This is Robbie

This is Robbie. 

This is Holly talking about Robbie.

You know how some things in your life stand out and make you feel warm inside - like you have a purpose and your potential has what it needs to be realized?  Those times that you ARE NOT fighting everything - school schedules, your own failed plans, your body or the people around you.

Think about the memories that erase all that negative, weighty and tiresome chatter. Those memories are what make your life rich - that give you hope and some levity.  

Every year Robbie grabs a bunch of friends from San Francisco to San Diego and goes camping with them in the back country.  Because they are all really creative - the whole thing becomes this dreamy music and art filled weekend - shrouded in what ever elemental event is occurring at that time: wind, drought, fog, just missed fire.  It is a time when you can stop and just experience the details of your surroundings and the people around you in what ever way you want.  It feels like a complete break from life as you know it...you have room to be who ever you are - and play.

It is a place and time in which you can let your defenses down and absorb: the dust of the creek bed, the crackle of the fire, ground bees, waste deep mud holes, and the continuous stream of music - as old band mates play together - this time, often, accompanied by their children. You carry on singing and laughing and being together until exhaustion or grey meat take you down, and then you do it all again. 

Robbie is responsible for this.  It is silly, it is magic and it is generous. What a great way to get to know new people - to be sitting in the dirt next to them hearing them play...the guitar, the ukulele, the keyboard...sharing the heat of a fire when the sun goes down, sharing food.

I wanted to introduce Robbie in this context because all of this is behind our shared vision for these project series that we're pulling together.

We believe in creating community by being in our bodies together, sharing things that I've described above, and more, unplugging and reconnecting to the world around us with all of our senses firing. 

We believe that art and music are both practices that facilitate this kind of connectivity and growth. They hone our senses, grow our attention and ultimately give us better tools with which decode the world around us and communicate with our fellow human beings.

Can you tell me what is more important or life affirming than that?