Friday Care Package
Dear Becoming Ones,
As promised, today I turn the page of this unfolding story and offer the pen to one of my beloved collaborators, Erin C. Law.
It’s Friday again, which means there’s a beverage in hand and an invitation to settle. This afternoon, it’s a maple cream coffee soda—sparkling and earthy, inspired by the coffee tonics Vivian and Tiffany craft at Noonday, our local sanctuary of caffeine and conversation here in Alfred, NY. I almost always drink my coffee cold—even the decaf, even in winter, which lingers here like an elder with stories still to tell.
These hills, ancient with memory, whisper the beginnings of the first democracy practiced on this land. And they continue to echo with becoming—like something sacred is still cresting, just at the edge of now.
Fridays are when we breathe together. When we pause to remember that care is not a luxury, but a rhythm. A radical act. A practice of worldmaking.
Words build worlds.
Each week, I’ve been writing into care—tending it, naming it, wondering aloud. But today, I step back, so another voice can carry the thread. Erin, one of my thought partners in this season of emergence, brings a deep wisdom rooted in the body, the land, and the in-between spaces where repair begins.
More voices will join us this summer. We are building a chorus.
So take a breath, as we do each Friday. Let it widen your chest and soften your belly. Then read slowly. Feel into Erin’s offering. Let it move through you like a warm current or a remembered dream.
Because somewhere in this story—between sips and silence—we’re imagining another world into being.
With care and wonder,
RCE+
Today, Roberto has let me take over his Friday Care Package! I’m delighted to be here and honored to have the chance to share something that makes me feel alive. (A little about me: I have a background in dance, sound, visual art, somatic practices and cultural somatics, and am a wannabe DJ 🎧)
As the patriarchy coughs pathetically and spatters residual droplets of violence all over us, we could let the rage consume us. Simultaneously we have a chance to practice something else. We can turn our attention and CARE to our own worlds, or put another way our relations with self, others, larger groups, homes and environment, exploring them with new eyes each day. We can engage in our sense of time, stretching and snapping each moment just through awareness and attention. But what to do with that pesky anger and rage that remains?
I live with many chronic and intersecting disabilities and illnesses which demand that I slow down and listen for where the inflammation is, where the heated core of the matter lives in my body each day. I can’t dance like I used to, and yet I find it as necessary as drinking water to move and alchemize my feelings through my pulsating tissues. When I don’t move, the pain gathers and thickens and tightens. When I do move, I can feel the release, the non-attachment, the connection to the flow of constant change of life.
I often follow some sort of flow that loosely looks like this list below:
prepare my space and change clothes if necessary, get comfortable and uninhibited
create a pleasurable environment with scent or light, closing a door, etc.
connect to a good speaker and turn on this playlist
walk or march or bounce in place to an upbeat song. Feel myself entering or arriving into the practice
repeat small movements like shimmying, shaking, stepping, etc and let them build and shift
notice and intensify or amplify qualities or states of movement that are naturally emerging.
have curiosity about how the states want to change/changing when I get bored or tired
cool down by following slower paced music
integrate the emotion with care by reflecting on what came up for me. Acknowledge its presence.
The final step I find myself taking if I am aware enough is to be curious about what it has to teach me and to come into acceptance around that no matter how much it sucks. Maybe I even need to write about it or draw or make art to help me process.
Basically, I ease into a little bit of shaking, thrashing, grooving, bouncing, and let it get as big as it needs and then let it slowly deflate and become right sized again. It doesn’t take long and I can practice as long as I want or just promise myself five minutes.
So, a little gift I offer you this Friday: I made this playlist for YOU as a jumping off point, because I am so in love with it that I can’t possibly contain the overflow.
And you deserve to be a little fabulous on the last weekend of Pride month 🏳️⚧️ 🪩 💅🏻🌈
It contains some of the songs that motivate me and open me to faster paced movement. This music (mostly house!) opens the door to the rage room of my body and lets it rip. Sometimes I even growl or yell and make terribly strange contorted faces, I dare myself to try punching the air while grunting! Sometimes I need to loudly proclaim “Fuck _(fill in the blank)_!!!”
So, you are cordially invited to an Alchemizing Rage Dance Party! You could follow any of these steps that I do in your own way. Please explore with caution and care as you also get brave and curious about what is under the rage.
Feel free to let the music inspire you in any way that feels right, maybe you need to make your own playlist. This one has one upbeat song to get you going, lots of house beats, and then three songs at the end to help you cool down. There are loose themes in the songs of saying NO, throwing shade, demanding attention, taking up space.
Rage is a flaming wild hottie asking for the next dance with you…and the beat is pumping will you take her hand?
Spotify Playlist: