A Moment of Kindness

The Dalai Lama
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

I had two things on my mind to talk about when I sat down to blog today. One was an incident on a bus that reminded me of the importance of the small moments of kindness in the world. And the other was China.

What photo was I going to choose that could illustrate one or both of my thoughts? Ahem, said the Dalai Lama from my flikr page, choose me choose me.

So I did, and in posting his smiling face I am reminded of that powerful moment when I snapped the photo in Cusco, Peru, as His Holiness arrived to meet with representatives of the Qero people.

I had many many powerful and 'mystical' moments in Peru which I am now being challenged to translate to my ordinary life in the daily slog of a crumbling and shifting California.

So, first the moment of kindness. And then China.

I was waiting for a bus in Richmond California to go visit a friend in Marin County when I struck up a conversation with an elder woman who said she liked the color of my hair. Turns out she was a psychic and had
all sorts of interesting things to say. But probably the most interesting was that she thanked me for the conversation, saying that she had been feeling that people
in Marin were not very kind, and that our conversation had reminded her that there were still kind people in the world.

This came at a time when I wondered if I was 'wasting my time' and not 'doing enough' with myself, watching everyone buzzing around in their cars and hammering away on their laptops while I seemed to be spending more time these days noticing what is actually going on around me.

So it was an 'aha' moment,like the beautiful stone you find on your path that reminds you that you are on the right road.

Now for China. In the news today there's an article about China's nervousness about the U.S. economy, and its advice to us to spend our money wisely or they may not want to give us any more of it. All of a sudden I felt like I was back in the 'developing' world, when I was always reading articles about how the U.S. wanted the government of whatever particular country I was in to act. Them that holds the cash holds the power, I spoze. And now the shoe is on the other foot.

But wait, my photo of the Dalai Lama says. Now you have to somehow link these two ideas. And what, he says, does kindness have to do with China and the economic crisis?

Well, you of all people can certainly tell me about China, I say. And maybe I don't know the answer to that question.

But I do know that kindness, like fear, is a kind of viral disease---the more you feed it the more of it you get.

And that if you are foolish enough to be riding buses in Marin County when almost everyone else is driving, you never know what you might find.

Coraline, Flordemayo, and the Day of The Feminine

Two Young Girls
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

Blue haired girl confronts evil button eyed Spidermom in Coraline, a creepy animated fantasy that takes us through scary tunnels and stirs up psychological ambivalence about Good Mom/Bad Mom.

Caroline, who is stuck with a couple of imperfect parents--an irritable Mom and a tipsy inefectual Dad, finds a secret door in her house that leads to what seems to be the Perfect Family. . .

Though the animation--- complete with dancing mice, cotton candy cannonballs, stripper trapeze artists,and unraveling worlds---was fascinating to watch,and Coraline was appropriately courageous, the overall creepiness of the film left me with a bad taste in my mouth. And no,it wasn't the popcorn. Even her real parents were pretty creepy.

Afterwards, I went to a healing meditation given by one of the 13 indigenous grandmothers, FlordeMayo, a woman of Mayan ancestry and very powerful healing abilities. After a group meditation,she said that yesterday, in the Mayan calendar, was the Day of the Feminine. Also the day of Empowerment, and of following the Laws of the ancestors.

What an interesting contrast Flordemayo was, in her incredibly healing and feminine power, to both the evil Spidermom and the irritable "real" mom of Coraline.

Her presence was more potent than anything she said, but a couple of good reminders stuck with me: the importance of surrender, and "If you know something, it's your responsibity to share it."

Maybe

Horses in the Andes 1
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

Maybe. A Chinese story about a philosophic farmer.

(This story courtesy Garsett Larosse)

One day, the farmer's horse ran away, and all the neighbors gathered in the evening and exclaimed ‘that’s a shame!’
He said ‘maybe.’
Next day, the horse came back and brought with it seven wild horses.
‘Wow!’ they said, ‘Aren’t you lucky!’
He said ‘maybe.’
The next day, his son grappled with one of these wild horses and tried to break it in, and he got thrown and broke his leg. And all the neighbors said ‘oh, that’s too bad that your son broke his leg.’
He said, ‘maybe.’
The next day, the conscription officers came around, gathering young men for the army, and they rejected his son because he had a broken leg. And the visitors all came around and said ‘Isn’t that great! Your son got out.’
He said, ‘maybe.’

Silence Is Golden

Scarf and Coat
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

Okay, so now I'm not only Flickrd but Facebooked. This could turn into a full time job. I am so busy keeping up with my internet friends and contacts that I don't have time to discuss the really important things in life here on my blog...like the definite change in the air since Obama has taken office, and how much I am enjoying the sunny streets of San Francisco,

There was a beautiful instant right after the Obama election, an instant that lasted for maybe a day or so, when everybody, even a large number of people who had not voted for Obama, just shut up and acknowledged that importance of the moment. One friend told me of how the French leftist newspaper Liberation kind of wanted to criticize Obama because he wasn't left enough, but couldn't bring themselves to because the mere fact that he was black (or bi-racial) was a major shift in this country, and the world. Even among the Republicans, it seemed that many people who didn't agree with Obama's politics still felt compelled to shut up for at least a little while.

These moments that force everyone to shut their mouths for an instant are a good thing. In that brief, fleeting silence, when we feel compelled to let go of our 'usual' discourse and the attachment to that discourse, great transformation can occur.

So it was nice while it lasted. Now many folks are once again taking up their 'positions' behind well-worn fences of discourse and idealogy. (I include the left, the right, and myself in this.)

I think one of the reasons I spent so many of these last months doing nothing but photography was out of this need for silence, and stopping. There is nothing like a photograph to allow you to stop the world, and really look at it.

But now, it seems my own addiction to words is returning. Which is fine, because I can at times be relatively good at this addiction.

It is a joy to have my friends from Peru and Mexico and Argentina and Spain and the U.S. all on the same Facebook page, and to be able to throw our words (and photos) back and forth. Everybody is asking me when I am going to return to their particular city. It is nice to be loved in different corners of the world. I wish I could be physically present with all my friends at the same time. But Facebook is the next best thing.

Now, for at least a little while, I'll shut up, and fall into that great transformative silence.

Baby Come Back

Baby Come Back
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

Baby Come Back

Vuelvete, Amor.

She's been on a one-way rush to acquire more and more things in order to try and cover her nudity. But, as you can see, she's a statue, stuck in mid-leap for many years. Now, as the stores she's been rushing to shop in are all closing, and her money to spend has disappeared, he calls her back. Come back, my love, he says. We have nothing now. Only ourselves, our nakedness, and our love for each other.

This is a fairy tale, of course. But, like all fairy tales, it is a parallel universe that breathes beside us all the time, almost close enough to touch.

Ella ha pasado muchos anos corriendo y corriendo para adquerir cada vez mas cosas para ocultar su desnudez. Pero, como ya ves, ahora es una estatua, atrapada en el salto imposible desde hace muchos anos. Ahora, las tiendas donde ella suele hacer su shopping se van cada una cerrandose, y el dinero para comprar cosas se desaparce. Entonces el le llama a ella: Ven mi amor, dice, vuelvete. Ahora no tenemos nada. Solo tenemos a nosotros mismos, a nuestra desnudez, a nuestro amor.

Esta historia, por supuesto, es un cuento de hadas, Pero como todas los cuentos de hadas, toma lugar en un universo paralelo que suspira a nuestro lado todo el tiempo, casi tan cerca como para tocarlo.


(photo: Detail, sculpture, Nashville, Tennessee.)

Last Dance

Last Dance
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

After 8 years of doing his dance, I guess the man needs a rest.

Meanwhile, America (on the left) looks ahead,somewhat anxiously, hoping for better times, along with the rest of the world.

(Photo taken last summer at the Houston Art Car Festival.)

Embrace It, Let It Go: Happy New Year!

Embrace It, Let It Go: Happy New Year!
Originally uploaded by ojodorado (Happy Holidays!)

Goodbye 2008. It's been a challenging, though ultimately rewarding, year for me personally--walking across the U.S. with the Longest Walk, then messing up my arm and shoulder and spending far more time than I would have anticipated recovering from that--which ultimately forced me to focus on my health in a good way.

A friend recently sent me an astrological report on 2009, predicting a real roller coaster year. But I don't think we need astrology to tell us that--we have a new president, a collapsing economy, yep it looks like we are in for it.

The astro report indicates we'll be able to ride it out if we let those things dissolve that need to dissolve, and trust that there will be something left over. In fact, we may discover that we had more than we thought we did all along.

Best wishes to y'all in the New Year!

Barack

20081104_Indianpolis_IN_UAWGOTV0318
Originally uploaded by Barack Obama

Obama!!

Good morning, new America.

"Is there too much hope?' A journalism student asked the woman next to me at the Obama headquarters celebration last night.

There is, of course, never too much hope.

Now, the question, as Obama himself as asked is, "What do we do with it?"

More than anything, as I was standing in the cheering crowd last night, I felt like all the battles that I and others had fought over the past several decades had piled up to reach this tipping point--this visible African-American face, this multiracial global man who symbolizes our hope for a new America and a new world. Memories came flooding back to me--my father standing up to the white city council in the San Fernando Valley over integration and civil rights, the tense and shattering day Martin Luther King was shot and how the huge crowd of us, black and white junior high school students, marched to downtown Berkeley, the battles for women's rights in the 70's, the organizing against Anita Bryant in the Castro, the chaotic and cathartic times in Argentina and Bolivia, it all filled my bones as I was watching Obama speak and made me feel, yes, all of us who have fought those battles have helped make this change happen.

Of course, he will prove himself not just a symbol, but a human being. He will make mistakes. He will disappoint us. And we of this celebrity-driven country will have to learn that we are still the ones, ultimately, that need to make the change continue to happen.

But yesterday, as I was looking at kids here in Oakland who are four, five, six years old, I was thinking: they ARE growing up in a country different than the one I grew up in.

In the polling place, a group of light-skinned black kids were sitting on chairs talking while the rest of us voted. "Who would you vote for if you could vote?" said one. "Well I'd vote for Obama of course," said the other. "Why?" said the first. "'Cuz he's younger." said the second.

Painted Legs, How Berkeley Can You Be Festival

Painted Legs
Originally uploaded by ojodorado

I remember doing this in Berkeley when I was in Junior High.

Some things never change.

Ear-cupuncture

Yesterday I went to the "How Berkeley Can You Be?" Festival and watched the crazycostumed Berkeleyites dance and prance around MLK park. (Photos forthcoming)

Ah yes, it's good to be home...

After dancing and prancing around a bit myself, I sat down on a wooden bench and had some needles inserted into my ears.
I'm great at giving advice to other people about getting acupuncture, but have yet to try it myself. And yes, it works....!

My energy is returning, my arm is healing, and my unabashed photo passion continues. I'll get back to more "serious" writing eventually--or I won't---but for now, I'm having fun.

From California: Flickring

The recuperation process from my injured arm and shoulder--and perhaps from the Longest Walk as well--as been longer than one would expect. My whole body has been exhausted.

So instead of travelling I have been Flickring...putting my photos on Flickr, sending them out into the world, and armchair travelling by looking at photos of people from all over the world.

Once again I am reminded of how much art heals, whether or not you are an artist. There also seems to me to be something globally healing about people connecting to each other uniquely through images. Here, it's easier to find our commonality--I don't know what a particular photographer's politics might be, or what an a-hole he or she might be away from the camera, but with the image we can share a part of our soul and our life in a simple, direct and beautiful way.

Here is one of the Flickr community's current favorites.
You can see more here

Dennis Banks Says Goodbye

After the walk, longtime Native activist Dennis Banks passed on his staff to younger leaders, made a speech, and walked away, symbolically retiring from being an active organizer.

One Long Walker gave him a mock bow on his way out.

Longest Walk in DC Photos

Whoops

Two days before The Longest Walk was to arrive in DC, I slipped while I was coming down a ramp, broke my arm and generally messed up my shoulder. I did manage to get to DC and walk with everybody else, but have spent the last 4 weeks recuperating, one week in DC and the last three here in Los Angeles.

Wow. This has really given me a new appreciation of our bodies and how much we take them for granted when they are working. I found myself watching people bicycling, walking, carrying things,dancing, going about their business, watching how elegantly their two arms functioned together without them really thinking about it, wondering if I would get that ease of movement back.

The doctor warned that I may lose mobility in the injured arm, but I am aiming for having that blissfully unaware ability to move both my arms together without really thinking about it again. In the meantime I have been VERY conscious of the injured arm---you realize that arms are also about balance for the rest of you,and you don't really think about your ability to roll around at night when you are sleeping until you can't. My awareness of others in public spaces also changed for awhile--I was hyper aware of the people bustling around me and their ability to send me into excruciating pain just by bumping into me the wrong way. (No cast--just a light shoulder sling.) So generally, I didn't go out much.

Also, I was exhausted, and slept a lot. I checked out some blogs from people who had broken bones and found that this was not uncommon. I guess your body wants you to rest.

Except for the lack of mobility, it is now doing much better--I can type with both hands, scratch my nose with my left hand, put both earrings in, put on my shoes--all sorts of activities that I was incapable of just two weeks ago. Having to ask other people to do simple things for me--ohmigod,not a lot of fun, but certainly a lesson in interdependance. Still can't get my arm over my head to put my hair up or anything like that.

This has also given me a tremendous appreciation for people who end up with lifelong changes to their bodies because of injuries--people like Christopher Reeves, Ram Dass---or someone like Jack, a Navajo guy on the Longest Walk who walked from Arizona with an artificial leg.

Also, as I am big on the symbolism of how we manifest accidents and diseases, I have to ask myself why my left arm has been screaming for attention, and what that says about the balance in my own life.

We must take nothing for granted.

Reflections On The Longest Walk, Three Weeks After

During The Longest Walk, some of us reflected that we would bettter appreciate and understand the walk after it was all over.

That has proved true in my case--but then, I've always been a slow learner, seeming to need a fair amount of reflection time after important events.

The walk was challenging, physically, emotioally, and spiritually. Up every day before 4AM, on the road by five, seven miles before breakfast, sixteen to twenty total, maybe showers maybe not, maybe a bathroom, maybe the woods, a diverse crowd of people thrown together from different cultures, sunburn, sunstroke, tics---and walkinig on land all across the country that held some painful hisorical memories. I wondered at times if we were actually doing any real healing with our walk and ceremonies or just scratching he wounds.

But now that it's been over for nearly a month, I feel more than anything a deep gratitude for the people I met on the walk and
the moments we shared. Ron from the Houma Nation with his New Orleans accent that made him sound like he was from the Bronx, Gilberto the Afro-Cubam Buddhist monk who WAS from the Bronx, Addie with the adopted dog Booger trailing along behind her, or pulling her along, Margaret from the Chumash Nation with her quiet and steady self, Christopher AKA Sunshine with his golden hair and spirit, quiet Kana from Japan who reflected that all the emotional turmoil we were going thru on the walk was like the laundry spinning to get clean, "All the Way Ray" doing sixty push-ups after the walk, Tony with his amazing plugalong car, and so many others....

Would I do it again? No. Am I glad I did it this time? You bet.

Longest Walk Photos, Virginia

Longest Walk Update

From Mebane, North Carolina--


Back on the Longest Walk. Still difficult getting internet access and getting on the blog.

Stayed with great folks at the Ocaneechi-Saponi reservation. The last full blood there died in the mid 1700's, so these folks look more like light skinned African Americans than full blood Indians. But they have recreated a traditional village, and are reviving their 'extinct' language. They also cooked up some seriously good fried chicken.

Interpersonal conflict continues on the walk, but it seems to be getting aired more, and resolved. People who took off for the NOrthern Route say conflicts are rife there too, and that visitors from the Southern Route did not feel very welcome.

One friend here, a Navajo, said he thought there was so much interpersonal conflict because of the work we were doing healing Mother Earth and the Native history on this continent. It's as if with every step we take we are soaking up her wounds and the historical wounds of the people we encounter. So naturally that's going to play itself out among us.

Other people have complained of the chaos and lack of leadership. The people who have taken on leadership positions are or have seriously burned out. Today and yesterday our extremely competent Japanese translator and finance coordinator blew her stack. Another walker stepped forward and asked Dennis to lighten up on the walkers, that everybody was burned out.

But the same Japanese woman led us in a hula dance and song today, which we all did. I didn't realize the hula was actually a martial art. You can see in the dance and song that it incorporates light and dark, and is nothing like the Hollywood versions of it I have seen.

These moments of song and dance as well as people's honest expressions of how they feel seem to have helped the mood of the walkers.

Dennis Banks has returned to the walk after being away with the Lumbee and Tuscalero people. He tried to get them both to join us, but word is that since the two tribes do not get along, when each one heard the other was going to be on the walk, they both cancelled.

Indian Country Today has run a good clarification story of an incident between walkers and police in Columbus, Ohio.

We are nearing the end of the walk, and will be arriving soon in Washington DC.

A medicine man in Peru once said "How you arrive is very important."

I am thinking a lot about that as we near DC.