Cooper's Gala
Cooper's Gala Memorial Day, 5-Course Indian Meal....Plus
Date: 5/31/2005 11:01:37 AM ( 19 y ) ... viewed 1870 times I had the joyful experience of eating and playing with Steve and Val Cooper yesterday.
He is my current 'teacher' in Path of the Buddha-What he is actually teaching me is "How to embody transformation" through art, dance, story, myth, meditation, ~let us not forget~ mind, body, soul participation....Much as Waldorf "teaches" children through projects that are carefully thought out for age appropriateness; the concepts of math, English, physics, etc...so the concepts are brought down from the head into the body-for a grounding of sorts...
Yes, Embodiment~ this is the message of the month, and it may be the message of the year, or the message of a lifetime. I intend to incorporate this whole body training concept in my own training...as soon as I gain clarity on what venue and audience I will play with.
Back to last night- Steve has 3/4 acre planted in biodynamic (Shuggell) gardens, his zucchini is fresh, sweet, tender, sensuous-he made a raw zucchini salad that was out of this world...his secret-1) the produce and 2) the dressing; peanut oil or sesame oil, sweet hot red chili sauce, rice wine vinegar, and whatever fresh herbs are in the garden-Masterfully done.
The rest of the fare consisted of: eggplant curry, hot~the way I like it, basmati rice with red peppers, tandoori chicken, a dark colored eggplant dish with red onions-tart vinegary tasting, lentils with finely chopped veges, pita bread, red pepper hummus, candied ginger, dried figs and dates. Yipee, the whole dinner was beautiful, what a wonderful offering to your friends and family....Thanks Steve and Val!
Steve is famous for 'wild scarf dancing' yes, it is part and parcel of the physical embodiment of transformation-this freeing up of the body, mind, and the spirit ...in ritual dance..."Where the Wildthings are"....in Steve's recording studio-dancing to disco with scarves...wildly playing and scarving each other....What Fun....Jo, a really funny, quiet scientist (voice like PeeWee Herman) began to wildly hip hump (forget hip hop, baby) all the women dancers, which is humorous because~how shall say it~ we are not his sex of choice...hm? The point ~we cut loose and act out our fantasies~in a safe fun way-it seems our group all have loving wide boundaries.... With Steve you are 100% free to be, unconditionally loved and a stand for fun! And there is something to add here, I have a good size streak of self consciousness with some types of physicality-the loving atmosphere creates the supportive safe envirnoment to play-all out, and this is what I love best. I love you, Steve!
We played crocket and even though I hadn't played since childhood I won-playing low tech-just going for the wickets not bumping everybodies balls around (Pardon me?) I played a non technical game UNTIL that is I became POISON- then I became the "shadow" game player and knocked everyone off in two turns-I took a victory lap around the crocket course....with mallet high over head...what fun it is to play! To play with joy and not care who wins (easy to say when you are the winner, eh?)My point is, it is spiritual to interact with people you love and be in their divine presence while you knock their balls to Kingdom Come--heheheh...
OK, OK, I'm off to yoga and my spiritual partners there. On the whole, they tend to be more serious than my other friends.. I do my best to loosen them up with well chosen tidbits of comment and wacky observations~but yoga can be serious stuff, eh?
I am happy to be alive...I have the dearest of all in my life! How thankful IAM.
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