Current mood:

ecstatic

Mythic Journeys 2006 Report - Part I
I had a good feeling about my trip to Atlanta for the Mythic Journeys conference. I left a week ago, Wednesday morning, and at the DFW airport, there was this inexplicable castle structure. Just hanging out in the American Airlines new D Terminal! The scale: it was big enough that full-grown men could walk through the passage way, and so could I. So I did. Several times! It was very appropriate to begin an event based on the words and works of Joseph Campbell.



One of the things that made the conference special this year (I went to the first one, in 2004, same location) is that artist Michael Green had done extraordinary things with art assemblages all across the huge and echoing Hyatt Hotel. Since the theme this year was the four elements, he had strings of white feathers in some places (air). He had arrangements of candles in red and orange in other places (fire). He had many lovely birdbaths placed all around in which he floated fresh flower faces every day (water). He had stones laid in spirals with moss and wood (earth). Not only were these beautiful, but often surprising and tucked away in corners. And I really appreciated how he often seemed to assemble easy to find and not-expensive things to make his art. It inspired me to think about how I can add the good energies to my home...

Michael Green's earth and moss art creation

At the opening ceremonies on Wednesday night, a fascinating guy named David Abram, described as an cultural ecologist and philosopher, told a wacky but riveting story of kayaking in the Alaskan sea. How the sea lions almost tried to attack him but he bonded with them first by singing in a barking yowl, then by dancing in his kayak. They swayed and bobbed in the water along with him!

During the reception with food & drink that followed, Charles deLint introduced to me one of my heroes, John Matthews. He's a scholarly Brit who wrote lots of heavily footnoted books about King Arthur, Celtic mysteries, etc. I brought his book on Robin Hood as a manifestation of the Green Man with me for him to sign, later. He was impressed it had come from Glastonbury to Texas and now to Atlanta... Another sweet man was standing with them and he made a point to introduce himself. It was David Spangler! The co-Director of the Findhorn Spiritual Community, Scotland. He himself is American. Findhorn, if you hadn't heard, was founded by spiritual people on rocky, barren coastline. They were guided by the spirits of the wild or nature or whatever. The result was they planted gardens in this rocky ground and grew huge vegetables, masses of brilliant flowers, incredibly lush and rich environments.

As I posted earlier, one of the really cool interactive workshops I did was body work where we acted out animal characters under the guidance of actor, singer and puppeteer, William Todd-Jones. We acted out solo animal characters that others guess, like in charades. We acted out scenarios in groups. At the end five actors created parts of one animal. Our group had decided to do a caterpillar/centipede with the many legs. Then Ellen Kushner was inspired by a butterfly on my shirt to want us to try a butterfly too. So what we did was act out a caterpillar trucking along (I was the front, using my arms to indicate antenna), then we clustered around Ellen to make a cocoon, then we created a butterfly with animated wings. Todd loved it! Told me so on the last day when I thanked him for the fun stuff.

More body work classes were offered in early morning, but I never could get up in time. I missed my sleep those 4.5 days! But a very happy, attuned and grounded man led them: Chungliang Al Huang. He's a Tai Ji master who worked with Joseph Campbell at Esalen on ways to act out the energies of the I Ching. He led the general session one morning in a sort of active, dancing meditation. We pulled the Chi down from the heavens, pulled it up from the earth, let it mix in our solar plexus. Then we grabbed our bellies and laughed "ha ha ha!" And moved the energy up to the heart, to awaken it and experience the world from that energy center. Then we emptied the cup to the universe so the heavens could fill us again. That last thing is not necessarily easy for a Westerner to do! We kept wanting to hold onto our lovely energy!

Fantasy writers and artists at the event: L-to-R: Karen Schaeffer (Charles Vess's wife), Ari Berk, Terri Windling, Heinz Insu Fenkl, Charles Vess, Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman (head turned), O.R. Melling (small woman in front), MaryAnn Harris (Charles deLint's wife), Charles deLint, Brian Froud, Wendy Froud

-- More to come later, when I have more time to post