Connections at Regenerative Design and Nature Awareness

It's a long way from Quail Springs to Commomweal Garden - 12 hours and several ecosystems to journey from one family to another!

On our last night to the South we feasted on wild boar and venison hunted in Texas by one of the residents of Quail Springs and cooked in the cob ovens outside. We also had a spread of roasted chickens from Alexia's farm in Washington, roasted local vegetables and garlic mashed potatoes (with a whole pot of butter!), roasted squash and sweet potatoes, all cooked by the Quail Springs residents with some of our students and staff. Last Spring my daughter put her hands into the building of the first cob oven on the property, and it was a beautiful sequel to see the fires raging inside those ovens all afternoon, smell the smoke pouring out all afternoon.

From Thursday evening through Monday night, our friends at Quail Springs provided a beautiful, restful space for us to sink into and plenty of good work that was restful and rejuvenating in it's own way. Tuesday morning brought our moment of departure... it was not abrupt. We took our leave of the land slowly, sending blessings and thanks out to all that supports us and taking care to gather our spirits to ourselves so that we would leave behind nothing but footprints.

After warm goodbyes, free and clear, up the road we go....
to our sister program, Regenerative Design and Nature Awareness, in Point Reyes.

Up the road to Santa Cruz, for a quick shopping trip. I lunched with friend and mentor, Mark Tollefson of Wilderness Youth Project, who then joined us for a few minutes in the parking lot of Long's Drugs to share about the work he is doing in Belize with sustainable agriculture and cultural mentoring.

Up the road a little further, along the coastline between Santa Cruz and San Francisco (so many of my favorite places on this trip), with a 45 minute stop at a gas station with one bathroom (bad idea) and on to Pacifica Beach for sandwiches at sunset.

There is something about this trip that I have not yet mentioned. The Song. It is a relatively recent but already seemingly established tradition for each group to create a song to share with each other upon our arrival at Commonweal Garden. Now this is a musical group, and give us any old song to sing and we will change it and play with it on the fly. But to write a song, especially to write a song to be shared with another group, seems to be an entirely different thing. There was a song before the start of this trip, and it was quite a good song really, but for a number of reasons the process of everyone getting on board and enthusiastic about the song was like swimming through clay. The energy for it needed to come from the students in the group though, not the staff, and they were assured that if they wanted to make a song of armpit farts that would be okay. So, getting down to the wire we gathered on Pacifica Beach after sandwiches and sunset for a quick run through of the song, this time with the clear intention to just play with it and have fun. Guitars and voices, drums and a saxophone, we rocked out on the wall between the parking lot and the beach. A few strange looks from passersby along with the smiles, and that's all part of the fun of roadtripping. Seriously, the song was amazing.

And once again up the road, through San Francisco after dark and across the Golden Gate Bridge... and onto a different continent! It's true, tonight I am writing from Pt. Reyes, which is on the Pacific Plate. At least according to my friend Ned. So I'm wondering, is it the plates that determine the continents or is it the connection to the rest of the land mass? I also wonder how it feels to be a cricket.

I can't say very much about our arrival at Commonweal Garden and the sharing of the songs, other than that it was great, and the coming together with unity for the actual singing of our song was that much better for the challenges that went along with it - at least it felt that way in my body.

The combining of these two groups is a vibrant energy - not relaxing, like that of Quail Springs, but pumped. Today the students took off in small groups based on the Acorn directions held by the students (see previous blog post for explanation!) to explore the landscape. The staff and instructors sat on a log overlooking the ocean and watched the adventures unfold. We gathered together for dinner, sharing appreciations of each other and the day.












As I have been typing this, I am sitting in a yurt with about 7- people, the sound of rain on the canvas roof. Stories of the day have been shared, including signtings of Turkey Vultures and Brown Pelicans, findings of skulls and skeletons, musings about Great White Sharks and Tule Elk.

My own story of the day, shared with a small number of other students and staff, was of seeing a bobcat. We watched it cross the road into the field towards the ocean, and pass a thicket of shrubs, from which a Spotted Towhee alarmed after the bobcat had passed by. It is a really different experience to be in a place where it is so easy to see predators and the ripples that they send out through the birds.

Images and sounds and smells from the day, some real and some imagined: the crash of waves on the ocean below the bluffs, the heat of sun and the chill of rain, the smile of my friend Connor - class mate from the 2004-2005 year of the Residential Program, Peregrine Falcons carrying Frigate Birds in their talons and Tule Elk attacking Great White Sharks, the sound of voices united in song and dancing feet pounding the floor in rhythm, laughter, crawling through wet grass on belly, the call of scrub jays in the tree, the smell of the greenhouse - which doubles as our dining room, concentrations of highly toxic plants, the hum of many quiet conversations, the astringent scent of crushed eucalyptus leaves, the company of friends.

Now I am tired and I want to join in on the singing. Our trip is almost over, but there will be a at least a few more posts before I am done... I have more pictures to share courtesy of Kristi D., and I'm sure that there will be stories remembered later and post-trip reflections to share. Until then, blessings from Anake On The Road.