Affirmed and Disappointed

My beloved Guinea Pigs played a gig yesterday at Billings Forge Farmers' Market. It's a lovely, small urban market, on Broad Street in downtown Hartford. There were a half dozen or so local farms, some products and crafts, and a handful of food trucks (including my fave, G-Monkey, from which I procured a hearty serving of cold peanut soba noodles, yum!)

We've played this particular market the past few years and it's always a fave for us, with friends and fans stopping by, and folks from the local arts and business community stopping in for lunch or their dose of fresh produce. The market itself serves the local community by accepting SNAP / WIC benefits for fresh local food, and doubling their value for produce purchased at the market (which admittedly does sell for a premium compared to the local mega-supermarket, not that there are many of those in Hartford)

I was affirmed a bit yesterday - a young woman who described herself as a "yoga newbie" recognized me from the studio, and perhaps seeing a free-spirit, artistic side of me that I rarely admit or see in myself, commented that "I need to get more creative in my life". Whatever stories I happen to be telling myself about who I am and how I live my life, I rarely would call myself creative or artistic. Yet this young woman, with her simple "I wish I were more like you" musing, held a mirror up to my own life, especially the choices of the past decade or so. It was very sweet and affirming.

And I was disappointed yesterday. I serve and belong to a "community" through my yoga practice, yet I can count on one hand the times a friend from that world has taken the time to support me, to come see my band play. Occasionally people stumble across me, but only 1-2 times has someone come specifically to see us. I know we're mostly east of the river, so when we do come to this part of town, I guess it sparks a little hope that "this time I might see a familiar face" of the 100s on my Facebook friends list. I'd guess that fewer than 2% of the locals on my 480+ Facebook friends list have ever come to hear me play despite my sharing every single gig since 2010.

I need to look at that a little. Part of it is certainly my own compartmentalizing my life / lives - with separate communities for music, for yoga, for GLBT, for ballooning, with a handful of people, events, and venues that overlap. Part of that is my own strong nature and ability to stand on my own two feet without a lot of support - the folks with needs and crisis and struggle seem to attract and receive both attention and love. And part of that is the complexity of boundaries and relationships in a world where I am teacher, student, client, friend, and employee, and pull back a bit to keep from getting enmeshed in drama.

But over and over, that part of my world continues to break my heart. 

Meandering

For a weekend of not much planned, I've been pretty busy.

Friday night, a pretty strong yoga practice with Tobey, subbing for Nykki. Tobey is a little more vigorous than Nykki (Baptiste trained and all) so it was a solid class - always hard to step in for a popular teacher. She's sort of similar in her energy and style of practice as Marcia (one of the studio teachers I practice with a bunch) so I was right at home.

Saturday, I trekked over to the Sustainable Energy Fest in Coventry, RI. I planned to stay all day, but got kind of wiped out - foolishly / romantically choosing to bike from the parking area to the fest (hills involved) and so as the day wore on, I got tired and anticipating the ride back (wanting to go in daylight and while I was fresh), I packed up early.



Ran into the Folk Czarina there, as well as Bob from Falcon Ridge. Highlights included:

* Keynote with Jim Merkel, author of Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on a Finite Earth - very inspiring and wonderful background on not taking up too much space / resources / etc. Need to add that book to my summer reading list.

* Laughter Yoga with Chris Belanger - Great intro to this unconventional yoga practice, I certainly enjoyed it. Not exactly something I would do daily, but lots of fun and invigorating (physically and spiritually)


* Lunch at Clover Food Truck - Delicious Chickpea Frittata and Watercress / Parsnip Salad. The picture is from their website - yesterday it was labeled "Clover 6/6" and silly me thought it was some cool name (as opposed to, say, June 6th)

* Late afternoon snack (avoiding the always tempting festival ice cream and kettle corn) was a delicious beet salad (sweet and delic!) and quinoa salad. (nourishing, with cranberries)

* A workshop with Rebekah Greenwald, Exec Director of Riverzedge Arts Prioject in Northern RI, on personal approaches to sustainability. Pretty much an intro to the concepts of sustainability, eco footprint, etc. but also with a bit of a practical side in terms of not being able to do everything, and perhaps working to get the most bang for your buck by committing to high eco footprint improvements (often around automobile use and eating locally). Fresh and interesting.

Then I browsed the vendors, listened to music, but left around 4 before things got really cranked up, musically.

After I got home, Zippy and I went shopping, and en route home, saw our friends Lisa and Arran, heading to Angellino's for a post-pride nosh. So we stopped and joined them, getting a teeny bit of pride energy.