Ancient Drumbeats Rattle Anew

Strong Start is a program put on by the Province.  It’s a free program designed with activities such as stories, music and art, to help children grow linguistically, physically, socially, emotionally...  it runs every day and is open to parents and their pre-kindergarten children and while Chicken Little is still too young to partake in much of the fun it’s a great way for his mother to get out of the house and socialize with other mothers.   

Gathering Strength Canoe Journey

North Coast  2009

Here in the rain capital of the universe we are fortunate to have a rich First Nations culture.  The beating of drums, pounding of feet and the accompanying vocables  is a part and parcel to this place.  I have lived in witness to the hypnotic sounds of the aboriginal drums my whole life, and a couple years ago I was fortunate enough to participate in a canoe journey .  Six Canoes each capable of carrying up to 12 people from the communities of the Nisga’a Nation, the Haisla, Gitgatla and the Gitga’at came together to renew their heritage and build community networks.

Gathering Strength Canoe Journey

North Coast  2009

An exquisite example of form and function, the canoe is inextricably twined with our nation’s story.  For Canadians, to canoe is to be moved.    In one of those canoes I paddled 115 nautical miles in 6 days.  We stopped in the evenings to camp and sat around fires on the beach – singing, drumming, dancing and listening to the legends of the First Nations people. 

Gathering Strength Canoe Journey

North Coast  2009

Some nights the tents rubbed up against each other in the small spaces we could find flat enough and clear enough to make camp.  Other nights we sank into thick moss softer than any feather bed, tents spaced randomly like so many hobbit holes tucked in among the trees and the moss covered old growth stumps. 

Gathering Strength Canoe Journey

North Coast  2009

At the end of our long route we were welcomed with feasting and drumming and dancing in a small isolated community called Kitlakatla, on Dolphin Island, off the coast of northern B.C.  We were honoured with the traditional foods of the community including seal, roe-on-kelp, eulachon grease, smoked salmon and heaps of boiled crab.  We called ourselves the mighty paddlers, the people of one nation.  Chanting, singing to the pounding drums and dancing in the traditional fashion, bare feet slapping on the floor. Dancing and celebrating late into the night.

Gathering Strength Canoe Journey

North Coast  2009

Ok ok... nice story and all that... but what the heck does to do with Strong Start??

Well the lady who runs one of the local strong start programs is from that tiny little community of Kitlakatla and she decided to bring her culture to our Strong Start group.  The project... traditional  Elk Hide rattles. 

This of course peaked my artistic side and I jumped all over like my dog upon seeing a mud puddle!   I cut out  my circles of hide and soaked and stitched and Voila! A Rattle..   and of course I couldn’t leave it at that.  I insisted that the rattle needed to be painted much like the First Nations paint their drums.  But since I can’t claim the traditional art of the First Nations with it’s unique and stylized forms, colours and subjects.  (for a better look at the local art styles see : http://www.tsimshian-gallery.com/cms/drums-sticks/  or http://www.pathgallery.com/itoolkit.asp?pg=products&grp=5)   I decided to put the little hand prints of Chicken Little on my rattle...   and so while he slept – at strong start – on the floor - on an old shower curtain appropriated for the purpose -  I painted his little hands and took hand prints.  Then transferred the best of them onto the rattle using acrylic gel gloss medium... the result...fabulous!!!

A Child’s Rattle

©RiverWalker Arts

“Life is the sacred mystery singing to itself, dancing to its drum, telling tales, improvising, playing”

Missing Paradise..

Rain, storm, snow and hail whipped and battered us today.  A potent post vacation reminder that March is not the end of winter.  But then I think our poor little groundhog blown away in a vicious hurricane force wind back at the beginning of February – so weather predictions by rodent are off the forecast.  

I have spent the last 10 days in paradise.  A lazy lounging of beach reading and pool side drowsing.   Don’t get me wrong I did my fair share of snorkelling, swimming, and exploring.  Chicken little spent time on a boogie board and got to eat his first fist full of sand.  Amazing how the sand can be so tasty and yet the pabulum is met with tightly sealed lips and a violent turn of the head and ends with more of the goo stuck in his ears than in his mouth.

While I did not touch paint or put pen on paper.. I did drag my camera along and managed to capture  a few memories of paradise...  

Hawaiian sunset in sepia.... at the Kalahuipua'a Fishponds

©RiverWalker Arts

Moorish Idol

©RiverWalker Arts

Volunteering among other things...

6”x8” Acrylic on Canvas

© RiverWalker Arts

The Creative Jam  - huge success.  Very stressful.  Worth it all in the end.   About 50 people came together in the end for a weekend of intensive creative expression.  Music folks, photographers, visual artists and creative writers.. all jamming together on the theme of “Light and Motion.”  One of the most gratifying things as an organizer was that a professional photographer came up to me and said.. wow I’m glad I came it was great,  and a gal with nothing more technical than a point and shoot camera  who had never done anything more than the odd family snap shot raved about the same session. 

As for me… I took Chicken Little with me for the weekend.  And ended up putting paint on canvas and explored a relatively unfamiliar medium… Acrylic. 

"West Coast Storm Approaching"

16”x20” Acrylic on Canvas

© RiverWalker Arts

More than one person laughed and photographed me painting with one hand while holding Chicken Little with the other.  Marvelling as I  fluctuated between mothering – organizer extraordinaire –and student painter!   So much fun. 

Next up for organization…. Postcards from the Edge of the World - Art Show  We are calling for submissions from the community and surrounding areas…. To make a postcard with 70% recycled or repurposed material... 4x6 inches... submitted to the Arts Council … and we'll hang it in an art show – with a viewer’s choice award of $50.  How could you go wrong??

Should be fun. 

In high seas sometimes you can do nothing else but scream and cling to a plastic duck

I’m here.  Perched on the edge of time and life. And I’m very excited, as I have a friend coming to visit.  The plan is to have me pick her up from the ferry terminal at in the early morning on Friday… but a quick look at the forecast and I’m starting to fret.  Pointless to fret really as there is absolutely nothing I can do about the weather other than invest in rubber boots and put rocks in my pockets to weight me down in the wind.  

 Photo      © RiverWalker Arts 

 The wind wails and whistles through the power lines.  I make a mental check ensuring that the garbage cans have been picked up from the street and brought inside – last week I had to go on a rubbish bin hunting mission and managed to find the big plastic green can lodged in the trees at the end of the cul-de-sac.  I couldn't find the lid and ended up having to send DH on a garbage can lid hunting mission.  I have since re-tied the cord connecting can and lid.  As for the bricks I normally keep in the bottom of the can to prevent loss of empty garbage cans.. well it seemed they were ineffective at keeping it in the vicinity of the end of the driveway.   

 Photo      © RiverWalker Arts

'Storm' force winds of 48 to 63 knots are occurring over the strait and seas are currently 6 meters building to 7-9 meters by Friday morning.  While I may not be an expert on weather patterns nor a ship’s captain, but what I do know is that a 9 meter wave (close to 30 feet)  is taller than my house and not something I’d relish floating around in.   So here I sit listening to my baby snore.. and the wind howl…  (I wonder if the groundhog blew away when it popped out of it’s burrow today?)

I’m guessing the ferry won’t sail.. but I’ll cross my fingers and try to think positively…. Like for instance on the positive side of things…  my pipes did not freeze and I have been able to successfully spray the worst of the mud off the dog following her expeditions through E-V-E-R-Y   S-I-N-G-L-E puddle she comes across.  Nose down - mouth open - she ploughs though any water with gusto, mud flying everywhere.  **sigh** I love my dog…  when she is dry and clean and snuggled in the hollow behind my knees. 

Winter either bites with its teeth or lashes with its tail.

It got cold… Not just that barely above freezing - cold to the bone dampness created by a perpetual drizzle soaked mist that edges on downright flood of cold water.  But the deep freeze temperatures where the snow is like sparkling fairy dust that twinkles in the air and you don’t even consider dragging your garbage can to the curb without down jacket, mitts and toque.  (no more of the “ I’ll just run out in my nightgown and hope no one notices”).  As the temperatures plummeted and wrapping a baby in enough layers to triple his size made leaving the house an onerous task - the community carried out it’s cold business as usual.   

But now it’s warmed up.  With the warming of temperatures business as usual seems to have become more difficult.  We are back to that not quite above freezing but still melting, although not melting fast enough, muddy slush filled nastiness that no one can even pretend to like.  

The drains are plugged and so the waters pool brown and slushy in the low points, the ensuing lakes spray grime and salt far and wide and unwary pedestrians beware!  Washer fluid just smears the grime on your windshield, and big clods of snow gather behind the tires and on inner wheel wells on vehicles.  (Urban dictionary refers to these as Snowberries) The little sporty cars slide around in that rock salt and road grime slipping and swerving dangerously in the sludge only to hit one of those muddy lakes and hydroplane alongside melting lumps of dirty slush like icebergs in a tsunami.  Yuck.

But if dangerous road conditions, and nasty sludge (which makes me cringe thinking about my next dog walking endeavour)  were not enough  half of town it seems is suffering from burst pipes.  The bank, the grocery store, homes, and businesses alike all drowning in more water.  As if life up here were not wet enough.  (Home maintenance is really all about keeping water in or out of where it should and should not be.)  

We did turn off the water to the outdoor taps. But the question remains… when I go to turn them on again…. Will I fill the wall up with water?  Or will all work as it’s supposed to?  And will I have a filthy wet dog covered in all the muck and grime of every puddle along the way to wash off when I find out? 

And just in case you are wondering… this is what I pulled off the easel this week: 

“When Snow Came Falling”

Original Watercolour

© RiverWalker Arts

There is a muscular energy in sunlight corresponding to the spiritual energy of wind.

The sun came out, but first it snowed.  

Clearing Skies

©RiverWalker Arts

In the grey north, on this little island where it rains and rains and rains, where water never ceases to fall and the appearance of the sun is a sign for celebration,  the temperature dipped.  It dipped just that last few degrees plunging us into the realm of snow… and so for a brief time the rain froze and the snow began to pile up. 

It was early morning when the children donned their snow suits and grabbed anything that looked like it might work as a sled and headed outside.  By noon the skies were clearing and the sun began to emerge from behind the mountain that marks the center of this tiny island.  With the flourish of sunshine people came flooding from their homes.  I saw children sledding, building snowmen, laughing and pouring out of the door at the public  library.  Mothers pushing strollers chatted at the park and looked on fondly as children played.  The swing sets which normally hang limp and sodden and covered in algae and moss suddenly found life and the world rang with laughter. 

Harbour Vista

©RiverWalker Arts

Somehow the light managed to arrive and wrought the most amazing change on this community.  I was awestruck.  A little snow?  Sure.. but what a change the sun could bring, and all that reflected light off all that white snow and suddenly everyone was outside – it made no difference if it was cold, or that the snow was heavy and wet but light had finally filtered through into this dark place.  It can be said that no one here takes the sun for granted…

I have found hope in the winter….   

think in terms of the day's resolutions, not the year's

And that was 2011.

A big year. But then they are all big  -  365 days of jam-packed action adventure.  2012 will be no exception… on the horizon is an astounding year of watching my Chicken Little grow from his four month old babbling self into a fully mobile and communicative toddler.. and  the failure of all my best laid New Year’s Resolutions (you know the ones we make every year… and never keep – I am going to lose ten pounds, I’m going to exercise more, I am going to eat healthier,  I am going to spend less, save more and pay off my debt, I’m going to learn to knit/speak Spanish/surf/play the guitar/master the art of Thai cooking….you name it.  By February I’ll have decided that Spanish is too hard to pronounce.  Guitar takes too much practice. Ordering out is just so much easier than cooking. I'll do it ... when I have more time…ya right!!)

To give myself credit I’m not sitting around doing nothing but navel gazing.  Although I do have times where my whole day revolves around nothing more pressing than a tot swim lesson… and that folks is a pretty good life!   Eating up my time (in addition to Chicken Little) is a host of volunteer work, including sitting as a director on the local Arts Council.  As far as volunteer work goes.. I like this gig.  People appreciate any ideas or work that I can contribute and I feel like I can make a difference in the community.  The latest project… the Creative Jam. From the realms of Photography, Music, Visual Art and Creative Writing, four facilitators will guide individuals and groups through a process of learning through active creativity in that most dark and dreary of months… February!   We’ve managed to keep the registration fee to a token amount  $40 adult / $30 student & seniors  (plus $5 supply fee if registering for visual arts). For a full weekend workshop that is truly a steal.

I thought I would share… hot off the presses… the poster for the 2^nd annual Creative Jam