first workshop nov 30

"pledging my love" (fawn wood)
"di grine kuzine" (isabel frey)
"sagittarius by moonlight" (the olympians)
"zemer shalosh hatsoovot" (zehava ben)
"calm me down" (ben cocks, adam connor)
"bei mir bist du schoen" (benny goodman)
"loch lomond" (benny goodman)
"it's a good day" (peggy lee)
"back pocket" (vulfpeck)
"panis et circences" (rosemary standley et al)
"you & me" (MEUTE)
"T.I.B.W.F." (the budos band)
"sunflower river blues" (john fahey)
"frysian" (phil cook)
"hasta la raíz" (natalia lafourcade)
"remember me" (fawn wood et al)
"entre los dos" (y la bamba)

medicine tongue:
workshop day 1 (nov. 30) outline

2-2:10 - honor song from chris sockalexis
during song:

people write in the chat where they are coming from

follow prompt on your own: what brought you, what question(s) you want to pursue, what synapses you would like to form

2:10-2:15 - intro from rabbi matt green, cory, tyler, lilah: today's workshop will focus on personal ritual; it will not be recorded

2:15-2:18 - tisha b’av-esque minute of mourning, turn off screens

tisha b’av: commemorates destruction of temple. celebration? origin of diaspora? supposed to be day of collective mourning that over time became a date to which jews have retrojected all sufferings (9th day of av, first and second temples destroyed on that exact date as remembered by jewish tradition..and all these other horrible things that happened are on that date, gives us opportunity on calendar to ritualize our suffering--pogroms, etc, set aside for pain and trauma--wear dirty clothes, sit on the ground in the dark and physicalize pain)

2:18-2:23 - acknowledgements

haudenosaunee thanksgiving address (click pdf icon)

2:23-2:25 - assigning kvetch buddies

2:25-2:35 - associative word vomit from facilitators
schematics of a well, storytelling, memory
plant metaphors / notes on plantain - White Man’s Footprint: The Cure Grows Close to the Wound

"Maybe the task assigned to Second Man is to unlearn the model of kudzu and follow the teachings of White Man’s Footstep, to strive to become naturalized to place, to throw off the mind-set of the immigrant. Being naturalized to place means to live as if this is the land that feeds you, as if these are are streams from which you drink, that build your body and fill your spirit. To become naturalized is to know that your ancestors lie in this ground. Here you will give your gifts and meet your responsibilities. To become naturalized is to live as if your children’s future matters, to take care of the land as if our lives and the lives of all our relatives depend on it. Because they do."

2:35-2:40 - sensory score led by tyler

noticing where the source of light is coming from, where you are in relationship to where the moon set last night, directions, to the most sacred place in your life. Placing your hands on your computer or in the air and sense into the materials that are connecting us in this moment. Think about where they may have come from in the earth. Invitation to close eyes and bring attention to your feet. Try softening them into the floor, into the earth. Just at the soles of the feet, notice if there is tension, release, can you soften all the way or not? Imagine yourself on the nearest shoreline. Imagine the feeling of both your feet on the shore, no part of your weight or footsteps are elsewhere.

2:40-3 - open up your in-workshop score envelope, do the score:

During Workshop Score
instructions to be followed during the workshop, 11/27

Draw a [floor plan / video-game-style representation / blueprint / map] of the ritual space that you are in now.

Or,

Draw a [floor plan / video-game-style representation / blueprint / map] of a ritual space from your childhood.

Include potential and actual movements; include things that can’t be seen.

How can you incorporate an altar space or a grounding movement, etc. into what you have drawn? How have you done so already?

3:15-3:30 - share drawings in breakout rooms; invitation to see what your collective ritual space looks like, too

3:30-3:35 - facilitator word vomit framing moment for altar making

altar as a collage of fragments
belonging to each other vs each of us consisting of individual accumulations of belongings
words like altar and bundle, longhouse vs tipi, diorama;
proud and open study vs hidden/fugitive study
things you keep for some reason: i save it because it’s evidence of something, i let go of it when I’ve internalized it—like tashlich
do you ever keep something to pass on to somebody else? vs letting go of something to make space for futurity
having a burn/you also have to clean and claim yourself first
medicine bag, remembering, protection, offering
maybe you don’t know what an altar is and you allow yourself to be taught by it
putting forth a gesture towards a future

3:35-3:50 - start creating the beginning of your altar (you'll work on it in between sessions); making it a living collage; music plays as we do this, lilah reads some notes on placemaking, rabbi moment about bundles

3:50-3:53 - on ley lines

ley lines are lines that crisscross around the globe, like latitudinal and longitudinal lines, that are dotted with monuments and natural landforms, and carry along with them rivers of supernatural energy; we’re creating a constellation of ley lines, look at moon paths, think of the ley lines between us all

3:53-4 - closing ritual: spotlight everyone's screen for 10 seconds, to music

medicine tongue:
materials mailed before the workshop

The growing tip is the present moment — your lived experience of now — which gnaws into the future as it advances. The history of your life is the rest of the hypha, the blue lines that you’ve left in a tangled trail behind you. A mycelial network is a map of a fungus’s recent history and is a helpful reminder that all life-forms are in fact processes not things . The “you” of five years ago was made from different stuff than the “you” of today. (Entangled Life, Merlin Sheldrake)