Good Golly, Miss Molly

You have to help yourself before you can help others. That's something that Austin, a sixteen year old volunteer at another social project in town, told me this week. He's staying here at the Healing House with a group of people also volunteering at the same project. He might just be going into his junior year of high school, but he's already got his goals planned through college. He wants to become a champion wrestler and I've seen him training every morning for hours on end to make sure he stays on track with that.

Anyway, that bit of advice really helped me make sense of a lot of what I've been doing here. I've really enjoyed being in a band with Giancarlo, Daniel, David, and some of the other local musicians here. I haven't really performed with them for the past couple of weeks, but I'll say there was a period of several weeks where we had back to back performances every Friday and Saturday night.

I definitely learned a lot performing with them, from the little things, like how to hold a mic well, to bigger things, like how to have a good stage presence and really take ownership of each song. Even just rehearsing with them taught me a lot. It wasn't always easy. I'll say my Spanish is definitely more than decent, but it was quite a challenge to keep up with what people were saying to each other. Musical jargon definitely doesn't translate so readily. Still, it was so cool to watch them communicate with little to no use of sheet music or any notation at all. These guys could harmonize songs at the drop of a hat. It was really impressive.

Giancarlo and I in the kitchen practicing some songs

Pouring so much of my efforts into my own performance skills sort of caused an inner conflict because I really intended to come here to teach music and help others get better. So, when Austin shared that bit of wisdom with me, I really felt some of my questions were answered. The farther along I get with my own music and the better of a musician I become the better of a music teacher I'll be and the farther I can take my students. That means though that I've got to help myself before I can help others. I do feel like I did indeed. I made a lot of mistakes in performances and there was definitely some miscommunication every now and then about who was going to come in next or what have you. I grew a lot from making those mistakes and being more clear myself about what I wanted to happen.

a Friday performance at the Marriot

Regardless of how perfect our performances were, I think the biggest lesson I learned was about myself and how much I really like to perform for others. At school, I really concentrated on how I was going to teach others, and don't get me wrong, I still love that. But I also just really enjoy singing for other people and being in a band. There's really nothing like just losing yourself in the music and expressing yourself so creatively. Also, I just really enjoy pretending to be Little Richard and I sure like to ball.

5. Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

The Healing House is a really transitory place. People move in and out all the time. Volunteers and residents come and go on their own schedules, according to their own plans. I suppose people come in and out of our lives like that all the time, but it's definitely accelerated and highlighted here. It seems that people move out just as you were beginning to get to know them. Just when you're getting used to things as they are, new people move in and the cycle begins again.

The ebb and flow can really get you. Last month, six people in the course of two weeks moved out. The house got strangely empty and quiet. The people I'd used to seeing around and gotten quite close with were suddenly not around anymore. The multitude of volunteers that we had shrunk to a just a wee little group of us that were supposed to keep things flowing here. After a week or so eerie quiet, perhaps just when it began getting peaceful almost, six people moved in all in the same day. Five of them were together, and one came here on her own and she certainly marches to the beat of her drum. Those people have been with us for about six weeks. Just this last week they all left, and coincidentally the one who came here on her own also left to go perform in the circus in the jungle.

This time around I'm more used to it, but it's really interesting to sit and reflect on the multitude of people I've already seen come through. What's even more amazing is to try to piece together how we've all influenced each other and how our paths intersect. I've met so many people from all different parts of the world, from Egypt, England, New Zealand, Canada, Lithuania, and Germany, just to name a few. I've learned great lessons from them, such as what herbs are good for certain ailments. I've learned all about how important it is to get out of the city every once in a while and just be in nature. I've even learned how to make an excellent cashew cream sauce (that tastes exactly like alfredo sauce!) The group of five people who came through consisted of a couple and three teenagers (their daughter and two friends) who were here for the second time. The couple knew so much about ayurveda, and the wife was an ayurvedic doctor. They gave an intense week-long workshop here, and always had great health tips and cooking tips. Thinking about all that, I feel so grateful that I got this opportunity and I get so excited thinking about how I'll apply those ideas I picked up (especially the one about the cashew alfredo!)

A new volunteer arrived on Tuesday. Her name is Valerie and she's from Canada. (She's the beginning of a new wave of people that should be moving in soon.) She's only been here a short while, but already she's made so many contributions to the way we run things here. Tonight, she even led our first meeting on how we're going to be doing our bookkeeping from now own, in a definitely more organized fashion, hopefully making our organization ready for our on-going growth.

Surprise Baking Fiend

Because we do have a lot of people coming and leaving, we also have a lot of going-away potlucks. In all of those, I've not only enjoyed celebrating others, I've discovered I'm actually quite good at baking.

One of our veteran volunteers, Kaki, moved out last month and was known for her amazing chocolate cake. So in her honor, I was enlisted to bake something for her going away party. I admit, I was quite nervous in my attempt to impress Kaki's refined palate. Still, I'm happy to say that on that rainy Monday evening all anyone could taste was success (and a hint of mocha).

my first made-from-scratch chocolate creation and I

After tasting that cake, Municky, a yoga teacher here from Brazil, requested--nay, demanded--I make something similar for her birthday. However, this time around I lacked powdered sugar, so I went for a recipe that used granulated sugar. That was almost a lumpy disaster, until I had a perfect epiphany moment and dumped it all into a blender. What ensued was smooth, rich chocolate perfection that I could easily spread on top of this cake.

The coconut detailing was done courtesy of Sarah.

I definitely didn't expect to be baking (or be any good at it) this summer, but here we are and it's undeniable I'm awesome.

That's all for now!

Sylvia