Prayer in the Angeles Forest

I woke up this morning with my, of late, customary Dread That Has No Reason other than The Usual. I had planned on taking Oliver out to the Angeles National Forest for one of those Jim Robertson Aboriginal Skills classes* that I told you about more than a year ago when I started homeschooling. This one was Primitive Pottery. Reader, I did not want to go this morning and spent a good half hour in bed pondering whether and why. I finally decided that since I'd paid and gotten a babysitter for Sophie, I would do it.

Well, thank the good lord I did it.

I bet ya'll didn't know that you can drive for about 51 minutes outside of Los Angeles and see this.

And this:

 And this:

Jim made fire the primitive way, and then we passed around a smudge stick to introduce ourselves.

Then we set about making pottery, right down to the clay. We even made what's called the "temper."

Here are a few of the pots made in previous classes:

Oliver and I warmed up -- very chilly in the woods -- while eating our lunch:

Here are our pots:

Then we made paint. We literally made paint:

Ya'll I am not an artist, and while my intention was stronger than the finished project, my little one came out pretty damn good. I even made a lid for it. We learned all sorts of things about clay and paint and firing and all that jazz, but I won't tell you here (mainly because I didn't know what the hell I was doing).

What I can tell you is that I highly recommend a full day (ten hours for us!) in the woods. I feel utterly relaxed tonight, and I haven't felt that way in a long time. I'm not even irritated at myself for going so long without this kind of natural respite.

Jim made us a pot of soup right on the fire. It had some kind of organic vegetable bouillon, greens and herbs from the woods and water. Someone asked Jim whether he meditated or prayed. He said,

No, I don't pray. My life is a constant prayer.

Amen.










*Other Jim Robertson Aboriginal Skills posts:

In His Element: Dispatch from the School of Revolution

Aboriginal Skills Part II

The Burn Bowl

The Burn Bowl

Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains

its original dimensions.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

Last evening, Oliver and I attended another workshop with Jim Robertson out at Malibu Creek State Park. We arrived at 3:30 and stayed through the rising of the full moon until after 9:00. We learned how to start a fire from little more than a nest of pine straw, a rock and flint, a bow-like tool and some serious back and forth movements. Here's the City Lady, getting ready to fire up.

Oliver, of course, is much more talented and created quite a fire with the help of Jim:

Jim taught all of us how to create a burn bowl. The burn bowl is a primitive container that you make by slowly blowing on an ember that you've placed in the center of a split piece of wood. The blowing is a slow and mindful activity. Jim told us that you can do it over a period of days.

Oliver took to this with his usual focus, blowing slowly and steadily until the ember had carved out a small indentation. Over the next few hours, the indentation became a dark bowl with smooth sides that Oliver periodically scraped out.

Jim told us that the bowl is a part of us and we are a part of the bowl.

Oliver then carved the piece of wood, softening and rounding the corners. He'll sand and polish it at home.

Afterward, he made a small, rustic spoon, using the same slow and mindful effort.

I guess I could make metaphor here -- the deep breath, the slow out-take, the burst into flame, the ember that erodes the grain, the carving out, the smoothing -- but I won't. As Jim said, the bowl is you and you are the bowl.

Aboriginal Skills, Part II

That's Jim Robertson, an instructor of aboriginal skills. In the above photo, he was demonstrating how to lie close to the ground and begin to move forward, tracking an animal. This man was wonderful -- craggy and handsome, he spoke of his deep reverence for the natural world, for animals and their environment. He told the kids that while he loved meat and ate it, he always took a bite knowing that the animal was a part of him and that he was a part of the animal. Jim doesn't believe in hunting or fishing for sport. He believes that we should respect where our food comes from and from whom.

Here Jim is showing the boys how to track a deer, how to slowly pick one's foot up and put it down, roll it in stay still and low and silent. It reminded me very much of what it looks like to do a walking meditation, and in some respects it was exactly that.

Here, Oliver is laying low like a deer, head down, unaware of a tracker behind him. If he heard the tracker, he lifted his head and the tracker, in turn, stood still and silent.

I love this picture, Oliver readying this boomerang thing that catches rabbits, the sun's rays over him. I think it's holy.

Here, Jim is demonstrating a bird trap. They worked for a long time on this, and it was intricate, careful and slow work. The other boys horsed around, but Oliver was completely into it.

Here Oliver is getting ready to shoot an arrow. I've mentioned it before, but The Husband is a sharp shooter, from his days in the compulsory Swiss bicycle cavalry (yes, he was in the Swiss bicycle cavalry). Oliver appears to have inherited his steady hand and eye coordination. A bow and arrow, a rifle -- anything requiring that sort of coordination and focus, is easy for Oliver and certainly a strength that was rarely recognized in a school setting.

Here's the broody sky that hung over us all afternoon.

I walked back up the trail toward the end of the day, cold and needing to warm up in my car. On my way back to get Oliver, I came upon probably twenty or more deer, silently nosing around a beautiful oak tree.
They stopped and twitched their ears, stared at me and continued sniffing and munching.  I felt free for a moment, of every single care.

Here's Jim Robertson's website.