Spain has a *lot* of Fiestas. And, since I think that providing excuses to party down is a Good Thing in a culture, this once-a-month major Fiesta thing really fits well into my lifestyle.
This particular Fiesta is supposedly the Catalan party-down long weekend of the year, and as such "feels" a little different than previous Fiestas this summer. Most of the rest of them were orig- inally religious in nature, and thus still have a slightly stodgy feel to them. This one feels more like, "We're Catalan and we're still here after centuries of barbarians trying to make us fit into their culture and give up our own, and this is our weekend to party. Be warned." For some odd cosmic reason, English tourists of the gay persuasion seem to feel a solidarity with this Catalan joie de vivre, because the town is just *full* of them this weekend. But it's also full of English tourists of the straight female persuasion, so I'm not complaining. I'm wearing my gaudiest Tommy Bahama shirt while sitting here at the Budda Bar typing away, and I've been getting a lot of interested glances anyway, more than usual. And from the women. Cool. Maybe this Fiesta attracts a higher class of tourist. Or a lonelier one. Whatever. It's a neat day, and the pheromone level in the air is so high it's probably testable, and it promises to be a good party. I think healthy cultures *have* parties. One of the ways that I could tell that the TMO had gone off the dharmic rails was that it stopped having parties. They started having "celebrations" instead. Deadly *serious* celebratoins, during which having actual fun seemed to be Off The Program. Call me an old hippie, but I *like* having fun. I *like* getting together with my friends for no other reason *than* to party and have fun. That seems to me to echo the flow of dharma I feel in the universe. I don't get the feeling that the universe "wants" me to take it all seriously, or myself seriously. If the universe has a sentience of its own, I suspect it wants me and all of its component sentient parts to party down as often and as heartily as possible. I think that the universe is one big party animal. One thing you can say about the Rama - Frederic Lenz guy was that he knew how to throw a party. He under- stood the seriousness that spiritual seekers tended to impose upon them selves, and he did his best to alleviate that seriousness at regular intervals. We'd fly to Maui and have a Gong Show on the beach while drinking Mai-tais. We'd go on a hike to a power place in the desert on the Fourth Of July and be served ice cream cones, secretly carried out in their backpacks by him and a few trusted souls, packed in dry ice. We'd go en masse to movies, or to concerts by Tangerine Dream, and afterwards basically take over the nearest restaurant and party till dawn. I think parties play an important part in the life of a spiritual seeker. There have got to be situations in which you are allowed and encouraged to "let your hair down" and just be your self. Drop the roles you have imposed upon yourself as you pursue your sadhana and just have FUN for a while. Tomorrow you can go back to being all serious, if you have to. But maybe you won't feel you have to.
