primitive medicine

EMC Goes Feral ~ Abalone Medicine Field Notes: Off-Grid in the Desert

Hatha Yoga at Dance Palace every Friday 10-11am
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Open appointments this week:
Saturday, 11am - 3pm (March 1)
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Embody Medicine Circles are going Feral

Its long-past time to tell you that my next round of Embody Chinese Medicine circles are starting in a few weeks. Reach out if you are interested in signing up… I have four spaces left.

For almost two years we have been circling up to experience our medicine directly in our bodies, in community, in the garden outside the apothecary when the weather is fine. This offering is close to my heart, as we taste our way through Classical Chinese formulas, create home retreats, cast Yi Jing divinations, and most recently we shared a wild winter herb wander (below).

In this spring circle we are going to spend more time in the wild where the real medicine lies. We will head to the forest or the sea for half of our sessions, finding herbs that grow in our region, brewing them into tea, divining their energetics, and experiencing Chinese medicine through the body of the land- witnessing wild yin, yang, dryness, dampness as the seasonal qi unfolds from spring wood into summer earth. If you are feeling this, book a free exploration call here…

Meeting place will be Abalone Apothecary in Point Reyes Station, and then we’ll carpool to trails and beaches in Point Reyes National Seashore. (I will still hold a restful class on the lawn some weeks, when we need to ground and relax)

Spring Session: 13 Weds, 4-6 in person in Point Reyes Station, CA

• March 19, 26, 25 • April 2, 9, 16, 23* • May 7, 14, 21, 28 • June 4
• final June class - bonfire on Limontour Beach + family & friends, date TBD
*note, no class on Weds April 30th

Early Bird Rate: $1300 before March 5th 🪲 after that, $1500

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what is primitive?

Abalone Medicine Field Notes: Off-Grid in the Desert, 02.25.2025
In recent years I’ve gotten into a rhythm of winter pilgrimage to the desert, to teach and learn, and live outdoors with a vibrant village of people who swim against the current of modern culture and live in connection with the earth. It is a huge push to get there, and it is always jarring to return. Primitive skills, ancestral arts, whatever you call it, is more returning than going backwards.

In Chinese medicine, acupuncture and herbs (surgery and drugs) are the last resort after all the other things that we don’t often think of as medicine. Food and meditation are obvious ones. What you speak about and listen to, what surrounds you, are others. There are more.

I love my life. And modernity is stressful. When I arrive in the desert, I spend a day shedding the layers of stress to arrive at a calm baseline of spirit, or Shen. I am more relaxed in the kindred sharing and bleeding sunburnt lips of temporary village life, than in the scattered mind-state of digital communication and driving at non-human speeds for work, errands and youth sports. It is all beautiful in its way.

Coming back home is a unique opportunity to watch myself twist back up into a state of tension wiry enough to navigate the pressures of modern life. A few gems from this last round of being old-school human in the desert…

1. Living outdoors is sublime.
   Being outside for 9 days, without electricity, using our tent only for sleep... I awoke with the sunrise. I was surrounded at night by the stars and changing moon. When I peed, I watered the mesquite trees. After dark there were fires, with people gathered around, singing, warming themselves, talking quietly. I was aware of the shifts of wind, warmth, and sunshine throughout the day, and learned to adjust my clothing and shade in flow. My spirit felt settled. My sleep was deep, my existential anxiety faded. Living outdoors places us in direct harmonious connection with the earth. When I got home, I resolved to put my bed out on the back deck as soon as the last hint of rain has passed, and decided to tend more to the details of the land where we live, even if I am “always at work” and there is “no time”. Today I teased 15 aloe plants out of a tangled pot that has been sitting outside my door for two years, made a succulent soil blend, and repotted them all along my patio. They are happy and glowing, food for my spirit. Turns out there was time, after all.

2. Older kids, like my teenager, do not incessantly need their mothers.
   This revelation was incredible medicine for our parent-child relationship. Parenting is one of the most rewarding but also hardest, most nervous-system-ravaging aspects of my life. Last week I learned that it doesn’t have to be that way. Parenting isn’t hard because we have bad alchemy with our children, or because we’re bad parents. It is a lack of humane cultural context.

   
   Last week my son ran wild with his friends through a beautiful safe outdoor village. I barely saw him. He had no phone or computer or school or sports, and never got tired or bored. He zoomed through our basecamp every now and again with a funny story or a snack, and then was off again, playing games, practicing archery, making deals, who knows. He came home after I was asleep each night, crawled into his sleeping bag and passed out. He even put himself to bed early on the night before their teen walkabout. I didn’t worry about him, I didn’t schedule his days for him, I didn’t micromanage him, I didn’t battle him about screen time. This is happened instantly without any effort. He was happier than I’ve ever seen him, so was I. I haven’t figured out how yet, but one of my takeaways is, more of this, please.

3. Being unplugged makes us well.
   My baseline consciousness at home is always a bit scattered, always a bit stressed, and now I’m seeing a main reason why: my constant connection to the digital realm. It creeps in quickly. Mostly, I use my phone and computer for communication. Email, scheduling, paying people, sending messages, sharing inspiration & information, replying. Rows and rows of names and numbers with little messages on little screens that are constantly flowing in at random times, breaking attention from whatever is present in the sensory world. Our new normal.

   
   For nine days I didn’t have a computer. I didn’t look at my phone. If I wanted to connect with someone, I hiked across the land and found them (or maybe I sent a message along with another human). I had unexpected and delightful vignettes with people I passed along the way. I believe that we are meant to communicate in person in all the infinite ancient ways, through body language, eye contact, speech, presence. On my return I have noticed myself feeling scattered and frantic as the communications start to fly from all directions all the time through this little glowing box. My time no longer feels my own. The irritability is creeping back in. The only calm moments are when I am attending to something and my phone is away, silent, out of my field, like my precious hours with my aloe babies. I don’t know exactly how, yet, but I want to free my mind from this digital mob scene, while still being in connection with all the people I want to be in connection with.

4. We can create our dream world (in person) without hating.
   The creators of the camp invited us *not* to discuss politics and divisive affairs that did not relate directly to our moments together. I shared in my classes about how to listen to our medicine and care for ourselves as a living ecosystem rather than a machine. I learned from people around me who were sharing their gifts from dawn until dark. I wove a broom and learned about the history and spirit of this craft from someone who I now call a friend. I learned songs and heard stories from old-timers and practiced friction fire. I traded medicine for treasures people made with their hands. I still navigated challenges - I was tired a lot, and at times had to retreat from all the activity, and my lips were cracked and my digestion was off… but I felt an anciently familiar and pervasive sense of relaxed wellness about life.
   
   When, on the drive home, I opened my email and saw the endless scroll of advertisements and political horror stories, I got to work ‘unsubscribing’ and ‘deleting’ everything I saw about the wrecked state of the world. I was not into party politics before, but my independent anarchist news feeds still scream about how vile the “bad guys” are. I want to offer my spirit to beauty, not war. The world I want looks more like the one I just came from. Where I walk through the village, or the grocery store, with an open heart, ready to connect in warmth, human to human, with anyone that I meet. Sharing our creativity and visions for our sweetest world.

5. Generations are meant to mix together.
   My father, my partner, and my son, all joined me in the desert. We found our rhythms in tandem, starting the day together with coffee near our tent and then circling back up before bed. I heard new stories from elders that I have befriended over the past few years. I taught classes attended by thirteen year olds as well as eighty year olds, and everything in between. My friend and her 11 year old son camped next to us. He would sail through camp to share a treat or treasure he had found and received my auntie-love of salty lemon water for hydration. I got smiles from babies and sang with toddlers - I don’t see babies or toddlers in my daily life here. My son went out with a group of youth on the land, guided by some bright and talented twenty-somethings, in a mixed-age group of 12 - 19 year olds - the younger kids looking up to the older ones and their impressive skills, which suddenly seemed more within reach. My father (who grew up hunting) brain-tanned a buckskin, walked among the boulders by starlight, and made dozens of new friends.

   

   my favorite men, covered in desert dust!

   My world here at Abalone is more multigenerational than most, but still, I want more, day to day. I recently said goodbye to one of my most precious elder friends, who I was blessed to have in my daily life for the past four years. Somehow, my son never got to meet her before she passed. My 95 year old grandmother is thousands of miles away. How can we create flow across generations? Please, bring your babies to visit!

6. Making things with our hands is good medicine.
   On the second day my friend asked me do I have a creative practice in my life back home. I paused… medicine making is my craft, but most of my creations are focused on specific people’s therapeutic needs, not my own self expression. I write… less than ever with pen and paper, and even then, writing isn’t quite handwork… too heady and abstract. I love to mend, with patches and embroidery… in theory… when I have time... I love to weave baskets, knit, make things with fiber. But I’m no master, and it is not part of my daily life. Rarely do I stop running around long enough to pull out my mending bag.
   
   Last week, everyone was making things, everywhere. Sharing their crafts. It was empowering. Every time I make something for the first time, it feels like remembering, like I’ve done this before. We can fulfill our needs, beautifully, of our own two hands. There was a marketplace filled with objects that had been crafted by humans, without factories and name brands, every piece unique, with spirit. Again, that sensation of ancient wellness mixed with the dust in the air. Can we slow down and sit for a spell, and weave, and mend? Can we afford not to?

   

   

   making with hands

may we feed our spirits
may we never be the same again

may you see the stars tonight (or the fog)
and put your face in the sun at dawn

may we meet again soon…

love,
Alison