Pandora's Amphora #4

 Original Thinkers Hosts Big Ideas

FILM ... I came to Telluride because of the festivals. First, it was the Film Fest. My seminary buddy Craig Chapot was involved, and I’d heard about some of the early classics balanced with cutting edge cinema. I was enthralled, having been a film buff in San Francisco – a regular at the old Canyon Cinematique at the San Francisco Art Institute ... Gradually, as I came to love mountain life more than Hollywood versions of reality, I got involved with Mountainfilm. I loved when Rick Silverman took the helm and moved the schedule towards more than just climbing films and extreme sports – herding us into social justice and the full spectrum of mountain life. For many years l emcee’d at the Mason’s Hall – an intimate venue with a dedicated crew ... I was sorry to see Rick leave the fest, but I loved the way David Holbrooke curated movies. He knew great filmmakers and brought a rich feast of film to Telluride. When he too left Mountainfilm, I was sad. But I was also getting disenchanted with the frenetic pace of both film festivals, where you were rushing from one theater to the next, waiting in long lines, always it seemed missing many of the films you wanted to see ... So, I was delighted when David pioneered a new kind of festival – Original Thinkers -- where you got to see all the offerings and had time to integrate what you’d seen, to discuss and take to heart big ideas.

STORY & COMMUNITY ... As one of my mentors told me early on, the poets of the time are our filmmakers. They create the stories and myths that inform our dreams, our conversations -- against which we measure our lives ... When I see a great film, I need time to assimilate it into my life. To reflect on it and discuss it with others. Original Thinkers allows exactly that. There’s only a handful of films. But not just films but great films. And there’s more. Yoga. Forest hikes. Tea ceremonies. Plenty of opportunities to make the stories one’s own ... It’s no mistake that Original Thinkers begins with a dinner for all participants. There’s no better way to jump-start community than eating together, turning strangers into a kind of film family. This year’s dinner was two long long tables in the Transfer Warehouse. I got to sit with two of the Janes who made Chicago history in the ‘70s illegally providing abortions for women at risk pre-Roe v. Wade. And I made fast friends with John Bates   -– trading his best-selling handbook on Ted Talking for my chapbook of Lone Cone poems.

BIG IDEAS ... So, for me, it’s the takeaways that matter most at festivals. What did I learn? What can I used in my life? ... Cancer kept me from enjoying many of the first few years of OT. But I remember one talk by David Quammen speaking of his New York Times bestseller, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life that changed my understanding of biology. I bought the book, read about Carl Woese and Lynn Margulis, and came to see horizontal gene transfer as the biological game changer that it is. That big idea has stayed with me for years and now informs my understanding of how life has developed ... Of course, singling out one idea is almost heresy, as there are so many. But that’s the beauty of the event. You get to focus on the big idea that strikes you ... Free from cancer, I got to attend most of the programming this year. And this year’s smorgasbord of films and happenings took my breath away. But it was the first film that made the biggest impression on me, “Of Medicine and Miracles.” Ross Kaufman is a master director. And the documentary’s “star” was as humble as he is brilliant. By matching the life & death struggle of a young woman facing acute leukemia and a research physician driven by good fortune and intention to figure out a cure for this deadly disease, the audience rides a roller coaster of emotion – from sadness to empathy to hope. It’s a story that had me in tears more than once ... And I came away with the big idea that with persistence and good fortune, using non-intuitive techniques, like employing HIV virus to carry activated T-cells into the bloodstream of patients, cancer can be cured ... Of course, that’s only one small piece of web of big ideas, great films and energizing events that made up this year’s festival. Personally, I can’t wait until next year.

photo by Jonathan Thompson

DOLORES LACHAPELLE ... This Silverton wise woman -- author, independent scholar, deep ecologist, mountain climber with a number of first ascents, and a legendary powder skier named to the Ski Hall of Fame -- has been dead for over a decade. Because she wasn’t associated with any university or institution, her books are out of print and her name has faded into obscurity. But thanks to Jen Brill of the Silverton Ski Area and Ananda Foley, executor of the LaChapelle estate, held a mini-summit last month to try and revive Dolores’ legacy. A small working group of friends heard from Clare Menzel of Montana, who’s done a MA thesis on Dolores; Steven J. Meyers, author, fine photographer, senior lecturer in English at Ft. Lewis College and an old friend of Dolores; and Katrina Blair, author, founder of Turtle Lake Refuge in Durango, and another old friend of Dolores. 

MASS MOVEMENT ... I had the good fortune to catch the Telluride Dance Collective's "Mass Movement: Rebirth" show at the Palm Oct. 6th. It was dazzling! I was completely blown away at the talent in our community. Wonderful choreography. Spectacular movement. By turns innovative, thrilling, funny. It even included outrageous aerial silk dancing ... Kudos to Kelsey Trottier and her whole troupe.

TALKING GOURD ... I’m not usually a poet who writes in form. I like the freedom to explore language without traditional boundaries. But Dolores always urged her students (which included Katrina Blair and I) to lie down under the aspen in the fall and look up at the sky through the golden leaves. We did this when we were in Silverton. And I found myself using a Persian poetic form of a praise poem:

Ghazal for Katrina

I profess the religion of love;

wherever its caravan turns along the way,

that is the belief,

the faith I keep

 -Ibn al-Arabi

For the love of the divine in everything

I lie among the golden leaves to sing

In the azure sky there’s no limits or endings

Our words like clouds obedient to the wind’s bendings

Sprawled with a friend among the aspen we sing

Our hearts wild as kites upon a string

Attached to fingers & toes of free mind at play

Praising passed friends and the passing day

On mats of leavefall that inspire what we sing

Lifting our voices like evening bells that ring

At dusk in Silverton to clothe the caldera in prayer

As we make afternoon ritual of the lyric air

With my sister teacher friend in contrapuntal witnessing

Honoring Dolores’ deepest gold as we sing