What I Did at Hippie Camp
So, I finally get some time to tell the tale.
Checking in, I looked over the books for sale:Buddhism, veganism, astrology. A book of Zen Koans.
Stayed in a room that was simple and tasteful. It's a place to sleep, not really optimized for hanging out.
Arrived about 6:30 PM, dinner ran till 8, so K suggested we take a dip/ soak before dinner.
I'm game.
I don't know how this works, so I follow her cue and undress and dress such that I'm in just a robe and flip flops and carrying a towel.
It's raining. Pacific northwest winter rain that oscillates between fine mist and gumdrop sized water bombs. It's dark. There are lights from buildings and lighted pathways, but there's ample shadow.
We walked up a small hill through a gate with a sign that points out that cameras are forbidden beyond this point. To my far right was a swimming pool, to my immediate right was a smaller pool with steam rising from it, and straight ahead was what looks to be another pool with a railing around it.
To the left of the pool with the railing was a building. The corner of the building was perhaps 6 feet from the railing of the pool and the 7 steps leading up to it. On the side of the building were pegs for hanging towels, robes, etc.
It was dark by the hooks on the side of the building, and the hooks were sheltered from the rain by the eaves of the building. In the pool I could make out a few heads, just bobbing in quiet corners. I don't see anyone walking around.
My companion disrobes, uses the pegs, and just saunters up the steps and into the pool.
"It's a 10 step walk" I think. So I do the same. I admit, I hustled. I sought to minimize "time walking around naked outdoors in public". I stood at the pool's edge and struggled to kick off my flip flops in the rain. milliseconds of delay felt much longer.
The water was body temperature. The air and rain were chilly. Once in the water, I realized that there were more people in the pool than I had thought, maybe 7 others. No one said anything, everyone whispered, it was quiet. All I could hear was the trickle of the rain hitting the pool, running down rooftops, and gurgling over the rocks in the adjacent stream. Mellow.
After a few minutes, I relaxed. Right. No biggie. You soon forget that you're not wearing clothes. Being in a pool is being in a pool.
I was aware that there were naked people around me, though. From time to time a nude couple would slip into the pool, or someone would exit the stairs at the far end to the adjacent hot pool. You'd see, in the moonlight, a bare body rise out of the water, and a white bottom would slip into the shadow of the hot pool house doorway.
No one gawked, whistled, or stood up and shouted "Hey, you're naked!". Right. Why would they?
So I started to get it. It's a different way of being. We all get to be, as we are, and we're all okay with it. There's a trust and intimacy and freedom of being undressed with strangers. It's not about being naked. It's about not wearing clothes.
That said, I'm undressed in front of several of my teammates 4 times a week at the boat house, so it's not that big of an adjustment. It's just like the locker room, only with naked women. As an athlete, I do think I have a different relationship with my body and the bodies of others than the average American.
Is it a shock? Yeah. The brain, natural human curiosity compel us to check it all out. But we check it all out. Old bodies, young bodies, male and female, large and small, giant boobs, tiny boobs, hairy, hairless. You get a sense of the range of what is human and beautiful.
Eventually, you don't notice the bodies as much. There are some folks, who, from behind, are hard to categorize by sex. Is that a tall woman with no ass or a skinny dude with little hair? So you begin to notice faces more. From the neck down, by and large, we all look a lot alike. And with no clothes on, it's hard to snap-categorize a person. You don't know if someone is a banker, a gym teacher, or a farmer. It's a safe bet that none are Republicans. If you want to try to know who someone is by looking, you must focus on the face.
A few cool moments:
Sauna. 3:30 am. Ken & K are in the sauna. A smaller framed, skinny, scruffy young guy enters.
Scruffy dude: How are you enjoying your Harbination?
K: Great.
Scruffy dude: (with mellow, stoner-ish voice) Right on, Right on!
Scruffy dude: (Sneezes)
K: Bless you.
Scruffy dude: (ponders)
Scruffy dude: Yeah! And Bless you too!
Getting my first intro to the scene in the dark was good. One can pretend one is hiding in the dark. Sunday was 100% daylight, which was another adjustment. At one point, one of the residents walked around the pool distributing giant fig leaves to use as hats to keep the giant raindrops off our faces.
I also tried the hot pool (112F?) which is just at the threshold of painfully hot, and then moving to the cold pool, which is perhaps 45F, and then back. One's body doesn't notice the difference, really, since both give that "temperature pain" feeling. Actually spent quite a while in the cold pool, which is fed directly by the rainflow from the adjacent creek. By an altar with a stone Buddha. And flowers. In the rain.
By the end, it was all cool. I didn't think twice about walking from one pool to the next in the daylight. It sunk in that being comfortable and free and open was how one helped create the atmosphere. By not acting self-consciously or ashamedly, I helped keep the atmosphere positive and open.
Only in Northern California? Yeah. And I like it here.
Checking in, I looked over the books for sale:Buddhism, veganism, astrology. A book of Zen Koans.
Stayed in a room that was simple and tasteful. It's a place to sleep, not really optimized for hanging out.
Arrived about 6:30 PM, dinner ran till 8, so K suggested we take a dip/ soak before dinner.
I'm game.
I don't know how this works, so I follow her cue and undress and dress such that I'm in just a robe and flip flops and carrying a towel.
It's raining. Pacific northwest winter rain that oscillates between fine mist and gumdrop sized water bombs. It's dark. There are lights from buildings and lighted pathways, but there's ample shadow.
We walked up a small hill through a gate with a sign that points out that cameras are forbidden beyond this point. To my far right was a swimming pool, to my immediate right was a smaller pool with steam rising from it, and straight ahead was what looks to be another pool with a railing around it.
To the left of the pool with the railing was a building. The corner of the building was perhaps 6 feet from the railing of the pool and the 7 steps leading up to it. On the side of the building were pegs for hanging towels, robes, etc.
It was dark by the hooks on the side of the building, and the hooks were sheltered from the rain by the eaves of the building. In the pool I could make out a few heads, just bobbing in quiet corners. I don't see anyone walking around.
My companion disrobes, uses the pegs, and just saunters up the steps and into the pool.
"It's a 10 step walk" I think. So I do the same. I admit, I hustled. I sought to minimize "time walking around naked outdoors in public". I stood at the pool's edge and struggled to kick off my flip flops in the rain. milliseconds of delay felt much longer.
The water was body temperature. The air and rain were chilly. Once in the water, I realized that there were more people in the pool than I had thought, maybe 7 others. No one said anything, everyone whispered, it was quiet. All I could hear was the trickle of the rain hitting the pool, running down rooftops, and gurgling over the rocks in the adjacent stream. Mellow.
After a few minutes, I relaxed. Right. No biggie. You soon forget that you're not wearing clothes. Being in a pool is being in a pool.
I was aware that there were naked people around me, though. From time to time a nude couple would slip into the pool, or someone would exit the stairs at the far end to the adjacent hot pool. You'd see, in the moonlight, a bare body rise out of the water, and a white bottom would slip into the shadow of the hot pool house doorway.
No one gawked, whistled, or stood up and shouted "Hey, you're naked!". Right. Why would they?
So I started to get it. It's a different way of being. We all get to be, as we are, and we're all okay with it. There's a trust and intimacy and freedom of being undressed with strangers. It's not about being naked. It's about not wearing clothes.
That said, I'm undressed in front of several of my teammates 4 times a week at the boat house, so it's not that big of an adjustment. It's just like the locker room, only with naked women. As an athlete, I do think I have a different relationship with my body and the bodies of others than the average American.
Is it a shock? Yeah. The brain, natural human curiosity compel us to check it all out. But we check it all out. Old bodies, young bodies, male and female, large and small, giant boobs, tiny boobs, hairy, hairless. You get a sense of the range of what is human and beautiful.
Eventually, you don't notice the bodies as much. There are some folks, who, from behind, are hard to categorize by sex. Is that a tall woman with no ass or a skinny dude with little hair? So you begin to notice faces more. From the neck down, by and large, we all look a lot alike. And with no clothes on, it's hard to snap-categorize a person. You don't know if someone is a banker, a gym teacher, or a farmer. It's a safe bet that none are Republicans. If you want to try to know who someone is by looking, you must focus on the face.
A few cool moments:
Sauna. 3:30 am. Ken & K are in the sauna. A smaller framed, skinny, scruffy young guy enters.
Scruffy dude: How are you enjoying your Harbination?
K: Great.
Scruffy dude: (with mellow, stoner-ish voice) Right on, Right on!
Scruffy dude: (Sneezes)
K: Bless you.
Scruffy dude: (ponders)
Scruffy dude: Yeah! And Bless you too!
Getting my first intro to the scene in the dark was good. One can pretend one is hiding in the dark. Sunday was 100% daylight, which was another adjustment. At one point, one of the residents walked around the pool distributing giant fig leaves to use as hats to keep the giant raindrops off our faces.
I also tried the hot pool (112F?) which is just at the threshold of painfully hot, and then moving to the cold pool, which is perhaps 45F, and then back. One's body doesn't notice the difference, really, since both give that "temperature pain" feeling. Actually spent quite a while in the cold pool, which is fed directly by the rainflow from the adjacent creek. By an altar with a stone Buddha. And flowers. In the rain.
By the end, it was all cool. I didn't think twice about walking from one pool to the next in the daylight. It sunk in that being comfortable and free and open was how one helped create the atmosphere. By not acting self-consciously or ashamedly, I helped keep the atmosphere positive and open.
Only in Northern California? Yeah. And I like it here.
posted by Kenneth at 11:03 PM
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