Happy Mayday!

This weekend and half of last week, when mostly towards celebrating Spring and visiting family and friends back in Minnesota. The Spring celebration comes in the form of the anual May Day Celebration, sponsored by the Heart of the Beast Theatre in South Minneapolis. I've been attending for the past 15 years, of its 34 year history.

The MayDay Ceremony in Powderhorn Park has become a joyous annual ritual for nearly 50,000 people in the Twin Cities. Each year, a 200-person pageant re-tells the story of that year's parade, with children and adult dancers, puppeteers, a live orchestra and four giant serene puppets who represent the Prairie, Sky, River, and Woods.

It culminates in the Tree of Life Ceremony: to the steady beating of drums, a resplendent red Sun Flotilla paddles the Sun from across the lake to the shore where the Tree of Life sleeps, waiting to be reawakened.

The weekend didn't go without some home renovation: I got my brother started on his own kitchen demo by helping to take down a few lath and plaster walls.