I went to the Bellingen Energy Festival and what a Festival it was. The Festival is in its sixth year and has previously focused on renewable energy. This year they expanded that to looking at sustainable communities so it included an art exhibition, contributions from Transitions Bellingen, the community gardens, many kids activities and a myriad of other local businesses and projects .... and was in conjunction run with the best local Growers Market I have seen! Dick Smith and Bob Brown were the headline acts.
I spent a good six hours there, mostly sitting in the shade chatting with people (for logistical reasons) but there was certainly wandering when I could. At one stage I got co-opted into helping supervise the kids (say 7 - 9 year olds) who were making paper mache .... which ended up in me getting paper mached and all of us laughing uproariously (and a number of fruit bowls made, as well as fruit and vegetables to fill them so there was some constructive work being done as well as the silly play).
What gets me most is that I am home here in this town. I have known it for a while but it is the first town ever I have felt at home (I have enjoyed living in many towns but always knew they were temporary stops on the journey of life) and it still surprises me when something happens to remind me.
I probably knew to talk to about a third of the large crowd, and could identify others as familiar. Obviously there were still lots I didn't know - be they locals or visitors to town. I spent the day talking to farmers and producers and chefs and moms and business people and artists and children and musicians and gardeners and friends and and and. Some of the conversations were deep and meaningfuls, others were on local food, some were on catching up on various projects I/we are involved in, still others were general chit chat.
There was very much laughter. There was much hugging of hello. There were promises of catching up again soon over coffee or wine or produce. After all of my years on this planet, I have found where I belong. I am home.
