Happy Tuesday!
Though Penny and I had a fantastic time in Toronto visiting Rory, Phil, Donna, Tomi Toles and his son TJ, and several other friends, it’s great to be home!
My Dance with Misty Tripoli!
Before I get into “today”, I’d LOVE to share this video clip (created by Phil Delaire) showing some special moments from my joint class with Misty Tripoli, the world famous, award winning dance teacher from Mexico (learn more about Misty here: https://www.theworldgroovemovement.com/)
Misty and I have been friends for a couple years or more now, but we often saw each other on the road as we lectured. Penny has been friends with Misty for a long time, and danced with her in her classes over the years.
I love Misty because she’s a straight arrow. What you see/hear is what you get. She’s honest, practical, “beautiful”, powerful, inspiring, and I love that. Her teachings are in harmony with my own beliefs and we share great joy in our synergistic approach to life.
It was exciting when she asked me to co-create a workshop together last year, and Can Fit Pro was very excited to support sharing our creation. Our class sold out very fast once the bookings opened, so we knew we were onto something.
I had a fantastic time teaching with Misty, and had a huge, amazing, positive, loving reception from the audience during, and after the class; I don’t think I’ve ever hugged so many stunningly beautiful women at one event in my life!
After our class was over, Misty and her sister offered to do a joint workshop together in Mexico next year, so I’m excited to explore that with her. Here is Phil’s lovely recap of our great session together for your enjoyment:
We arrived home yesterday afternoon. As soon as we pulled into the driveway, I noticed my tallest stack had fallen down. I was really surprised because it has made it through many storms, but as life will have it, all things change. I saw it as an invitation to create something new.
After I unpacked my suitcase, I headed out into the garden to start the rebuilding process. I got tired after about an hour due to jet lag and being on the road in general, so I stopped at about half way up to where I’d like it to go and will continue when it feels right.
As I toured my garden, I saw that my little pet fig tree’s figs were bursting open!
This was a much-welcomed surprise. I planted my little fig tree in the beginning of September 2010. Since then, “Figgy” has been through a lot of challenges.
There have been times when we were on the road, and by happen chance, she didn’t get watered. I’ve come home to find her leaves dead and just a bare, lifeless looking tree stalk. I gave her a big drink, and very soon, new leaf buds appeared and she revived. This has happened a couple times!
There have been times when I put the hose on my little Figgy and got distracted by my art, gardening, or something, only to find my little Figgy drowning in water the next morning as I went to my car to leave for work. I quickly shut off the hose and hoped she’d be fine. She has come through the drowning’s and droughts with flying colors.
So yesterday was a special day. After three years in my very dry front yard, she gave us her first figs! I tasted my first one right there with her. It was AMAZING! Incredibly sweet, and my body tingled with a flood of nutrition as I ate it slowly like a Taoist monk. Honestly, I can’t think of a time in my life I’ve had a nicer tasting fig!
I asked her for another for Penny, and got a big happy “YES”. I plucked the biggest one. It was so full, it was bursting open at the bottom. It was like holding a small baseball in my hand it was so densely packed inside. I took it to Penny as she read in her favorite chair in our front room.
With the front door open and the sun shining in, I presented her with her first fig from our one and only little fig tree. She was amazed! Penny doesn’t over-play anything; she’s a sailboat with a very large keel. She chewed slowly and tasted a minute or two and looked up at me with bright eyes and said, “Wow! That is a really good fig!”
Then was my favorite part…I reminded her that I regularly pee on the fig tree’s soil when I water her! I proposed that she was actually tasting my sweetness, transformed into food by our fig tree. She rolled her eyes a little and said, “well it seems to be working” with a little grin on her face. She’s use to my odd farmer’s humor.
This morning, I woke up at 4:30 AM and shot straight up. I was having a dream that my fig tree was being over-watered. In my dream, the fig tree was calling me, and asking me to shut off the water. Sure enough, I’d forgot to shut the water off again and she was swimming in it after about 13 hours of the hose running. Ooops.
You’d think I’d have learned by now…no surprise to Penny of course… I jumped up and ran out there in the raw to shut the hose off and ask her if she was OK. “Yes”, and “thank you for coming” was her reply.
My body, now adjusted to Toronto (EST) time, wanted to stay up. I went back to bed and tried to sleep more. I imagine I had a series of short naps before getting up and at it.
I came to the Heaven house to write this blog, water plants, and check on things in general. Not to mention having a little workout in my lovely gym here. It’s GREAT to be home to the Vista ocean breeze, and the cold, cloudy mountain top mornings of the Heaven house.
After reading many of the comments people left after viewing my recent video blog series What Is Organics?, I felt compelled to share a little story that pretty much encapsulates how I feel about the situation the world’s soils are in, and particularly the US soils, which have been the melting pot for chemical experiments since 1945.
What Is Organics? – Post Script
Mr. Jones, a retired farmer, had spent his whole life in the farming industry. He was raised on a commercial farm, and studied agriculture in college. By the time he graduated, he had worked his father’s farms for 20 years. He had seen first hand the damage done to the soil, and witnessed as the amount of chemicals needed to control weeds and pest went up each year.
As an elective, he studied organic farming and found that it was tremendously logical, so he began working with his father to transition their commercial farms to organic farms. This took three years for the microorganisms to clean the soils adequately to meet organic standards. He then spent the rest of his career in the world of organic farming for corporate consumption.
As his retirement age approached, Mr. Jones dreamed of having his own small farm. He wanted to have something he and his wife could comfortably manage alone.
He searched the listings and found a 60-acre farm plot that had never had chemicals on the soil, but it was abandon, run down, and overgrown with wild brush.
He spent a year working his new farmland with his wife. He cleaned up the brush, repaired the buildings, plowed the fields and fertilized them with fresh cow manure. He repaired and painted the fences.
His final task on his once very long list, was to restore flow to the front irrigation ditch, which passed right under his driveway and ran right along the road.
As he was working away unblocking things, a woman approached. She approached Mr. Jones and said, “Hello! You must be my new neighbor.” “I’ve seen you out here from time to time, and have been meaning to come meet you and say hello.”
As they both stood there overlooking Mr. Jones’ farm chatting, Mrs. Smith said, “My Mr. Jones, God has certainly been very good to you! Look at the farm he gave you!”
Mr. Jones listened to her patiently as she sang the Lord’s praises and reminded him how fortunate he was that the Lord had been so good to him. When she finished, he paused a moment and said, “Well Mrs. Smith, you are right, God has been good to me, but you should have seen the look of this place when S/He was managing it!”
Commentary
This is actually a joke I was once told, but I’ve made a short story out of it because the joke is designed to bring clarity to a common human, and religious misunderstanding of God and life.
God certainly does give us Every-thing. But God also leaves it up to us to manage our Gift, our planet, our soils, our waterways, our oceans, our skies. When we take an active role in cleaning up the lands that feed and nourish us, providing life affirmative sustenance, we are affirming the Grace of Great Spirit.
Leaving the government and the corporations they sleep with to manage your life-giving resources is like leaving your teenage daughter to be babysat by Satan so-to-speak. Praying to God for help with diseases we create ourselves, out of ignorance, or expecting others to “treat you”, is no different than trusting the state to manage your water, land, air quality, or food supply.
If you live in a city, or farming isn’t something that you’d enjoy, you can become an organic farmer by simply finding good local food and buying it from them. Your money supports the farm, the farmer, and all they feed and support – you become an organic farmer by supporting an organic farmer!
You can hand an organic farmer a bucket of fresh water, load some shit into the spreader, or you can hand him $50 bucks a week and he will do the rest for you! Either way, you are helping by giving reciprocity to the land. You are improving your children’s future in more ways than you are likely to imagine.
I hope when you run into Mrs. Smith, you can share the ways you too have helped God manage the land!
Love and chi,
Paul Chek
