Celebrating

This cake was the one my niece Cindy made for her daughter's first birthday.

Yippee! I'm back! Nathan the Magnificent fixed my computer! All sorts of wonderful things that weren't showing up before are now visible and the screen no longer dissolves into mush every 20 minutes or so. There is much joy here in Hancock.

Not only am I restored to my version of normalcy, but today is my one year anniversary. Yup! I've been posting almost every day (until recently) for a full year. Yeee ha! I had made a failed effort in 2006 and given up and then my niece Cindy's friend Linda (snoopmurph) nudged me gently to try again. And I did. I titled my blog's rebirth Laying Another Egg. I'm so grateful that I have stuck with it and met so many wonderful people along the way. I enjoy the photo memes (though I get sort of overwhelmed by them sometimes) and am so grateful for the faithful crowd that plays wordzzles every week. This evening I'll post the 50th wordzzle post... oops... 49... I'm so confused. But still, 49 isn't bad!

A number of people asked about the Peruvian Whistling Vessels I mentioned in my last post. So here's a little information about them and how I ended up in posession of a set of my own.

The vessels were rediscovered by a man named Daniel Stat, a businessman who purchased it at an estate auction and one day on impulse blew into it. His experience blowing into that one vessel changed his life and sent him on a quest to discover more about the vessels and their history and how and why they were made and used. One thing he discovered was that they were buried with their owners, not passed down from generation to generation and that they were kept secret from the Conquistadors. Eventually Mr. Stat studied and explored and figured out how to recreate them and over time passed that knowledge on to a man named Don Wright, who is the person who made my vessels. Each vessel contains some part of the clay from all the vessels that went before it. They are cast in molds and hand burnished by Mr. Wright. Here's a link to some photos of that process. But how did I wind up with a set of these strange and rare creations?

After my sister's murder and more so following the death of both my parents and the injury to my legs two years later, I pretty much imploded emotionally. I went on something of a healing quest. I was already deeply in love with reiki. At a workshop I attended, I was introduced to a Whistling Vessel experience. I fell in love with the look of the vessels first. And the experience of a "blow" was quite amazing. The originals which I saw were all terra cotta colored, though the design is the same as mine. The vessels are a group experience. They come in sets of eight. They are NOT musical. Individually, they sound like tea kettles whistling. Blown in unison, they create a strange and inexplicable (at least by me) harmonic which induces a state of what is called "synesthesia." When they blow in unison, it often (for me) sounds like the wind blowing in my ears. It can be a very intense experience. Some people have been taken to past lives, some have "heard color" or "see sound." Before I left the city, I managed to share the experience 4 or 5 times with groups of friends and others, but while I was on the road and during all my moves, I have not been able to share them yet. My friends and I have talked about it, but so far haven't been able to act on the idea. But writing about it, makes me want to push forward with the idea. I've already talked about setting a date in the Spring where some folks from New York and my friends in Oneonta might be able to come and share the experience. We'll see, I guess. I'd say to everyone out there, that if you ever get a chance to experience this, go for it.

Guess that's enough for now. Here's hoping I last another year.