EarthDance: From Hippies to Hybrids

Part Two of a Four Part Series

After my first night at the Earthdance festival, I awoke to a really soft morning. The hammock allowed for a blissful awakening and the wet grass and mud felt quite nice under my bare feet, which continued ant bites had transformed in both texture and size so it looked like I was walking around on mud caked armadillos.

After a brief meditation in a chair in the waterlogged Artists’ Tent, I went to survey the damage to the Labyrinth of the Unbroken Path. Fortunately, my art is amenable to weathering as the washed out colors in the decoupage seem to add the wisdom of wear to the messages, and any pieces that fall off can be filled in again with Sharpies or paints. Once I was once again pleased with the display, I went back to the Artists’ Tent and became the first person at the festival to get my face painted.

Hunter Slade says he paints people’s auras. When he finished adding an assortment of color, he said, “I kind of want to add black, but I don’t see any black in you.” I took that as a compliment and set out to showcase Hunter’s latest work of art.

I wasn’t a few steps out of the tent when someone asked if I could help get a stuck golf cart out of the mud. The spinning wheel was getting no traction so I grabbed a piece of plywood from the effigy, and put it under the wheel with the help of some of the beefier festival goers. With a little push, it made it out only to get stuck again ten yards away. With another good push, I was able to get it loose and a fresh spattering of mud along my right side. I decided not to bother washing it off. With my painted face, bare feet, bare chest, ripped denim shorts, and earthen badge of courage, someone said I was the ultimate festival baby. I took that as a compliment too.

Because the Artists’ Tent seemed to have been erected in a swamp, I helped Hunter move his stuff to higher ground, and returned to the hammock for an afternoon swing. My camp was in Mr. Bean’s Wonderland, which boasted a full day of different DJs. I’ve never been a huge fan of a lot of the music coming through the speakers, and I’m pretty sure that there were certain vortexes between the stages that triggered neuroleptic fits in passersby, but in general, I found it oddly relaxing, in a pulsing, knocking, grinding sort of way. At least they mixed in some songs I knew to make the arrangements more interesting.

The festival goers were a unique mix of burners and ravers, hippies and house kids. My photographer friend Mikki G said that the appropriate term is ¨hybrid.¨ The result is interesting to say the least.

After moving the artists and equipping them with individual tents, an afternoon storm swept in and shook up the establishment. Though no rain accompanied it, wind flurries lifted tents, mangling the ones that weren’t grabbed quickly enough. Fearing the worst, the vendors put away their wares and did their best to make the most of the situation.

The wind subsided as the sun set into a milky horizon and the darkness was ignited with flashing lights, glow sticks and spinning fire. The three different stages each offered their own signature styles as various DJ’s took their turn spinning beats to keep the festival goers in a constant state of groove.

At first I found it almost disconcerting, the odd dichotomy between the pasturesque landscape and the driving beats of dub step and electronica. A few people that I talked to also felt that the melange was a bit… inorganic. Perhaps I’m a bit too old to really get this generation, but when I consider the festivities I would include while building toward a prayer for world peace, I wouldn’t have an afternoon of electronica. But maybe I’m a bit old school.

Yet as the night wore on and I got closer to the fray, my friend Lyndsay clued me in to how she felt peaceful in letting her body go into the driving beats and grinding rhythms. I approached the stage to watch the performers embracing flames, spinning fire, spitting fire, and swallowing fire, letting the music take me into a greater appreciation for the realization that everyone takes their own path to peace. That is, after all, what I call the Unbroken Path.

As fire dancers continued to spin throughout the area, hula hoopers took to the stage, bringing this childhood toy from recent workout craze to bona fide art form. I’ve seem some pretty incredible hoopers lately, including Hunter’s girlfriend Audrey, and watching that kind of performance with that kind of dance made me appreciate the event a bit more. As hip hop breakdancers took the stage later on, I began to think about what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote about that zone of flow and the nature of enjoyment, and I understood this vantage point on the path to peace a bit better.

To be continued…

EarthDance: From Hippies to Hybrids is a post from: Modern Hippie Mag

Modern Hippie Mag is an online resource dedicated to promoting hip, healthy conscious living and environmental sustainability. Featuring engaging articles, podcast interviews and video features, Modern Hippie Mag is “Where it’s hip to BE!”