BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?

Subject: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:44 PM

My answer to this question has changed over the years. (I can remember when my most honest answer would probably have been "during SEX"!)

Later, during the years I spent a lot of time camping in the mountains, I felt most alive- alert, senses open, my heart-in-my throat alive - in the middle of the night standing alone in the quiet watching the world around me and there was not one sign of human habitation.

Nowadays, with the decrepitudes of age and its concomitant inward pleasures, I'd have to say that it's in the middle of music. I can lose my self and still feel totally alert and receptive.

Where do YOU feel most alive?

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: MMario
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:46 PM

my perennial answer - holding a baby. But submerged in music is a close second. they have shared aspects.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: The Barden of England
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:51 PM

I'm with you Ebbie. There in a session with singers, players and listeners. What more could anybody want?

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:52 PM

It's still the vinegars for me.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Sorcha
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:54 PM

Playing music, holding a baby, camping, all just about a 1 on my scale....I am NOT alive when trying to do house cleaning!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: The Barden of England
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:55 PM

The BigPinkLad - which; Balsamic or Wine?

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:55 PM

MMario, thanks for the thought about a baby. I think the mindset is similar.

And 'vinegars', BPL? Do I dare ask?

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: MMario
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:56 PM

*grin* it *HELPS* to be "not alive" when doing housework!

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 03:59 PM

I thought it was a common expression (it is where I grew up). 'Vinegar strokes' occur at the performance finale in coitus where the facial expression is as though tasting vinegar.

Oh dear, I'm embarrassed now.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Sorcha
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:02 PM

LOL!

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:03 PM

I feel best when I'm in the Pacific Northwest, whether in the mountains or woods or around the waters of Puget Sound or one of the local freshwater lakes or rivers. Near water in the Northwest, then, for a physical place where I feel best. To approach that feeling down here it Texas it has to be one of the three days a year with the temperature and humidity and wind movement are just right that it's fresh and crisp and comfortable.

As to the occupants of my comfort zone, that can vary. I know my zone will feel empty as my kids grow and go to college. I hope they don't trip over themselves trying to hurry moving out of here, and that they'll enjoy coming back for visits or staying when they need to.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: The Barden of England
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:10 PM

With you now BigPinkLad - then it's certainly 'Cider with Rosie'

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:11 PM

LOL, BPL. That's a new one on me though I do know what you mean...

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: MBSLynne
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:14 PM

Either in the deep countryside, preferably with mountains, or at least hills and lots of trees, and quietness all around, or at a folk festival singing, playing and surrounded by folkie friends

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: gnu
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:18 PM

Alas, I am childless, so I can only imagine. It must be the true joy, to hold your young. Tunes, yes, I have been there, with the audience riveted, when you can do no wrong and every note pours from your soul so easily and magnificently. And, I have been there when all hands are choking with tears of laughter in the kitchen session... and you just wait a slight bit to set them off again... and again.

But, when I sit in alone the middle of nowhere, up in Kent County, on a crisp fall dusk, with nare a strip of wind, and all the creatures in the woods, even the bugs, grow quiet, and the silence is literally deafening, so much so that you make a noise to see if sound exists, that's when I am at peace... when it feels good to be alive.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: MMario
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:25 PM

gnu - as far as I know I am also childless (at least children of my blood and seed)- which is part of why holding a baby is so special to me. I have been blessed by many who have shared their children with me - and a precious gift it is.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: CarolC
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:27 PM

Standing in the sand where the ocean meets the land. Wherever and whenever I'm with JtS. Wherever and whenever I can get really lost in my accordion playing. Bathing or showering in really good, pure, sweet spring water. Watching nature, just about anywhere. On top of Dolly Sods on a perfectly clear moonless night, when the stars are at their brightest and they seem close enough to touch. In well kept old historic cities and towns, like Savanah, Georgia. In Canada.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 04:52 PM

"But, when I sit in alone the middle of nowhere, up in Kent County, on a crisp fall dusk, with nare a strip of wind, and all the creatures in the woods, even the bugs, grow quiet, and the silence is literally deafening, so much so that you make a noise to see if sound exists, that's when I am at peace... when it feels good to be alive." gnu

Gnu, I will always be in awe of one perfect moment like that- I stood alone high in the mountains, the sun hot all around me- way below me off the precipitous cliffs hawks and turkey buzzards circled and made their cries... I felt as much a part of LIFE as the boulder beside me, as the sky above me, as the deer I could feel all around me as their dainty hoof prints in the dust attested. I didn't feel insignificant at all, rather my existence felt important. I've never had quite that transcendental feeling since.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Don Firth
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 05:52 PM

Wow! That takes a bit of thought.

I asked myself the question and I seem to have come up with a variety of situations. Being in the throes of advancing age and general decrepitude (as we all are, in one degree or another, no matter how young or old we might be), I seem to lean toward some of the more sedentary pursuits.

When I'm writing and it's coming well. When it just seems to flow out of my fingers, and after a long burst of writing, I notice that I've cranked out maybe 1,500 to 2,000 words in a relatively short time; then, when I read it after letting it sit for a day or two and I can honestly think, "Hey, that's not too bad!" I've always wanted to write (fiction, non-fiction, essays), but I just haven't had the time until lately.

Weirdly enough, sometimes when I'm watching a science program on the tube, like Nova or something on the Discovery Channel, and the subject of the program has to do with cosmology, astronomy, space travel, that sort of thing. Suddenly I want to live forever and see how it all turns out. I wish they'd run Carl Sagan's Cosmos series again.

Music. I love performing, and although I don't do all that much of it anymore, as often as I can manage I get together with friends and swap songs. When I can sing something I like, and when I reach the end of the song I can say, like with the writing, "Hey, that's not too bad," often adding, "Gee! Maybe I'm finally getting the hang of this!"

Now here's the really weird one:   I love to practice, both voice and guitar. When I start a vocal practice session all croaky and full of mud, and at the end of twenty minutes or half an hour of vocal exercises, I can feel the voice opening up and coming out nice and clear, then haul off and sing a couple of songs and they come out the way I want them to—yeah!! And with the guitar. When I first tune the beast and my fingers feel like a bunch of bananas, then after playing some warm-up exercises and going through several pages in Shearer or Carcassi, the fingers start doing what I want them to do. I try one of the classic pieces that I used to play fairly well, and if I can still get through it without screwing it up too badly, I feel pretty good about that.

Down in the Hoh Rain Forest on the Olympic Peninsula, communing with this huge tree just a few dozen yards down the path from the parking lot. . . . It's been there for maybe half a millennium or maybe longer, and when I'm there, I feel that I'm in the presence of something old and wise. Somehow, I think it knows I'm there—but relative to it, I'm sort of transitory, like the birds that light for a few moments on its branches, then fly off again, or the squirrels that skitter up and down its huge trunk. That's when I feel how ephemeral human life is—and when I would like to live forever.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: frogprince
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:07 PM

When some bonafide singer invites the audience to join, and my frog-collecting "buddy" is sitting next to me, singing so beautifully that she could just as well be the one on stage...that's pretty close to "it". When she is up front, leading a real singing crowd in something I've written (which, for me, is much too rare to become commonplace)... that is as good as it gets.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:17 PM

"Down in the Hoh Rain Forest on the Olympic Peninsula, communing with this huge tree just a few dozen yards down the path from the parking lot. . . . It's been there for maybe half a millennium or maybe longer, and when I'm there, I feel that I'm in the presence of something old and wise. Somehow, I think it knows I'm there—but relative to it, I'm sort of transitory, like the birds that light for a few moments on its branches, then fly off again, or the squirrels that skitter up and down its huge trunk. That's when I feel how ephemeral human life is—and when I would like to live forever. " Don Firth

Lovely.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:20 PM

When experiencing great love. That can occur in many circumstances, and having sex can be one of them, all right (depending with whom and how you feel about it)...so can playing music...being in the company of people you love...praying...singing...being inspired in any way whatsoever.

One can also feel very alive in moments of extreme emergency or danger, because one loves to be alive and those situations demand full attention!

It's 100% attention and focus on someone or something that makes a person feel most alive.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: freda underhill
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:22 PM

in the ocean, with the waves crashing around me..

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:41 PM

I'm know I'm gonna get in trouble for this, but...

BETWEEN SHANIA'S LEGS!!!

Yeah...

I wish.

- BDiBR

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 06:44 PM

Where do you feel most ALIVE? / Newcastle; Nude.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Amos
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 07:02 PM

The most alive moment of my life has been when I was handed my newborn daughter fresh from the womb. Someone opened a door and this Mississippi came through that no-one had ever told me about.

Nowhere near close but still never to be forgotten are moments like dawn watch at sea when the colors first appear out of the darkness; and the amazing sensation of topping a thirty foot wave in a gale and going down the other side.

And love.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: dianavan
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 07:15 PM

Several places -

On the beach alone at a very, very low tide.

Swimming at night when there is phospherescence in the water.

Waltzing in the streets of Dingle after the pub closes its doors.

In a moonlit meadow when there are billions of stars overhead.

Eating pears warmed by the sun in the garden of Alhambra.

When breakers of warm salt water crash over me and I can body surf to the beach.

Wandering the streets of Paris in the early morning.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Deckman
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 07:30 PM

In keeping with Don Firth's quite wonderful posting, I'll add a little more.

One of the most "ALIVE" moments I've had was when, after a three day climb, I reached the "High Divide," also in the Olympic National Park, just as Don mentioned. I literally stood with one foot on each side of the divide and just smiled and felt overwhelmed. Below me, in 360 degrees, fell all of the magnificant Olympic mountains, all of Puget Sound, and looking to West, I could easily see the Pacific ocean and ... the curvature of the earth!

And, remebering that this is supposed to be a music site, I'll add the following:

"ROLLING IN MY SWEET BABY'S ARMS!"

Cheers Bob(deckman)Nelson

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 07:50 PM

It appears that plain, unadulterated awe is a necessary ingredient of feeling alive. I love it.

BDinBR, I would guess you have never been alive.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: GUEST,khandu
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:01 PM

In the good old/bad old days, I was most alive, vibrantly alive, when I stood behind a pulpit as a minister of the Gospel.
Times change, people change, situations change. I guess I feel most alive now at those rare times when I am either making music with my son, Jason, or my long time best Friend, Ranger Dave.

k

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: dianavan
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:35 PM

Ebbie - For me its a sense of wonder and exhiliration.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:40 PM

That's not fair, Ebbie! Shane IS alive...from the neck down. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:48 PM

Singing to an audience of folkies, at the moment you realise that you have connected with them, and at that moment they love you. You can feel this wave of shared emotion flowing around you, and you feel ten feet tall. That's ALIVE for me.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:48 PM

Well said, Don.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:49 PM

That's scary, LH.

Dianavan, I'd say that 'wonder and exhilaration' are present in 'awe'. But that's nitpicking, of course. I agree with you.

One of the things I find fascinating is that laughter is awfully close when one is awed. It is pure joy, it wants to bubble up. Is there more to a laugh than we realize?

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:53 PM

Laughing is wonderful. There's a Guru in India called the "laughing guru". He helps people toward liberation by encouraging them to laugh. I saw a short film about it....hundreds and hundreds of people roaring with laughter, rolling around on the ground laughing...boy, was that infectious! You couldn't help but laugh yourself just watching it. I think he's onto a good thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 08:57 PM

Its never been a matter of where for me. Its more a matter of when.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 09:04 PM

Donuel, after I first posted the thread I thought that the title might be an unfortunate one- I thought somebody might say: 'In my nether parts." Luckily, we're all more grown up than that... *G*

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: freda underhill
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 09:30 PM

- when marching the streets as part of a mass demonstration, among people with banners, people singing, shouting and chanting, striding purposefully onwards

- at Windjana Gorge, watching blue water, and dozens of Johnson's River crocodiles sunning themselves on the white sands, with the vast red gorge rising up behind, under a very blue sky

- round a campfire, under the stars, listening to someone play the concertina

- having a cup of tea with someone i've known, laughed and cried with, and trusted for a very long time

- crawling about with my beautiful granddaughter

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Metchosin
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 10:18 PM

When I'm pumped up on chemicals....like... serotonin, oxytocin, dopamine or adrenaline....I think that covers most bases.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Metchosin
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 10:29 PM

Oh! That was ..."where" do you feel most alive? Any place or event that will get that stuff flowing. A lot have been covered by most posts here.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Janie
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 11:00 PM

In the garden. In the woods. In the river. In the middle of a therapy session when a lightbulb comes on for a client.

But I realized as I read this that flying down a fast hill on a sled trumps all the above.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: GUEST,Art Thieme
Date: 22 Jul 05 - 11:03 PM

It depends.

If you mean the state of being/consciousness called Flow, as it was enunciated by Mihaly Czhicksentmihyi(spelling?) in his book with that title, then I have to say it was when I was on stage presenting my found songs, and everything was clicking better than ever. As M.C. said, and I paraphrase: "Time truncates and/or diminishes. It's passing becomes nearly un-noticeable--almost an easy and accessable proof of Einstein's relativity stuff. Everything seems heightened--almost glowing. You can do no wrong in that zone.---And, then, next, you find, fantastically and amazingly, that you have an encore or two to do."

That sounds to me sort of like what cocaine must be like for some.

On another tack: I never felt so alive as I did many times when I was singing five months a year, every other day, for ten solid years, on Mississippi River steamboats. It wasn't so much when I was playing, then, as it was when I was free to luxuriate in the serenity, the colors, of the river---no matter whether it was during a storm, or just a lovely and tranquil day out there. It could be sublime!

On the back of John Hartford's fiddle, a photo of which is in my "forty years of folk scene photos" website, he had an inscription inlaid around the bottom of   the instrument's back saying: Nothing Is Real But The River, And All Else Is Sham.

----- I understood how he felt!

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Stephen L. Rich
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 02:40 AM

When I'm on stage.

Stephen Lee

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Spot
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 04:30 AM

Hallo everybody...

                  Howling down forest tracks on my Honda **
                  Getting a new harmony right
                  Getting anything musical/vocal right
                  Howling down forest tracks on my Honda
                   "      "    "      "    " "   "
                   "      "    "      "    " "   "
                  Getting jeans that fit
                  HDFTOMH....


         

                   ** Only where legal, of course!!
      
                        Regards to all...Spot    :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: GUEST,Ellenpoly
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 05:17 AM

In water floating on my back looking up at the sky

On water paddling a kyack and singing for the humpbacks to come

In a Redwood Forest, or any forest for that matter, listening to the birds

Looking at flowers and smelling them

Taking a big breath of pure air anywhere in nature

Listening to classical music on my headphones and walking around a beautiful city

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Midchuck
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 02:37 PM

Sex, as best I remember.

Singing and playing guitar, most particularly when it's for an audience that is actually listening and likes it.

Hearing a song for the first time and realizing that this is one that I have to learn and sing, I have no choice. (This tends to make those close to me wish they were dead, however, since I usually play the song over 100 or more times, then start trying to sing it, very badly, before I really know it.)

Back when I was running a lot, the feeling you get after the first hour or so of running, like you're sort of floating, or planing above the surface like a fast motorboat...I still remember that fifteen years later.

That same feeling cross-country skiing - which I still do get.

Downhill skiing, especially in bumps, when it works. It usually doesn't. And I don't do it much anymore because it costs too much and I'm to brittle.

Waking up on a weekend morning when the sun is out.

A really good, powerful dump. (Before you curse me for a crude slob, ask yourself honestly if it isn't true.)

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 03:25 PM

I have lots of answers to this question and many resemble some of the answers here. One of my favorites though, hasn't been mentioned. I feel most alive when I'm laying next to my husband and we are both recovering from a giant tickle fight....still out of breath and giggly...

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Deckman
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 03:35 PM

Oh ... I just remembered another momentous moment! Many years ago, I had surgery to remove a very serious growth on my foot. The expected 20 minute surgery lasted five hours.

During the recovery period the doctor told me that I would probably never be able to hike again, let alone run.

I said to myself, "Myself! That man's full of crap. He's never run into a stubborn Finn before!"

I started walking, very slowly, then trotting, then jogging, and then running. Seven months after my surgery, I stood on top of Mt Rainer ...12,470 feet high! To say that that was a very "alive" moment for me would be an understatement. CHEERS, Bob(deckman)Nelson

Subject: RE: BS: Where do you feel most ALIVE?
From: Deckman
Date: 23 Jul 05 - 03:37 PM

... and there's the first time I kissed "Bride Judy" but you probably don't want to hear about that! Bob