FireDrums 2007

Over the week­end, we went to Big Basin State Forest for Fire­Drums V. It was a magical week­end, mys­tical and wild, even if it was emo­tion­ally drain­ing at times.

I lit my poi for the first time ever and Doug and I did a quiet little Beltaine ritual in front of the big fire, just us. I read runes for people. I left my smudge stick in the ground at one point and came back to dis­cover it had been taken up and passed around the whole huge circle of about 200 people.

I met some lovely people the second night there. Shir­een, who helped teach the begin­ner poi class, and Cara, who helped me do my first spin with actual fire and then did the most incred­ible fire­hoop routine with a part­ner doing rope dart through her hoop.

Doug spent most of the night taking amaz­ing photos, except when Tina was off taking amaz­ing photos, and then we spent some time dan­cing to the drums and hold­ing each other close (and having a couple of intense con­ver­sa­tions, but that’s typ­ical of a Beltaine weekend).

We met a woman named Allison who is an e.r. nurse who offered to help Tina out with volun­teer work, which was won­der­ful. And now, it seems, I have to go get myself a Tribe account, because every­body asked me “are you on Tribe?” in the same way that every­body in Oz asks “are you on LJ?”.

Check out the rest of Doug’s amaz­ing pic­tures. Ignore the way the site looks. One of this week’s pro­jects is sort­ing out my per­sonal, poetry and pro­fes­sional web sites and how they all integ­rate because right now, it’s ugly.