Wellspring Festival Weekend
My experience at Wellspring:
Some lovely scenery on the drive up Thursday morning. I don’t get to see the mountains much anymore, though I hope to change that. We hit quite a bit of construction though (read as, about every 20 damn miles), so Sati’s car wasn’t too happy with being stopped mid climb up a mountain. I barely slept the night before due to too much excitement so I slept a good chunk of the way up.
Arrived about 12:30-1pm, set up what we called the “CedarLight Fairie Mound” (pictures to follow), and enjoyed the rest of the day.
An opening ceremony thursday night. A beautiful ritual space (also pictures to follow), and very nicely done. I like how much music they incorporated into the rituals and talked with Caryn later about attempting to do the same with CedarLights rituals.
Friday I don’t know if I remember much of. A lot of workshops/meetings that day, I didn’t attend because they just weren’t something I was interested in. Was given a brief tour around the 200 acre Brushwood farm, as much as KaeLea’s car would take us though. Wow would I love to take my bronco next year.
A lot of trips to the hottub over the weekend, though I don’t get into the nudity thing, so no hottub for me.
Saturday, more workshops/meetings. They had some more Warriors Games, including the Circle challenge, which I took lots of pictures of. Later in the day they had “High Tea” which was a women’s only tea party basically. It was interesting, and I’m glad I went, I just don’t get into the whole women’s spirituality thing very often. The lavender cookies were awesome, and the long island tea hit the spot.
Saturday night was Bardic night. I was freeeezing, but had a great time. Some wonderfully talented people performed. I was actually third to perform, following Ian (owner of Brushwood I think?) and his wife(?), and then Isaac Bonewits, who founded ADF.
Let me tell you about nervousness. Sati had to cut me off from the mead because I was so nervous. But I got up and performed anyway. My fingers were frozen so my guitar probably sounded like crap, but I kept going. I didn’t really see much of the audience during the performance, but Sati said they were all waving their hands and singing along. When I was finished, they all cheered, and some people came up to me asking for my e-mail address so I could send them my music.
I played Janis Joplin’s “Bobby McGee” and a Brigid song that Sati and I wrote to the tune of Collective Soul’s “Shine.” A guy was taping the entire night, so I’m hoping I can get a copy of that.
Aftewards, a woman named Willow came up to me. I’ve met her before at some CLG events, and remember being told that she channels Brigid. She was really touched by the Brigid song, to the point of tears actually. And she told me that even though Brigid visits her, that she lives in me. It was something special for her to say that to me, and really made my night.
I’m very happy that I did it, and look forward to doing it again next year, hopefully with more songs 
Sunday I just felt lazy and didn’t do much of anything. I did venture down to the ritual space to take some pictures in the daylight. The closing ritual Sunday night was awesome. Especially when we were all walking up to welcome Mananan, I just felt completely empowered.
At some point in the day, a man came up to me and gave me a jar of red raspberry jam as a gift for playing music saturday night. It really made me happy, my first paying gig ;). But seriously, it really made me feel like my music DID something for someone. The reactions I got were just amazing.
After the ritual Caryn convinced me to come with her to StoneCreed’s camp and sit and talk with them, eating food and drinking. So I did. It eventually turned into an impromptu bardic circle, which I was able to capture 3 videos of (I only posted 2 though). The one labeled “Sway” which didn’t really have any image to it, since it was dark, still captures my thoughts on the entire weekend. When we were all singing that song, I remember Skip telling us that this was the best time at Wellspring he had ever had, because of the closeness and togetherness we were experiencing. And I felt a great sadness when we sang that song together because I knew that this was pretty much the end. I’m glad I at least got the sound if not the images of Sunday night.
Monday morning we ate a quick breakfast and packed up all of our camping supplies in the rain. Hail Wellspring. It was a loooong ride home. We left at 11:30am and didn’t arrive to Sati’s house until 8pm.
My high points of the long weekend were definitely meeting some awesome people for the first time. Rod, Michael (even though you did abuse your self appointed harem ;)), Adam, and several other people whose names escape me.
I was introduced to Isaac Bonewits, which isn’t a big deal for some, but meeting him for the first time for me was something special.
Meeting all of the other ADF druids I hear so much about, like Skip and Ian.
Spending quality time with some of my CedarLight friends and not ever getting that feeling when you spend too much time with certain people, and you want to kill them?
Performing for ADF for the first time and the reactions aftewards.
Willow telling me that even though Brigid visits her, she lives in me.
Being given a gift of Red Raspberry jam for providing music.
Sitting around the campfire on Sunday night and loving every minute of it.
If you’re interested in some of the pictures and videos of the weekend:
Wellspring 2004 Pictures:
http://www.cedarlightgrove.org/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=24
Wellspring 2004 Warrior Circle Pictures:
http://www.cedarlightgrove.org/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=25
Wellspring 2004 Videos (rather large)
http://www.cedarlightgrove.org/media/wellspring2004/
Entry viewed times. Posted in Religion and Spirituality
2 Responses to “Wellspring Festival Weekend”
June 3rd, 2004 at 6:41 am
It sounds like you had an awesome time.
While I’m glad you did, I’m a little green. 
January 16th, 2006 at 7:56 pm
[…] I was looking through various videos I’ve taken at ADF events and festivals, as well as Grove rituals and such. More specifically the time I spent at Wellspring 2004. Even days later I missed being there. I guess now has more significance than before, because at the time, Sati and I were like best friends. And now we are complete strangers. Though I do send her emails wishing her well on holidays, even if she never replies. […]