Drums

A couple of weeks ago there was a talk given at Empty Field Zendo (the zendo is at an organic farm eight miles from us). The talk was given by a Native American named Mala Spotted Eagle, who is half Shoshone and half Cherokee and who has a community(Nanish Shontie)  near the farm that focuses on maintaining Native American traditional culture and spirituality and works to be what we nowadays call a sustainable and ecologically sound community, but for them is simply living with a Native American respect for Mother Earth.

His talk stressed the importance of being aware that everything we do affects everything else in this world and that everything we have comes from the bounty of life on this fragile planet. He spoke of the traditional ways as not coming from a "religion," but rather from a spiritual way of life: a way of life that holds that each little act should be done with the awareness of its connection to everything and that nothing should be treated simply as an object. A wonderful statement he made about experiencing things: just experience them from start to finish without thinking about them, there will be plenty of time later to think about the experience. I don't do justice to the simple and elegant way he expressed this. A fine Buddhist talk.

After he talked he led us in some "inter-tribal" songs with his drumming. The important thing about the drumming and singing is to keep subject of the song in your heart and sing from there: if it was a deer song you sang to the deer from your heart. Just honoring everything, it sounds so simple but my monkey mind often gets in the way.

A few days later at his community there was an afternoon of drumming and songs. Catherine and I went. There were about a dozen of us around two drums and we all drummed together and sang the songs. Whole hearted practice, singing and drumming with the ears, letting the voice and hands follow.

We had another drumming experience the next week. Early in the week Catherine and I heard some odd noises that sounded like drums, but may also have been some odd machines. I walked around our lane to try to get some idea of where the sounds came from, to no avail. But the sounds kept going, all day and into the night. We thought about it, forgot about it, thought about it, eventually thinking less and forgetting more. Jake and Leslie came and visited later in the week and they heard it and wondered. By Friday evening we were really wondering what it could be. We were sitting outside around dusk when Catherine gets her car keys and says she's going to find out what was going on. She had a hunch. We piled into the car and drove off, headed towards Camp Serene, a Lutheran camp about a mile from us. We'd stop the car and listen carefully for the sounds. They led us to Camp Serene. A bit down the road from the main entrance there were the drums and a big camp fire. But what was it? A Lutheran rave? We headed home and Leslie did some web searching and found out that there was a week long drumming camp going on, the twenty third annual drum camp. No frenzied Lutherans, they were just renting their space out. So next year when the drums begin we'll know that it's just the twenty fourth annual drum camp.

In telling the story over at Horton Organic Farm, where Empty Field Zendo is, we found out that in the valley over from them folks let there place be used a couple of times a year for raves. All day and all night and damned loud. It's amazing how sound travels out these ways.

Country living isn't always peaceful and quiet.