“Their stories are now our stories…”

“Their stories are now our stories…”  Steve Skafte 

Shifting from my dream state to an in-between state of consciousness, Terri Luanna and her mother, Jeanne, beckoned to me. 

Remember. Muse. Memorialize.

It’s Memorial Day. An American holiday honoring the men and women who died while serving their country. It’s also a day to remember our departed loved ones. My mother always visited the cemetery on this day, choosing just the right arrangement for my father’s grave in Medford, and later for her parents and daughter in Provincetown.

I’m sure many of you are doing the same. Visiting. Tending. Tilling. Mourning. Honoring.

No wonder Jeanne and Terri “showed up” today. 

But they didn’t just appear in my dreams. I received an email from Jeanne’s husband, Spider, entitled, “You won’t believe this. I didn’t.”

In it? A link to Human Nature – Hippie Houses of North Mountain, Nova Scotia, sent by Spider and Jeanne’s dear friend, Alex Morton.

Spider wrote, “I am mentioned by name in the opening seconds, and more than the first half of the video focuses on the two dwellings on Nova Scotia’s North Mountain where I met and courted and married Jeanne… We met in the TA, and first made love in the Five Sided House. I do not know the filmmaker, Steve Skafte, or the composer, Caleb Miles, but both are terrific.  I am seriously impressed. 

I hope to meet both its creator and accompanist one day.  That video was, for me, a very thrilling and moving experience.  I have not seen either of those houses for so long, the last time I was there, Jeanne and Terri were both with me.”

Spellbound, I watched and listened as Steve’s hypnotic prose and Caleb’s otherworldy orchestrations transported me back almost 50 years.

I was 16.

Desperate to escape my tumultuous adolescence and hometown smallness, I set off to visit my spiritual anchor, Jeanne. Living in Nova Scotia by the Bay of Fundy, she and a group of fellow idealist hippies had founded a commune fashioned after The Farm, an inspirational Tennessee commune led by Stephen Gaskin and grounded in the spiritual teachings of Zen teacher, Suzuki Roshi.

Boarding a bus for Boston, a backpack my only luggage, I transferred in Boston to Bar Harbor, Maine, then boarded a ferry bound for Nova Scotia. Scanning the crowd at the dock in Yarmouth, Jeanne’s India import skirt sparkled in the sunlight, her long brown hair held in place by a single strand of rawhide tied around her forehead.

Running into her arms, we soon set off for the busy street where Jeanne proceeded to stick out her thumb. Assuring me we were totally safe, I quelled my inner voice that was shouting, Mom will kill you when suddenly, a family traveling the 100 or so miles to Hampton, picked us up. Journeying the final 20 miles up the North mountain to Crow’s Hollow in a pickup truck with a brother and sister team named Squeaky and Sophie, we eventually made our way down a serene wooded path, which opened to a clearing where I beheld an extraordinary, five-sided structure. Punctuated with diamond and hexagon-shaped windows, rounded door, and a looming turret, I made my way into the space I would call home.

That week profoundly changed my life.

Soaking up the commune’s love of life and nature, political musings, unconditional love, and pervasive sense of hope, I bathed in their waterfall, reveling in the simplicity of no electricity or running water. Bonding with my revolutionary sister, I was deeply grateful that she always welcomed me with an open heart, inspiring me to dig deep in my ever-evolving search for self.

Fifty years later her story continues to inform and inspire mine.

“Their stories are now our stories…”

I hope you will consider joining Jeanne, Terri, Miss M, and I next Saturday, May 30th, as we lean into our legacies, enfolding their stories into ours, on Jeanne’s 10th deathiversary. We are thrilled to announce that Graceful Woman Warrior will be hosting an Author Talk/Q&A as part of Reimagine: Life, Loss, & Love, a Worldwide Virtual festival hosted by Reimagine during COVID-19.

Reimagine End of Life is a nonprofit that organizes in-person and online festivals exploring big questions about life and death through creativity and conversation. Artists, storytellers, healthcare professionals, faith and community leaders, and innovators from around the world are uniting to create a unique virtual festival in response to COVID-19, coming together to explore life, love, and loss.

I could not think of a better organization for two social workers, a lay ordained zen Buddhist monk/transcendent artist, and an eleven-year-old to partner with as we explore life, death, and living beyond. You can register here.

So bring your stories. Bring your memories.

And join us as we remember, muse, and memorialize.

Hope to see you there❤️

With love,

Auntie L