La Bahia to Tatagata Tea Ceremony

It's been a nice day. I got a lot done. I even got a nice walk in at lunchtime. It was hot outside too. I picked up the Dust and Illusions tickets today for a Burningman documentary that I'm helping promote for a local screening. I printed up a few posters too. I was hoping to go see Star Trek with Lover Who Is My Lover this evening but that doesn't look to be happening so I guess I'll be staying home and hopefully will motivate myself to get some much needed work done. I'll have a house full of guests this weekend and a big birthday party on Saturday. We'll also be seeing Michael Franti in concert on Saturday night!

My trip to Santa Cruz this weekend was relaxing. The perfect weekend get away. We left in the morning and arrived on Friday with plenty of time to settle into our motel room before taking a nice leisurely stroll through the boardwalk, along the beach, river and train tracks. We also stopped by La Bahia where some friends of ours live but I had left their phone number on the computer so we weren't able to connect with them at that point. I had hopes that maybe they would spot us in their courtyard where I was taking pictures but that was a long shot that didn't happen. I did get some great pictures and our friends said that was a good thing because La Bahia will probably only survive another couple of years.

We eat dinner at the Greek Festival in downtown Santa Cruz and afterwards we, well, lets see, humm...Friday night was lot of fun. We perused downtown Santa Cruz and then made our way out to the Wharf. We stayed out walking until quite late, enjoying the sights and sounds and the cool ocean breeze. When we finally made it back to our hotel room we continued enjoying the night.

Saturday morning we walked along the ocean again and J. connected with some street/beach front musicians for a little drumming. We finally caught up with our friends (yea for facebook reconnects!) before heading to Ben Lomond, which is situated in the Redwoods about 10 miles north of Santa Cruz, for the annual Tagataga Tea Ceremony. It was a small gathering with only nine of us this year. Very sweet and intimate. We arrived at our friend's, Forest and Elaine's house around 1:00 p.m. Elaine served us snacks while Forest delighted us with different wines. Elaine is a chef extraordinaire and she prepared us a lovely early dinner. After eating we settled into the living room for tea ceremony. Tatagata Tea Ceremony is based on traditional Japanese Tea Ceremony except that no training is needed. Japanese Tea Ceremony is very rules oriented whereas Tagataga tea ceremony is very heart based, the goal being to make a cup of tea while being in the moment and connecting intimately with others. That we did!

Forest and Elaine and many of their friends are old hippies from way back when. Forest traveled to Japan with Alan Watts back in 1962 which is where he originally learned Japanese Tea Ceremony. He and Elaine live in the same place they did back then, when it was a commune. They raised their children there, remodeled, moved around a bit and then settled back in to make quite the beautiful live for themselves. Forest was one of the first computer geeks from back in the day and at age 72, he is still doing computer programming from home.

Sunday morning I went for a lovely walk through the Redwoods and we shared a lovely breakfast together before heading back to our respective homes. Late Sunday afternoon I did some grocery shopping and then had a nice visit with my mother. I read her The Song Of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:

...Toward the sun his hands were lifted,
Both the palms spread out against it,
And between the parted fingers
Fell the sunshine on his features,
Flecked with light his naked shoulders,
As it falls and flecks an oak-tree
Through the rifted leaves and branches...

J. made us dinner. I drank a strong dark beer and washed clothes. Life is good. Oh yeah, another up and coming blog post these is Informed Consent versus Full Disclosure in poly coupledom.

Life is a Dance

Yesterday we had a leisurely morning with B. and M. in San Luis Obispo. They have the biggest yoga bad I've ever seen and I rolled around on it a bunch before hanging from their back inverter machine. That was an awesome stretch. In the afternoon we headed out for the Elfin Forest and walked the wooden trail that overlooks the Mud Flats. That was and interesting and mellow place to hang. In the evening Jerry and I packed up and headed to Atascadero where my cousin lives. It's always so good for me to connect with my cousin. I love him so much. I've had a huge crush on him since I was a baby, or maybe it's better described as my being head over heels in love with him. He was almost eleven when I was born and we both spent lots of time with our grand parents. In fact, I lived with them until I was 6 years old and my cousin lived there for a while too and visited often when he didn't. We lost connect for awhile as adults and then several years ago we reconnected and I confessed to him how I had always been in love with him and he told me that he had always felt the same way about me. Aw, so sweet. Our grandparents were also the loves of our lives.

He took us out to Thai food for dinner and then we stayed up visiting until he had to leave for work (he works the night shift in the mental hospital.) We slept until he arrived home from work in the morning and visited some more over coffee until it was time for us to head home for Chico and time for him to crawl into bed for some sleep.

Jerry drove us all the way home and we arrived safe and sound after about 5 and a half hours. It was a pretty easy trip. After unpacking the car I went and visited my mommy who was doing really well and it soothed my heart to see her looking an feeling so good. I was gone 8 days and have been concerned about her but she seems to have taken my absence in stride.

It feels really good to be home and we just relaxed for the rest of the night. I put a little erotic slide show together from some pictures from our trip along with some others. That was fun.

Jerry is back to work tomorrow but I still have another week off. Very glad about that. Pema is coming by in the morning to walk in the park with me and I'm looking forward to seeing her.

I miss my lover who is my lover...

Here the a few more pics from the last of our holiday:
1. Bo and Milly's refrigerator art. This a a picture of Jerry's band Spark-n-Cinder, back in the old days. That's Jerry, second to the end on the right.
2. Bathroom window.
3. Bathroom art.
4. Bathroom Buddha.
5. Bathroom Ganesh
6. Prayer flags.
7. Refrigerator art. Obama
8. Refrigerator art. A Merry Christmas and Happy New Year--check out the lettering.
9. Me in the Elfin Forest at the Mud Flats.
10. Meeka, Bo and Milly's dog. Can you see her dreadlocks with beads?
11. Milly and Jerry.
12. My boots at the Mud Flats. Obviously not in the mud.
13. From my cousin's--Life is a dance to the music within you.

More Holy Days

Drinking really yummy espresso that D. made me and now he is making oatmeal for breakfast. I'm looking out the window into the mountains of a beautiful, warm, sunny, Santa Barbara day. Last night we listened to the coyotes yipping from these mountains. Today we leave for San Luis Obispo to see my god daughter and our good friends Bona and Milly. D. and Ren are coming with us so it will be a little partay...soon our holiday will be winding down and it will be back home and and then soon, into back to work mode. No one is quite yet ready to let go.

Pictures from yesterday:
1. I love this bird flowers. See the bee?
2-5. The two great loves of my life. My sweethearts, Ren and Jerry.
6/7. Ren is addicted to yarn. If I saw her stash, which she was going to reveal to me but we got sidetracked, I think I might have deemed an intervention necessary.
8/9. Self portraits.
10/11. More moi via Ren.
12. Two Queen of Hearts, one from me and one from Ren. You must understand, when the Queen of Hearts ends up on top of the discard pile she is not being discarded. She is blessing the game and showing herself, ready for love.
13. Ren's new Naughty and Nice winged shirt from Lucky Brand store.
14. Check out the 4 jokers. This is a virgin hand.
15. Ren keeps score. I've gone from She to Hoar you can see. She actually was the Queen in this game. I admit it.
16. A sweet little altar
17. More cleavage.