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February 22, 2005
Blindfolds, pathologies, and play
First, linkage: another from BoingBoing, on the New Zealand Health and Safety Manual for prostitutes. When a government writes about dildos, it's gotta be good.
Well today we actually got on the tables in Deep Tissue!
And then we blindfolded ourselves.
Mm... not as hot as it sounds. Palpating backs blindly isn't my idea of fun, although it was a valuable experience.
The positives: I felt more aware of my body and body mechanics in some ways and less aware in others. Exploring the bony landmarks and having to rely on my tactile memory of them rather than my sight was interesting. While stripping the layers of muscles with my fingers, I think I was able to pay more attention to what I was feeling and get a better "read" on what was going on in my partner's body.
The only negative really was trying to use my forearm and elbow, tools I'm not really comfortable with, blind. I got frustrated with it and gave up pretty quickly.
In keeping with today's activities, I brought Aleksey, my stuffed Chesire cat toy, to class... he has a custom-made leather harness and padlocked chain collar, all by Leather Masters in San Jose.
So far on the lists of things Warren likes: blindfolds, fists, and stripping.
First day of Pathology, yay. I'm really excited about this class. I realize that I've always enjoyed reading about how the human body works and doesn't work. I'm also really feeling a desire for more grounding in massage indications and contraindications, and that's exactly what this class is for.
The cool part is not only learning about the diseases from a Western allopathic perspective, but being able to bring other viewpoints to the table... TCM is the most commonly talked about here, because of the Asian Healing Arts program, but Paul's book also takes Ayurveda into account, and I still enjoy referencing Louise Hay at times.
We're required to give two five-minute presentations on chosen pathologies (I picked fibromyalgia for this half of the quarter), with an accompanying paper. Class will be conducted in a seminar/discussion format... each week we're required to read about pathologies of a particular system, outline 3 of them, and come to class prepared to discuss them. Sounds like a really effective way to both learn the material and bring our own personal backgrounds, experiences, and opinions into the class.
At dinner Jana and I did further planning for Play Night, including visioning, nailing down a time and place, writing up a notice on the Lodge whiteboard, and checking with the Welcome Center on using the space. We still need to create posters and make announcements at dinner tomorrow and the next night.
We thought of calling it Deep Play instead, but worried about turning people off. Sometimes it seems like everything at Heartwood has to be deep, and people sometimes get weary of that. I myself do not generally experience that kind of overdose, but I'm in the minority. And Play Night can be as deep--or not--as one wants it, depending on how one is feeling that week. Although I wonder if levity and transformation can't ever be partners. Movement Magic seems to do a decent enough job blending the two.
Anyway... afterward, we had an impromptu dance party in the student store, and ended up in her cabinette talking. At some point Silas got home and joined us... it's really nice talking with them into the night, even when Jana falls asleep ;-) Silas gifted me twice, first offering me the privilege of being one of the readers of the rough draft of his novel (I think he's past 200 pages already), and then again, thanking me for the conversation and expressing how much he enjoyed talking with me. Aww. Likewise, likewise.
Posted by Josh A. at February 22, 2005 10:49 PM