Author: mopress

June 10th, Thursday; Ray Charles died this morning at 73. I listened to WBAI, and NPR and WNYC radio, mostly getting tidbits about the ceremonies for Ronald Reagan, but also other interesting tidbits about what’s going on behind the scenes in government, and I actually took notes. There was a whole lot of news on what was going on with the World Trade Center “Freedom Center” and 9-11 Memorial. A man named Tom Bernstein (a founder of the Freedom Center) was talking about how “all the scholars were consulted” and I knew he was lying because I was one of the main scholars he was supposed to consult, and he never called me. (Most of the people involved are great, especially the architect Dr. Stanley Moses) It also seems that the Signature Theater got the contract to do theater arts at the WTC, a group which only does American classics. Then I heard Pataki say that “everything we do here must in some way honor the heroes we lost on 9-11.” If he’s talking about the 9-11 memorial that’s bad enough, (NY Times called it a “political sham”) but if he’s talking about the Freedom Center, its absolutely absurd, and designed to cut out all the rich native American history which is so relevant and needed. (And the responsibility for which has been placed on my shoulders by New York Algonquins!) I have yet to find out which speech that was, but it was trick wording to avoid any agendas that don’t serve the support the narrow and teetering Republican base! Someone called in and complained about undue attention placed on the families of those heroes at the growing expense of the other 7 million New Yorkers. I don’t know about that, but everything is so politically motivated in this case, its become annoying.

I mixed the tobacco from the workshop with sage and burned it in the window sill, the smoke playing in the breeze. At noon I shook the turtle shaker over it and played the water drum (which I did not bring out during the workshop). The purification of the fears went exceedingly well. I buried the ashes amid the happy, brightly colored flowers out on the street, in midtown Manhattan.

I looked in my suitcase and found my assistant had taken a copy of my book that belonged to the Open Center bookstore and placed it in there. So what would Abe Lincoln do? I had to walk all the way back to Spring Street to return it. Then I went on a wild expedition to find an old man in a butcher shop on the east side who could give my screenplay to an actress (Linda from last night) who could give it to Audrey Tautou, (my favorite actress, from Amelie) who is ideal for the part of the kooky co-star who is supposed to be amazingly beautiful. I got there, but there was no copy place near there, so I had to walk a half mile back westward to make a copy then a half mile back east to find the old man in the butcher shop, and then a mad dash mile to the cabin in the city and then take a taxi to the ferry for Hoboken. I was supposed to sing my Cats Don’t Care song at a banquet for the fourth anniversary of the Institute for Staged Recovery, but getting there was very elaborate. I raced for the boat and then waited on the other side. There I found therapists wandering around lost, looking for a way to get a ride to the banquet site, which was several miles inland. I said, “Good thing none of us have any abandonment issues!” which got a laugh. Someone got Jim on the cell phone and he eventually came and picked us up. We were saved. It was a great party; a lot of therapists, dynamic people on the cutting edge of their field. There were over fifty people there, surrounded by banquet tables lit only by candle light, groaning at the boards from all the food.

I had help from Susan who held the mike and the words so I could sing Cats Don’t Care, and it came out well for a first time. Dr. Michael Picucci, the founder of the institute, said I was the closest thing he’d ever met to a real Renaissance Man. He always knows what to say, knowing I was a little rattled at the difficultly in getting to the banquet. He said it was his honor to have me as the editor of his book Journey To Complete Recovery, for which he won Man of the Year from NIH for 2000. And he asked me to help edit his next book. It was a huggy moment. He was also the one who inspired and encouraged me to write Cats Don’t Care, (write it and they will come, he said) which is about how cats love you based on your heart not on how much money you have, it’s a satirical song which closes with a poke at VP Cheney, and what I’d do if I were his cat, (which is to give him thirteen stripes, a very patriotic song) but it is very loving overall, with lots of references to ideas from APT (Authentic Process Therapy, a term I coined for him, although Michael now uses APH (Authentic Process Healing). For those who don’t know his work, Michael has worked for two decades with those suffering from AIDS, and has used spirituality/psychology to help them be amazingly healthy and productive. To my knowledge only one has died in all that time. Staged Recovery is based on the idea that there is a whole lot more recovery needed after 12 step programs, and he starts where they leave off. The other singer was quite amazing, Chris, who recently won the distinction of Worlds’ Greatest Tango Singer, Male. He sang several tango songs, very stirring and authentic. By the way, I took home lots of left-overs. My friends in the car were talking down Reagan. I realized that this group is very dedicated to AIDS prevention, one of the most successful, and that Reagan “hid” the AIDS crisis for years, or neglected it as a “homo’s disease.” That kind of us-versus-them attitude generally creates anger, and our friends had a dose of it for the dearly departed.

Today I got an email announcement from singer Danielle Woerner for her “Arts for Peace” concert coming up. A line up of great performers, making a statement for peace that is pleasant and fun and spiritually uplifting. My busy schedule (sitting here typing) didn’t allow me to drop in, but I’m sure it was great.

Wednesday, June 9th; This morning I awoke to the sound of a wren in my yard, who repeatedly said, “Twenty twenty twenty twenty two, twenty two!” I called my bird watching mother to find out what kind it was; she thought some kind of Carolina wren. I went out and saw the bird up close, it let me come right up to it. I never did figure out the message, but later, in NYC I found a Julius Pizza that had a $20=$22 special. In spite of the repeated message of the bird, I declined the offer.

I was rushing around quite a bit, then finally felt ready to make the train for the city. I thought I left plenty of time, but the train came while I was buying the ticket at the computer booth, and they had to hold the train ten seconds for me, as the little ticket emerged from the slot.

At Grand Central I talked to Edith at the Story Corps booth. An interesting project. I hope to be part of it some day, but you need a computer to go online to schedule a time. I heard a great Doo-wop group, perhaps the best I’d heard, singing right in GC in the marble halls where the vibes are so cool. (I keep meaning to suggest to my son he get into a doowop group.) Then I got on the subway. I went to my (friends’) secret cabin in the city and repacked and showed up at the Open center to make lots of arrangements. Everyone was exceedingly nice, and organized! There was a large yellow poster under glass in the hall for my class. What an honor! In the lobby were big piles of the new New York Spirit Magazine, which I like anyway, but I like this issue even more because there is a two page article on Native New Yorkers, and a large map of ancient Manhattan, created by me as an exclusive for this issue. So I took a bunch and brought them upstairs. I had a flier for the upcoming walking tour and Carol made copies of that for me. Sojourner showed up as an assistant, and this made me very happy. I had met her “on the street” at the book fair at the Mercantile Library, and felt she was very spiritual, and invited her to come to the workshop. That was almost two months ago! Now here she was again, looking very spiritual.

As it turned out, almost forty people came, and we tried to make a circle in the small room as best we could. William Meyers and Leslie from New York Spirit, a high quality free magazine, were there to record the parts that could be recorded. This added more challenge to an already challenging program, in that according to my tradition, these types of encounters with spirit cannot be planned in advance. I had to go without notes, or outlines. Because of the large crowd, I knew I could not do as much one-on-one as I had planned. I sang a lot of songs. I offered each person a smidge of tobacco and we all prayed about our greatest fears. I pointed out that looway-woo-dee meant “bad things in my heart” and referred to confusion leading to fear, leading to anger, leading to conflict. I said the way to peace was to resolve the underlying confusion. Later I said in meditation that when you hear the turtle shaker around you, you will drop the human confusion for a while. I did not comment individually on people’s fears, but then passed a basket with ribbons of the six colors (small snippets) and each person chose one color. I said that the tobacco was like a microphone to the Creator, and that holding the ribbon was a constant prayer. We prayed for the power of the animal spirits to overcome our fears. As we meditated I simply went through and stated which animals could help with which fears.

Then I took out the turtle shaker and shook it around each person with the instruction that when they heard the sound of the turtle, they would drop their human persona, or mask, and become one with the animal world, and with their protector. They would drop the human confusion. Of course there was much more that went on, but I felt that each person got a new glimpse into how to live a more courageous life. I talked with a number of people afterwards (including “Medicine Flower”an Algonquin student from my classes at Marist.) One of the most dramatic moments came when a Caucasian-looking woman said her greatest fear was “that she might not fulfill her mission in life.” I said, “Are you Algonquin?” She answered, “Yes, that’s what my parents believe.” I said, “That’s an Algonquin fear! You’re probably Algonquin, if that’s any consolation.” (Of course other people have this fear too, but she was the only one in this classroom who put it that way) Then I gave her one of the few red ribbons and said, “Hold this! The red is from the east, the direction that has to do with the big questions, such as “why am I here on earth? What is my mission?” Everyone seemed to come away with something they could hold onto, other than the ribbon, which I asked them to keep. A lot of people felt that linking with the animal powers helped them feel stronger and less fearful, more peaceful. I collected the tobacco and packed it for burning the next day.

June 8th, Tuesday, This morning I had a lot of pills to take and things to take care of, trying to make peace with my body which is undergoing healing. Then there was a phone call, and I was a few minutes late for my panel meeting at Stony Kill on bringing ethnic diversity to Outdoor Education, with Reba Lax, regional director of NYSOED. The company was august to say the least. Nate Davis, a good-looking big burly black man who is a pioneer in the field of Ecological Justice, (Arbor Hill Environmental Justice Corp) Rodney Davis, (his brother I presume) also with EJ, Yaritza Cuevas, director of the Greenbelt Outdoor Education Center at Staten Island; Ranger Rick from Urban Park Rangers, and the legendary Brother Yusuf from Brooklyn and Albany, who works to help reformed ex-convicts find peaceful work in the community. We had a lively discussion on how to involve the full range of ethnic backgrounds in the environmental field. I was a spokesperson for aboriginal concerns. Nate talked about “quibbling” and I responded. We agreed that when teachers are subconsciously closed to the values of an ethnicity, they tend to quibble with the beliefs of the other person, and their ways of expressing it, leading to tension and loss of interest. Yaritza was very lively and enthusiastic. I explained some of the native history of her immediate region in Staten Island, and she invited me to come down at some point to look around, perhaps talk to her people. I said that many people who hail from Puerto Rico have Taino blood and are therefore part of the Native American community. She raised her hand and said, “That’s me! My Grandmother is Taino!” I also mentioned that there is an affinity between most blacks and Native Americans via the Cherokee, and all heartily agreed.

Later on I had a one on one discussion of calendar turtles with Ranger Rick, who is an expert on turtles, but did not know that the local Lenape used the backs of certain turtles as calendars, with 13 moons of 28 days, marking 364 days of the year. We found that most turtles have 13 central “moon” platelets, but the outer ring varies, always just short of 28, which is easily remedied by marking. He said scientists today also mark the outer ring in order to identify individuals!

Reba Lax took us on a tour of the site, and we visited the VerPlanck servant’s quarters from 1760. I recounted how the great Wappingers Chief Daniel Nimham was apparently friendly with the family (as they had a son Daniel at the time) and probably visited this house. Such a friendship between Nimham and the Dutch leading family shows a real dedication to diplomacy and peace, given the circumstances.

Today was the Venus solar eclipse. I completely rewrote “Madly In Love” a tragic-comic screenplay about a crazy couple; she is a somewhat violent person who falls in love with a pacifist who is involved in trying to kill the President,.and she’s trying to stop him. Of course it is filled with irony and satire. I printed out one copy to take to the city. I also posted an article on space weapons to peacefile.org.

June 7th, Monday, Dentist appointment with L Z first visit. It was rather violent as far as my teeth were concerned, but Lily and her crew were very gentle. I had managed to avoid Western medicine for about twenty years (except one course of antibiotics for Lyme’s disease, which was not known during traditional Algonquin times). It was a shock. I needed a lot of Novocain. I couldn’t talk after that, so I drove the 90 minutes to Sloatsburg to retrieve my turtle shaker which had been left there during my talk on the Ramapough Indians. I knew I’d need it for my “Path of the Shaman” class at The Open Center. I have been fasting for the last week as part of my cure for my infected tooth, which has worked both for the tooth and in preparing me for my Path of the Shamans class. I realized that the turtle, which has always had a life of its own, was letting me know I was not ready to teach this class yet. Now after making a blood sacrifice (to a healer who reminds me of Kwan Yin) and fasting for a week on and off, I feel more ready, and suddenly the turtle rattle is back in my hands.