Category: Postcards

They’re balancing the ring in Petronella

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
A style of community dance popular in New England since Colonial times, contras start out as two lines of partners facing each other and then the next couple on each side. There’s a live band and callers, and we walk through the sequence of steps before the music begins. The whole point is to have fun, and you wind up dancing with everyone in the line before the piece is finished. This example is from the  Lamprey River Band’s dance series in Dover’s city hall before the monthly event moved to a Unitarian-Universalist church in neighboring Durham. This particular dance is named Petronella.

Blessed bliss

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

My novel YOGA BOOTCAMP describes group meditation as a central discipline in the daily life at Big Pumpkin’s ashram. As a real-life example, here’s a photo taken at the Poconos Ashram in mid-1972. I’m struck by how young we all look and the fact that most of us could sit in a full lotus position. Makes my knees hurt just thinking of it now!

Yes, I really lived this.

Morris men in a ring at the autumn equinox

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
The Pinewood Morris Men continue a festive dance style from the late middle ages in rural England. The performers wear costumes specific to their troupe, including bells, and often wield sticks or handkerchiefs in their routines. This group frequently appears in Boston Revels’ events throughout the year. Here they are greeting concertgoers to last fall’s equinox RiverSing in the Herter Park amphitheater along the Charles River in Allston.