by Gwagwagwe
You see it's all connected, everything is part of the other, fractal in its composition and structure. The patterns of energy and life created by the gods in some sort of game theory pattern. So let's connect the dots.
Civilization encompasses everything in our surroundings. I'll lift the lid and lets look at the machinery. Country is basically a euphemism. Nine corporations control the majority of world media, three corporations control the majority of world's food production, and one corporation (the US military-industrial complex) controls the dissemination of the majority of technology based social and environmental programs. In our "free" country, 86% of the counties in the US have no abortion providers and at the current rate of incarceration 100% of the people in the US will be in prison or working for a prison by 2031. The list of civilization's crimes against the basic search for individual happiness is endless. No one is untouched; no one is without the ability to choose a prison ward.
So your choice is prison ward on the sinking boat, and this means ANY attempt to scoop out the water, or over the wall you go.
So what's on the other side of that wall. Well, the fractal of course. Similarities everywhere, yet infinitely connected in all aspects. Perception is one of those similarities. Every glob of matter perceives the other; the perception of the mountain stream to the wind is no less valid than the perception of our skin to that same wind. And than wind connects both perceptions. Energy is another. Each glob of matter converts all it's energy into the other. The boulder converting it's potential energy into the avalanche is no less valid as the our mouths converting the potential energy of the plant into dance steps. The amount of energy provided by our sun and the energy lost to chaos connects both conversions. So these similarities and this connectedness drives what we call life, or the amount of energy the patterns of chaos allow us to use as we wish.
Well as an individual human, being innately social (although not necessarily friendly), I need other humans to deepen my perception through storytelling, to quiet my fears of uselessness, to sing a chorus in the pink of the sunrise. We need food, air, water, and some way to lesson the pains of aging vessels.
That's all; that's all we need in order to find the fulfillment of our continuum. Well this is the beginning of a search for the lifestyle best suited for these needs, the beginning of the vision quest of the bison band of the scavenger crow tribe.
As the summer sun grows weary, the collection of our winter needs begin. As we sing and tell stories of the summer's adventures in the sweat lodge given to us by the blackberry, deer fern, cedar, and grass people, we begin the prayers for good harvest and safe refuge in the winter.
Bison one tells the adventures to the place of many pages in search for more knowledge of the past. A summer spent in word, and the answer to our prayers for food and medicine (Ethnobotany of the western US).
Bison two tells of his adventure into the land of many greetings. Here the search for others, others to share stories and spend a lifetime caring for, is like tracking the snake through the trees. Sometimes you get a glimpse, but soon the leaves hide his speckled skin. The Bison band has decided to abandon its place in search for these others. Although the monthly Ishmael meetings have been exciting, only one other has joined the bison band, and not on a permanent basis.
The bison band had spent its first summer in the middle of what some would call a suburban nightmare. But since the bison band answers to no one but the community of life around them, they see little of this sick, congested landscape. The bison give thanks to the apple, pear, and cherry trees for sharing their life with us. The blackberry, huckleberry, yellow and black raspberry, salmon berry, elderberry are all given thanks for their sweet winter snack loaves to come. The plantain, dock, wild lettuce, clover, dandelion, sheep sorrel, cattail, and mullein are given thanks for we are one in mind and body. And all this food in ten suburban blocks.
All the bison band sings a song for this place, because according to these humans who proclaim some abstract ownership, all will be under concrete before the summer sun shows it's face around here again.
At the next half-moon, the bison band will be visiting the mountain gods new to this continent (southern Olympic Mountains). These gods have provided food and shelter to tribesman for thousands of years, and with a little effort we shall meet and become one with these gods. As the cold winds approach, we shall follow the swallows south to where the giant tree gods of redwood and sequoia will provide our winter refuge.
The tribe is in need of others, especially anyone interested in a lifelong community support team. We have the gods of food and medicine trapped on paper, and we need other who have met them for real (we have their names and uses, but many we cannot recognize). Singers, dancers and storytellers are needed to make our prayer circles rich with color and intrigue. All applications accepted, lifelong commitment might be required.