Mill Creek Lodge

Mill Creek Lodge (Where its NOT happening!)

Hello.

This is a very new photo of the old Mill Creek Lodge.

The only difference in the photo and others you may have seen years ago is our green Chevrolet Aveo parked over on the right.

Change is in the air as they say, but some things change a bit less or slower than others!

And this antique building is one of those things!


When we drove over the Lassen Park Highway from the north last fall I was flabbergasted to see the huge "new" (I imagine) parking lot at the trail-head of the hiking trail to the mountain's summit! There was even a hot-dog stand or some such in the lot--and maybe a hundred cars already parked and their occupants already on the trail I suppose!

(Population explosion!!!)

Of course it had been several years since my last visit!

And when we drove around the corner below the Sulphur Works I was surprised again by the absence of the Lassen Chalet!

Holy Mackerel it was GONE!

A brand new building was taking its place!

There is, they say, no place in the universe where nothing changes nor moves.

So it is.

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Ahimsaland

Tanya checks the columbine at the Saturday Farmer's Market

Dear readers:

You may have noticed that I took a long weekend from writing.

Nice to be communicating with you again!

I am going to write some more about Lassen National Park, Mill Creek and Mineral and that good high country in northern California that I like so well so you can be ready for some reading again tomorrow.

For today, I would like to recommend a book I have recently come across which I believe is an important good read.

The title is The Inner Reaches of Outer Space and it is by the man who understood mythology so well, Joseph Campbell.

If you are enjoying my blog--you will enjoy this book.

See you tomorrow,

Thomas

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Tanya and Crampus

Yesterday you saw the unpainted Crampus mask.

Here I am with Tanya wearing the finished mask.

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Crampus mask unpainted

Crampus mask unpainted paper mache

Making the masks is easy for me and good fun too.

I am not under contract and am not trying to please anyone but myself with these masks.

I work well without direction!

So far there is no pervading theme or precise direction so anything that happens in masking characterization is perfectly OK.

As long as there are cast-off newspapers and a bit of flour to boil up some paste, I am in business.

Who knows where it will go?

Who knows where it all will go??

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Me working

Me working on a frog mask. Tanya photo

Hello.

It seems an odd time to be doing something as childish as making masks of paper mache--but the world seems so bizarre to me right now that it seems the very best thing I can do.

There are presently almost two thousand wild fires burning in California--some sort of record they say-- gasoline prices are increasing by ten cents a gallon or so daily-- who knows for sure what is happening in Iraq or Afghanistan since the powers that be play so loose with the truth...

Making paper mache masks seems not such a bad occupation after all to me.

Good peaceful work to you too!

Tom

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Fish Mask

Tanya photo

Fish are an important part of the circle of life in this part of the world.

Very unfortunately, the local salmon have reached a point where they could become extinct if human habits do not change.

Other fish share the same bleak future--and unfortunately so do humans since it is more than a poetic conceit to state that all life forms are indeed connected.

By constructing this fish mask and using it ceremonially, I hope to raise my own and other's consciousness to a point where we can truly realize that making money and acting foolishly are not the only habits worth having.

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Wise Woman mask

Tanya photo

I call this mask "The Wise Woman". (Our part-time cat maggie is resting near the mask.)

I have been very fortunate in meeting a number of older women who have greatly helped me in my development and understanding.

This MASK character represents a number of the wise women I have had the honor of meeting in my life.

No longer in the body but always living in my thoughts are Sister Helen Mary of Bardsey Island, Wales, Elizabeth Studer of the Ceramica Il Poggio in Italy and Kikka Gladhorn of Gut Bellers, Germany .

Another of my great old friends is Beatrice Bennewitz of Bad Feilnbach, Germany.

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to these wonderful older woman.

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