I am peeling off my masks and going Naked this Halloween.
Wooo hoooooohooooooo! it's scary out here, in the dark without a mask!

Carla

Here is a description of my dream vacation, and you can come with me!
There are close encounters with whales, living in nature, and lots of food and friends. Read on!

You are invited to join me and Colin Garland of Raven Adventures on a 10 day Baja adventure in Feb/March, 2010.
We will spend 10 days on the earth, sea, and sky of Baja, Mexico, hiking, kayaking, and camping with the whales, dolphins, sea lions, birds, plants and stones of Baja Sur. We will create ceremony together at some power sites, and in our time on land we will hike among ruins and petroglyphs of the people who lived in the area centuries ago.

Please visit Raven Adventures website for more general information'
http://www.ravenadventures.com/ra/baja/baja.html

The time frame of our trip is February 24 to March 5, 2010.
The price, which includes all equipment, food, and air fare from the lower 48 states is
$1595.

To reserve your space, mail a deposit of $600 to Colin by October 15, 2009.
The balance of $995 is due by December 15th.

This deposit is non refundable, as it will be used to purchase your airfare and tickets may not be transfered to others.

These dates insure the best prices. After November 1st, the airfares go up, and the cost of the trip will increase.
Please email me (Carla) your intention to come on the trip, and let me know when you have sent your deposit. We only have space for 8 people.

When you send Colin your deposit please include this information necessary for booking your flight.
Departure city.

If you do not have a passport, you have plenty of time to get one. Your local post office can tell you the nearest passport application office.

There is more information forth coming, including confirming with Colin the address to mail the check.
Raven Adventures does not take credit cards.
This is an amazing trip. I spent 3 weeks in Baja last year painting whales, and visiting blue, humback, and gray whales. I did not get to go on the kayak adventure, which will allow me a more complete experience of the wild and ancient Baja.

I hope you will be able to participate. It's a big deal in these times. but worth it, and this opportunity may not be available at all next year.

My times with the whales last year changed my life, and I want very much to share this amazing experience, including the beautiful people of Mexico. In case you are wondering, Baja is a place in Mexico where you can drink the water and eat the food.

I look forward to hearing from you.

love and Blessings

Diva Carla

I am now choosing to make the choice not write about it.
Turn off the computer.

My friend Cris at Facebook posted this link. I'll embed if I can or just link to the website where you can choose from several Eagle Nest Live Cams in Victoria, British Columbia.
The links didn't work so I took them out...

Here is the link to the website:

Hancock Wildlife Foundation

from Dreaming Bear. Breathe. Open up. Let it in.


This poem say a lot about my galaxies paintings. I am grateful to my Diva Sistar Nejah for sending me this medicine for a sore heart.

The Galaxies I was working on are finished. I made a short video to show them to you.

Tonight I attended the Camden Festival of the Spirit screening of Fierce Light by Velcrow Ripper. He was present for a post film discussion.
With the film, Velcrow wanted to observe and connect with people around the world who are finding a strong spiritual core in their activism for peace, justice and the environment. These seem sterile words, for in most cases their lives, their freedom, their homes, and communities were at stake.  The people faced arrest, persecution, murder in order to organize peaceful actions in the cause of justice.
Watching the scenes of people marching, chanting, sitting, while tear gas, police, and bludgeons closed in, I wondered again: is it enough that I make art about love? That I pray in a sweat lodge? That I touch people? 
I had a question for the film maker but it eluded me. The question cried to be asked, but I couldn't find the words. Finally I borrowed this question: What if we can't save the world?
Velcrow offered a wise and eloquent response. He spoke of the difference between Hope and Optimism, saying he is not optimistic, but he has hope. (Optimists see evidence and conclude things are looking up; hope sees desperation, and takes action anyway.)
As Siona posted in her blog, Paul Hawken's book Blessed Unrest points to a world wide grassroots upwelling of small, local activist groups who are making real change. Velcrow likens this to an immune response to the war and destruction that has brought us to the brink. To poorly summarize his answer to my question: we continue our "soulful" activism without knowing if we will succeed, because we must, and because the rewards we receive now are so great: community, deep spirituality, and positive growth.
Spiritual activism is Light and Life giving.
I have a renewed appreciation for the presence and potential of the people at Gaia.com. I wonder if typing in blogs and posting videos is enough? It certainly does not make compelling cinema. But I think it counts and when we are called to put our Souls on the line for something big, I think we are ready.

I'll let the Kristin's Song and Colin's video of the whales speak for me.


This was filmed at Bay of Loreto National Marine Park in Baja Sur, Mexico. I painted whale murals here this winter. Come with me next winter and meet the whales.

November 1, 2007, I returned to my ancestral home in Gibson County, Tennessee to bury my mother. On the way to the funeral, my son and I drove down Sanders Bluff Road, where I grew up on a cotton and pig farm. The road didn’t look too different from what I remembered.  A few new brick houses dotted the cow pastures and cotton fields. This was still small farm country, until we got to my farm.

Where the broad gravel driveway once gave access to a garage and a tractor shed, was a massive brick and iron gate. Winchester Estates the sign read. The farmhouse and the great barn built by my father, uncles, and grandfather had been bulldozed, and replaced by 30 brick ranch houses, stretching from the strawberry patch to my grandmother’s house on the hill, now owned by strangers. Where once cotton, corn, soybeans and winter wheat had grown in rotation, concrete driveways and above ground pools sprouted. The field was surrounded with a 10 foot high iron fence. What are these people afraid of? And who is Winchester? Only Sanders have lived here for 15 generations.

My family left the farm and moved to East Tennesssee in 1970, driven off by the upside down economics of agribusiness expense and farm policy applied to a small scale farm production. At that time my father could have sold the land to a developer, but he wouldn’t. He took an economic hit and sold it back into the family, where it stayed in farm production until 2004. That was the year he died. When Daddy was buried, the barn still stood. There were no gates or fences.

That land is gone now and shall never be reclaimed.

Now I live on nine acres of rock and woods in Maine. The land was once part of a large dairy farm and orchard--the Mervin Hobbs place. That farm is broken up into smaller orchards, house, and wood lots now, but it is still rural and spacious. I have the old house and spring. The owners before me kept sheep. I grow an organic garden, but I am not a farmer. My dream is to invite a farmer onto the land. As I read about permaculture, I understand how bony land like this can produce food in a way that integrates with nature’s patterns of soil, water, and woodlands.

Meanwhile, I grow my garden because I love it. I was born of the earth on that farm in Tennessee, and I must have my hands in dirt at least four months of the year.

But I count on the farmers of Maine to feed me. I love buying food that has been loved by the people growing and handling it.  I trust food when I know the grower, and I prefer buying directly from the grower when I can. The closer to the earth my diet becomes the better my health. I am blessed to live in a state that supports organic farming and hand grown food as much as it does. 

I am heartened to see so many young families selling their farm produce at the farmers markets. I am happy to spend my food money with these young farmers who are keeping land in cultivation and open space, while keeping farm skills flourishing. Across the nation, the diversified family farm is the vortex of food security, environmental and physical health, and the creative, sustainable economy.

On my drive to Tennessee to visit Mother in October 2007, I stopped at Sweet Providence Farm Market and Bakery in Floyd County, Virginia. I bought an organic free range chicken that the Houstons raised on their farm nearby. It had been killed that morning. Next day I roasted it for Mother. I didn’t know at the time, but it was the last meal I ever cooked for her. I am happy that it was likely the best chicken she had eaten since she was a girl on the farm, and she and her sisters caught and killed the chicken for her mama to cook for Sunday dinner.

(note: we did not have chickens on our farm, but that is another story. See “Chicken Snakes!”)

Having children.