[Minutes] [Day 1] [Day 2] [Day 3] [Day 4]

Summary:

8 AM - Sitting in the 'ballroom'
8:40 AM - Breakfast (granola, yogurt, etc). Aims discussed. Martin announces he will be at the Swedenborg gig.
9 ish AM - Rehearsing in the ballroom. Seeing where we are at. Jill, the AT instructor arrives. David is feeling ill and takes a nap.
10ish AM - We sign up for 15 minute sessions with Jill, and focus on personal practice otherwise.

1 PM - Lunch. Lentil soup, bread and salad. Kitchen and housework orientation.

Afternoon - More personal practice. Victor checks in with everyone. MB and Meli get going on dinner.
4 ish PM - Ben and Cyn arrive. Tea. Esoteric topics, "the water producing stone." Ben's injured finger.
5:30 ish PM - A guided sitting with Ben.
7 ish PM - More personal practice. Meli and MB work on dinner.

8:30 - Dinner. Veggie stir fry. Salad. Meli's apple pie.
After dinner: work in the circle: Vamps. Rhythmic call and response. The 16 bar exercise. Circulations with metronome. Clapping on our slot. Eye of the Needle to end the evening. Meli Dev and Martin sleep in the basement.

Martin Bradburn

Decided not to go up on Thursday night as the traffic back from my AT session was brutal. This was the right choice.
Left West Greenwich at 6:45 and arrived at Glenn and MaryBeth's just before 8.00. Everyone was arriving.
Sitting at 8.0 and then breakfast of granola. yogurt and bananas. Intro to house and house rules.
Jill our AT instructor arrived and I ddi the first session with MB observing. Jill knows Mara my AT teacher but her style is very diffeent a very good session.
We circled then split up for personal practice, I choose the garden. The backyard is small but cosy and I sit on the brick
patio. The neighbors on the left are building a door/step. Lots of bold squirrels. Work on 2nd & Fifth primaries, crosspicking
and BtA bass.
Lunch is lentil soup, bread, carrots,swiss. More personal practice. Glen's cat is Leo the Zen Master and is always plotting escape. They have another cat Gus who is black and not as sociable. Leo was and integral part of the weekend. David was sick with a sinus infection and left in the morning, after a valiant effort to show up.
I was on tea and put out the chocolate chip cookies I made. Ben and Cindy showed up and we discussed many things including the Gnostic gospels. We had 2 sittings with Ben directing one that ended with a talk about cosmic and earthly evolution and man's part in it. My speaking about fear's and my meeting with RF leads to Ben discussing his saw/finger injury. I was struck by how calm and matter of fact he was discussing this major injury. He is an amazing person. The second sitting presented a new exercise
Melissande and MB were on dinner a veggie stir fry. Some humorous moment concerning the cooked/undercooked-ness of Meli's pie. It was delicious. Circle work, mostly on rhythm. Dev, Meli and I in the basement. Dev and Meli practice flying home. Talk of the house and Level 3. We really bonded, lots of humor. In the middle of the night Meli awakes and say something about
"left foot" Dev awakes and inquires as to the issue, and I say Meli was talking about the "left foot". Strange.

Glenn Hughes

Saturday: Up at 7. Shower. Set some stuff out for breakfast. Took my laundry upstairs. The gang began arriving around 7:30. David wasn't feeling well.

Group sitting in the 'ballroom' aka the middle room downstairs at 8. Dev showed up a few minutes in. Not really following a strict schedule, breakfast was around 8:40. How good to eat some granola with my mates. Some talking, and aims discussed. I broke a glass while cleaning up.

Victor hadn't heard that Martin was going to make the Friday gig, so he needed to recalibrate. We circled up with guitars in the ballroom, and ran the beginnings of a few tunes. Calliope, Larks, a bit of Bicycling, and so on. Then we were sent off to practice on our own.

The AT instructor, Jill, showed up, and we got her situated in the basement. David found a place to nap. I did some work on the modal exercises of late. I had a good but brief session with Jill. I asked her how often during the day she remembers to think about AT, which led to an interesting exchange.

Victor asked me to do some 'mind numbing' right hand work. I kept making it more challenging, which really was just a way to escape boredom. I showed Dev around the kitchen, and got him going on lunch. David headed home, since he was feeling too ill to work. Said goodbye to Jill. She'll be back tomorrow.

Lunch around 1. "Do you like lentil soup? 'Cause that's what we got." An enjoyable meal. I pointed out some things in the kitchen for everyone. MB talked about house cleaning tasks.

More right hand work for me in the afternoon. Between the hours of 3 and 4, I picked 16th as 76 bpm, nonstop, save for a few glitches. MB and Meli were working on pre-prep for dinner. A bit after 4 Ben and Cyn showed up. A rather long tea with them, talking about getting water from stones, faith healing, stonehenge and so on. Then, a sitting. Ben talked about life on earth, the intersection of worlds, and humanity's responsibilities. A little break. Ben showed us the finger he had injured recently using a table saw. MB and Meli put rice on to cook. A guided sitting with Ben.
I played some guitar in the living room, as MB and Meli got dinner ready. Moving Force was in the air, which I took slow. The time with Ben had run long, so dinner was served around 8:30. A delicious veggie stir fry and salad. Meli's Apple pie for dessert. Meli and MB put the dishes in the washer, and Ben and Cyn headed out.

More work in the circle, little vamps, rhythmic call and response, the 16 bar exercise (seated and marching in place, then free associating), circulations with metronome, clapping and saying our slot, etc. Eye of the Needle to end the evening.

Victor and Terry headed out. Meli, Dev and Martin headed down basement, apparently to practice more guitar.

Mary Beth Abel Hughes

I got up at 7 AM, took a shower, and was downstairs in time to clean the cat box, make coffee and such. But, I headed up stairs as people arrived to do some stretching. Stretching before a sitting works for me. I like how my muscles feel after I have stretched them and I feel much more relaxed in that state. Sitting from 8 to 8:30, then breakfast and talking. We did something and then the Alexander teacher came. M was first, and I observed. It was like I thought it was and very gentle. It's amazing what the body will do when it is in a receptive state and the guide is nearly imperceptible touch. Close Embrace tango (Argentine) works this way. Actually, all partner dancing works this way when it is done well.
I was next, learned to pay attention to my neck. Being guided by the AT teacher is like suddenly becoming a marionette -- you become hinged and loose.
I then when to practice and was playing all over the place, until V came in. He asked to hear EofN. I did part of that. He quickly identified that I need personal practice with a metronome. But, how I work with my hands seems good. Dancing seems to help in this respect. I playing the first primary for about 25 minutes, then went back to EofN. I managed to play it 11 times today. 29 more times and I have reached an aim for the weekend. Lunch was good. More practice, then Me and I did kitchen work for dinner. I made a gooey mess making little curry-floured tofu cubes. Tea with good cookies from M. B and C came. Rocks conversation. Later, with the group, B talked about the universe and oddly talk of the universe is the only bit of talk that I have heard of his dad or was it G? Anyway, B seems pretty well versed in science, but I've been so steeped in it, I have adopted the view that although the chances are very slim, the world came together as it did just because. There's been some proof that you can get life-like molecules by mixing the right ingredients under the right conditions (early proof, Stanley Miller). But, there is probably more evidence. B was proposing that there was intervention, but I had trouble with the sequence. It sounded like...until we were grown/evolved enough to be creative on our own, there was intervention. But now that we have creative power, it is up to us to guide our own evolution. It seemed that the right path depends on connecting with our spiritual essence. It wasn't until now that I saw that this is close to a religious belief. There was talk of sharing these ideas with others (as a way to save humanity?). But, it is all good and so much of what G and I have done or are doing seems to parallel these thoughts. But, I'm not sure that I'm quite ready to tilt the balance toward the spirit side yet. Looking for the pocket.
Afterward, it felt like a circus to get the food on the table. M straining rice, me facing a 400 deg oven to retrieve heated tofu cubes. Stirring veggies, while trying to make a dent in a huge pile of dishes. I matter of factly told M that I didn't like to cook. More accurately, I just don't like how I feel afterward...tonight, I just felt so hot and rather disinterested in food and far from relaxed. But, the food was good and people ate. I did too. Me had made lovely, lovely pie. Afterward, another rush through a pile of dishes with M. Small break and then guitar. Mostly fun, but my body didn't feel good. Three of the troops are downstairs, B and C went home, V and T went home. D is sick. Sending wellness thoughts. B has a pretty impresses damaged finger. He cut it with a table saw. Wow!
Shower and then lots of streching to get my body back to a good point and undo tension. Good bed soon and quality time with cats and G.

Dev Ray

after 2.5 hours of sleep, I get up and drive to Glenn's house. sitting. and actually, one of the best sittings i've had in a long long time. focused, relaxed, and no sleepiness.

we talk about the weekend and state our names at breakfast. David is sick and not feeling well. David decides to go home and rest. Things take some time to get rolling. Meeting without guitars to discuss the situation with the Alexander teacher, who then showed up.

Individual practice, with AT work in the basement one on one.

I was on lunch duty. Warming up a frozen soup, bread, cheese, salad.

After doing the dishes i showed Meli the bass line to Flying Home. Ben and Cindy Bennett show up around tea time, at 4pm. Tea. meeting with Ben. lots of interesting subjects.

during the sitting, i had a very hard time.

Dinner - MB's tofu with help from Meli. after dinner, circle with focus on rhythm.

sleeping in the basement, or trying to. lots of fun with Meli and Martin. probably too much fun, but hey, it's the basement.