixture of hot mineral water and well water. I love swimming there in the morning before the crowds arrive. Lying in the water, looking up at the sky and clouds, watching the swallows swerve around in the sky...bliss...There is also a smaller and hotter soaking tub, where you can really loosen up and relax.

Bright flowers ornament the pool in hanging baskets and big standing pots. Sometimes my visits are quiet, and other times I meet old friends, people I have known for many years,or visitors from different parts of the country who are camping at the hot springs.

It is truly a restorative place. I have enjoyed myself here this summer, last summer and the one before that, etc. To me, Jackson Hot Springs is one of the best things about Ashland. And I don't want summer to be over. I hope we have a nice Indian summer so we can continue to soak and swim in these healing waters. Happy Labor Day weekend!

Week 3 of the Wheelchair

I've been using a wheelchair for the past 3 weeks after fracturing 4 metatarsal bones in my left foot. I was trying to collapse a cardboard box but it slipped out from under my foot and I fell, landing with my weight on my left foot. Being in a body requires mindfulness and even then, one may still suffer an accident. One great thing about it is how marvelous the staff at Ashland Community Hospital's emergency room is. I've gone there twice in the past few years and both times it was a friendly, even uplifting experience.

People suggest that it is instructive to navigate in a wheelchair as an educational process in order to understand the experience of the disabled. Yes it is educational. First it is much harder to do anything, from getting something from the cupboard to getting out of the house and into a car.

When your eyes are at the height of everyone else's waist or chest, you remember how big everybody seemed when you were a kid. In a crowded place, I noticed a natural wish to protect myself from the quick movements of others. You feel more vulnerable, in other words. Sometimes people look at you as if you are defective or should be avoided. (Since I am quite aware of these "mostly unconscious" attitudes in regard to being older, this was one more layer to assimilate in terms of prejudice and avoidance.)

In spite of the various difficulties, I have been enjoying this period of time. Maybe day after day of spring rain has helped in this regard. Well it's raining again, I say to myself, settling in for another day in the house.

I finished some rewrites on A New Wrinkle and am pleased with them. I am surveying what I need to do in order to get it produced locally and elsewhere. I am planning several events that involve reading the play or performing excerpts from it. I am reviewing my overall vision for Sage's Play, which includes seminars, lectures, performances, community forums and a book on aging, which I am starting to write.

There are moments when my overall vision seems rather BIG. I now remind myself that I have had little signs posted in my office for months THINK BIG. I want to free myself up in that way since I have often confined myself to small thinking in the past. I want to THINK BIG and be relaxed and easy about having a BIG vision. What's the BIG DEAL? Big or small, you still have to do one thing and another, look for ways to synthesize, expect miracles and enjoy the ride.

I am enjoying the ride which right now involves a wheelchair.

My 69th birthday is about to arrive at the end of the month, so in the Sailing Toward 70 cruise, I am coming closer! Birthdays tend to get me reflecting on my life. I am remembering how my dear astrologer friend Kate Maloney said to me in a reading many years ago, "Doesn't it all seem of a piece?" She was speaking of the pattern of my life. I was ashamed to admit to her that no it did not seem all of a piece. It seemed disparate, fragmented, and the themes were hard for me to see and understand. Now finally it does seem all of a piece, the whole journey thus far with all of its variety, tributaries, cul de sacs, bogs, peaks, enchantments and epiphanies. I notice that my awareness of not only my life but of the culture and era becomes more panoramic with time. Many decades of life can do this it seems.

No guarantees or certainty about anything. Here one minute, gone the next. Learning to relax with that. Meanwhile, beautiful bird songs outside my window and the promise of some sunny interludes today. Hope you are enjoying the ride too.

Photo credit-- www.crinklecrankle.com

Call Back the Sun

Ashland, Oregon--a small town with a lot of artists of all kinds. Sometimes it seems to me that our town's population is mainly composed of artists, healers and real estate agents plus those who aspire to being artists, healers and real estate agents. That's my little Ashland joke.

The dance community in Ashland is quite large and varied. Dancing People Company magnetized many dancers and a big audience of dance lovers last night for its 4th annual "Call Back the Sun" Solstice celebration.

First, I will say that I could not find any reviews of Dancing People Company performances. This proves I live in a small town, even if it is pretty saturated with all manner of art and artists. No proper dance reviewer in sight. (if there are any reviews hiding somewhere, I would like to read them to see what others have to say.) Second, I will advise that I am no dance critic. I am also rather reticent to discuss wine's finer qualities though I do know good wine when I taste it.

The performance began with the room completely darkened. Dancers appeared one by one, illuminated only by the candle each carried. They moved slowly through the space. More dancers appeared, and together their movements conjured up a mythic, ancient rite. I was mesmerized, enchanted. My heart was moved; the audience/performer boundary was erased.

In dance, things move fast. It's not like looking at a painting or reading a book. What a no-brainer, you may be thinking, but bear with me, I am not a dance reviewer. Watching dance is more like watching a football game, except that nobody is doing video replays of what just happened so the mind and emotions reel as ecstatic gestures and movements cascade through eyes, brain and heart minute after minute. You want to stop just for that particular gesture or jumble or leap, but you cannot. It's already gone.

Of course the sheer physical power and grace, that beauty, was astounding at times. The leaps, raises, balancing, catches, such evocations of flight, lightness, power, freedom and trust, such vulnerability were at times completely breathtaking.

The performance included aerial dancing too. It was stunning. To watch those beautiful beings suspended in mid air, curling and uncurling like flowers, revealing all their strength, delicacy and skill, well what can I say except Hallelujah! Bravo brothers and sisters! You filled my heart. All of our hearts are full.

Mythic, primal, Dionysian/erotic, lyrical, powerful. Somebody write a proper review of these folks, please! The musicians were wonderful, too.
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Photo by Hennie Van Heerden,the Netherlands, via Flickr