A week in my own heaven

I knew now that Hippydan's heaven was not mine. As well that it shouldn't be. It only took another week to find my own and I got to stay there longer than a weekend. Someday I know I shall actually take up residence there.

First I got a visit from one of my traveling hippy friends. I love playing tourist guide and enjoyed showing him where I grew up, taking him to places tourists never get to see. We celebrated easter together, dyed easter eggs German style, with onion peel, tumeric, red beet, and stingy nettles for paint, herbs for designs.

The saturday before easter we went to the old Lutheran church in my hometown. The service started at 11pm and we all entered the church in silence, in the dark. Instead of a sermon the service consisted of bible passages being read, starting in Genesis 1:1 leading up to the resurrection. Between bible readings we sang traditional church songs and spoke parts of the liturgy.

Once the readings got close to the resurrection story a small orchestra began playing. The sound of a violin moaned through the dark cavern of the church, joined by a cello and other classical instruments. As the music rose to become more cheerful a candle was lit on the altar and from there the light was passed from candle to candle, everyone igniting the candles they received when they walked into church. We sat in the balcony and watched the darkness flee beneath us, step by step, one flickering candle after another. The orchestra played lighter music until finally the resurrection was proclaimed, every candle flame danced and bathed the church in light and warmth, and a joyful tune boomed through the ancient cathedral.

As people started turning to their neighbors, proclaiming "he is risen" - "he is risen indeed" I felt part of something old and great, a tradition passed down through millennia, a hope celebrated by countless multitudes, thousands of whom had spoken the same words within these same medieval church walls hundreds of years ago. When we stepped outside we were given a freshly baked sweet roll each, baked with yeast since lent was now officially over. An easter bonfire was roaring on the lawn, casting its flickering shadows upon the church tower.

Sunday's celebration was as beautiful as easter should be. Even nature contributed by sending white and pink showers of fruit tree blossoms and sun rays warm enough for us to enjoy our feast outdoors. We ate a rich meal of German delicacies and mom baked challah. After delicious food, lots of laughter, and dessert, Jared, my brother TJ, and I jumped in the car to drive to the Belgium border where the German national rainbow gathering took place.

I didn't know what to expect but I certainly never imagined the gathering would be so different from an American gathering and come to mean something to important to me. Through the rainbow rideshare board we had arranged to pick up another traveling brother half way to the gathering but were in for a surprise when we found out that he and Jared had a close mutual friend Jared wasn't headed for the gathering but to stay with some Jesus Freaks in Koeln and apparently this mutual friend was going to be there as well. When we dropped Jared off, we were invited to stay for pancakes and left all smiles and hugs.

The gathering was in a deep valley right next to a tumbling mountain stream in the Eiffel mountains. I expected the gathering to be much smaller than the US nationals, but I was surprised to find only about 200 rainbows camped together. We arrived just in time for dinner food circle and as we turned the corner into the main circle a couple hundred smiling hippy heads turned towards us and called out collectively "welcome home". I must have grinned like a complete idiot for hours. After dinner we set up our new tent - "this tent isn't for camping," Jared had said, "it's more like staying in an outdoor 5 star hotel!" - and huddled around the fire.

There was only one main circle, one bliss pit, and one community kitchen. I couldn't possibly have kept track of how often I was asked what American gatherings were like. Someone even suggested I'd offer a seminar about American rainbow family since I was soon turning into the gathering's token story teller. Even though I missed the immense diversity of the US nationals, the freedom to roam for hours and find new camps with different themes all day long, I really came to appreciate the German rainbow gathering style.

Within no time I found myself in the kitchen helping out and once even running the show. Fittingly for Germans the gathering was much better organized than what I have grown used to. After the third "food circle" call that was passed on throughout the forest everyone gathered in main meadow, formed a circle and started holding hands. Someone then chose one of the rainbow community songs and we all sang together, then ohmed in unison, rose our hands to the sky, gave thanks, and sat in a circle. I quickly came to love this new rainbow liturgy.

What was curiously absent were the drums. There were some, here and there, but the entire time I was there no real drum circle ever formed. It was mostly singing but I loved that. German family has its own rainbow songbook and every night there'd be singing around the bliss pit. The tipi usually turned into a worship tent with a blend of reggae music, bhajan singing, and random worship songs. On the second night I was sitting around the fire while a group of musicians were playing reggae tunes I didn't know.

But then, all of a sudden, I started to recognized the chords and the words and my heart skipped a beat: Shimshai! Now back in bible college I lived in an affordable apartment surrounded by neighbors of questionable sanity. One neighbor with horn glasses thicker than a bullet proof window and a somewhat retarded grin came over to my place one night and handed me a home burned CD -"from the Essenes, cause you guys would like it, you would fit in, you know?" - then left again, grinning. I took the CD and said I'd listen to it, mainly to be rid of him.

I never would have thought that CD would become my absolute favorite. Beautiful reggae worship tunes that hinted at the presence of God even when I was in the depth of the dark night of the soul and didn't think there was a God. I loved that CD more than any CD I had ever had. For that reason it was in my favorite CD folder, which ended up getting stolen when the bus was broken into in 2006. I never talked to that neighbor about the CD again - he disappeared from the neighborhood somehow - nor did I ever find out what the artist was called. It was only since I came to Germany again last year that I found him online and downloaded his music.

I had never once met another person who knew Shimshai. Even on the drive to the gathering I was thinking about how awesome it would be to meet someone in Germany who knew Shimshai, that way we'd have something in common. And now this group of musicians started playing Shimshai. I dropped my bliss ware on the spot, jumped up, and joined the growing crowd of dancing, smiling, worshipping, loving hippies and lost myself in worship like I hadn't since my Jesus Freak days, more than a decade ago. If I had died and gone to heaven that instant it would have taken me a while to know the difference.

Every night from then on I got to bask in the presence of God so deeply I sometimes found tears running down my cheek, happy tears. When was the last time I cried for joy, not out of pain? I honestly couldn't remember. It had been such a long time that I had completely forgotten what it felt like to be content, to feel perfectly loved, unconditionally. One night I rested on the straw bales in the tipi, my bare feet stretched towards the fire, my heart beating happily to the bhajan singing, when a stranger stuck his feet right next to me. I didn't think long before grabbing them and giving him a foot massage and after a long while we started talking, then leaning against each other, then snuggling, and before I knew it I was clutched in a tight embrace, my feet tingling with the heat of the dancing flames, my heart keeping time with the drums, my face permanently fixed into a smile.

Since I was in rainbow land I had complete trust that my new friend respected me, that he would not take advantage of me, would not push me or manipulate me into anything I did not want. What a redemptive experience. And what irony that I would now enjoy the safety and trust that was always missing in my marriage.It was a perfect night. I wanted it to last forever and lost sense of all time. When I finally felt ready to go sleep the sun was probably close to coming up again. I snuggled into my sleeping bag with a smile, fell asleep with a smile, and woke up the next more, still smiling.

The next day my brother and I went for a hike, then rested in a secluded spot by the river on our way back. In a moss covered alcove I stumbled upon a meditation wheel laid out on the ground, designed with stones and pine cones and other forest treasures. As I stood there admiring the art work, another rainbow brother came down the trail to the river. He asked if I was meditating, I told him I was just going for a walk. "Let's meditate together, shall we?" he asked and reached for my hands. And for the next fragment of eternity I stood there, feeling the pulse of his warm soft hands, listening to the laughing tumble of the creek, feeling the breeze caress my face, smelling the fresh young spring growth all around me. I have never stood so long without shifting, without wanting to be somewhere else, just enjoying being, feeling contentment.

Another aspect I came to appreciate about German rainbow family were the seminars. After every lunch food circle anyone who wanted to offer a seminar or workshop walked around announcing where and when to gather. On my last day someone offered a workshop on transforming emotions. He was going to teach methods for dealing with anger, grief, and other emotions that are generally difficult to cope with. Just what I needed, so I joined the group. By the time everyone who was interested was gathered together, it turned out to be nearly half the gathering. The seminar leader decided to split the group and have a naturopath lead one half.

There were 2 non-German speakers for whom I provided simultaneous translation into English. One of them wanted to be in the naturopath's group, so I went along. What I didn't know was that she wasn't going to teach a seminar on how to transform emotions, instead she was offering a sample healing session. We gathered in a circle and performed some relaxation and energy gathering exercises. She explained that she was going to be working with energy and was going to call each of us into the middle of the circle, one by one, and then work with whatever emotion came up.

When it was my turn I was rather anxious, expecting pain and fear to come up and dreading what kind of meltdown I would have and how much I was going to suffer experiencing these emotions, even if the result was a release. We had introduced ourselves earlier, so the naturopath knew of my divorce and my emotional struggle. But as I stood in front of her with everyone else circled around me I didn't feel the rush of pain and fear I had expected. Instead I felt an increasing lightness. "There's something coming up, can you feel it already?" she asked. "I feel light," I said. "Yes, but there's more," she continued, "let's speed this up and make it physical." And then she laughed. Softly, looking at me expectantly, and suddenly I felt like laughing, too. "Let it out," she said, "come on now, it's coming up, I can feel it, now let it out!"

Yes, it came, I felt it, and it pushed it's way out, and with no thought of preserving dignity I yelled, I laughed, a hollered, I jumped in the air, swinging my arms wildly, whirling in circles, feeling light, feeling good. I head talk all over camp about "some crazy chic laughing and screaming all throughout the woods" all afternoon and even the next morning. I don't know how long it lasted, but I finally collapsed into hugging the naturopath and she whispered: "more often! let it out more often!" I nodded and knew what she meant. I got so tied up planning to live in the future, that I forgot to live now. I thought so often about having fun once this pain is dealt with that I forgot I was also alive right now.

I practically floated through the rest of the gathering and even for another week after I came home. I had definitely been to my own heaven. And I took something precious with me from the emotional healing. Even after my feet landed back on planet earth, I remained free of a burden I had been carrying. Prior to that healing circle I'd spend hours having imaginary arguments with Dan, brooding over the way he used to treat me, having trouble sleeping and being haunted by nightmares. That all stopped the moment I stepped into the healing circle. It took me weeks to even notice that I hadn't had a single dream since the gathering, that I hadn't been brooding, and that I would go days without Dan entered my thoughts at all. And that truly was a gift from heaven.