Howl for Community

I live in Santa Rosa, pretty much the center area of town. At 8 PM every night I join with maybe 15 people at all distances from where I am in mutual howling. I don't know any of these people. I can hear them. We howl for two to five minutes. I feel such a powerful sense of community. We are howling in support of the doctors, nurses, ambulance workers and EMTs, police, fire, post office workers, clerks and all others who are doing their jobs so the rest of us are safe and protected. We are a community. We howl together as one to affirm our community. Join us.

Star Man

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Posted in reply to the post by Star Man:

I live in Santa Rosa, pretty much the center area of town. At 8 PM every night I join with maybe 15 people at all distances from where I am in mutual howling....

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Thinking about the controversy that has roiled Waccoland recently I realize that I have not heard one person scream "You're all a bunch of libtards!" when we are howling. No one has yelled, "Does George Soros pay you?" No one blasts an air horn to drown us out and then boasted "Boy I really owned the libs just now." Thankfully we do not have jack-booted, heavily armed, camo-wearing, 'Merican-flag carrying protestors grunting as loudly as they can to express their hatred for the people whom we are celebrating, people who are trying to save everyone's life regardless of their political orientation.

It is a beautiful sight to experience when authentic community suddenly bursts forth. Join us for a community howl this evening at 8. Open your window in Petaluma, in San Rafael. I've been told they howl up in Humboldt. I hope to hear you.

Star Man

Yes, I love to go out to the corner here at Palm and High St in Sebastopol and join in the small chorus of howlers. If I'm hung up on Zoom at 8 like I am on Weds. night with the Love Choir--join us--then I just step out on my porch and HOOOOOOWWWWWL!!

Lilith

I first heard the howl in Petaluma. My daughter sent me a video of the sound out her window. My first thought was: how silly... millennial techies with nothing to do while working from home. I had a motherly yuk.

I replayed the video and let the sound wash over me. I began to tear up with an emotion I couldn't understand at first.

I understand it now on a level of existence rarely felt by humans. This is animal, primal. This is life acknowledging that we are all one force. It says: I am here alone in this house. I hear you alone in your house. We are connected in our lonely isolation and can count on each other to check in at 8 pm every evening, like the church bells ringing out the Angelus at noon, like jungle drums cascading down the lenghth of the continent... it says: I am a part of something bigger.

You can hear the smiles in the howls.

Ahhh, that's so lovely. I love the howls here in Sebastopol, too. Sometimes I just step out on my little porch if I'm busy Zooming and join in from home, other times I walk up the block to the corner where I can hear many more neighbors out howling. Esp. sweet in this full moon time. Aloha, Lilith

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Posted in reply to the post by Chris Dec:

...You can hear the smiles in the howls.

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While preparing for the June harvest of our organic boysenberries, here on our remote farm on a dead-end street slightly South of Sebastopol, we and our neighbors have been howling. It is fun way to communicate and be in touch with one's neighbors. HOWL ON!
Aloha

here west of town the howling has, unfortunately, been freaking out the wildlife. personally I wish people would sing instead.

Curious which wildlife is being freaked out by the howling? I had one evening where I opened my front door to join in and started the howl even before the door was completely open...when I looked up-in the middle of my howl-about 5 deer were standing there in a calm stillness, looking at me with interest! I've lived out here with the deer for 20 years, so I know when they are freaked out...so just to say, doesn't seem to be bothering my deer friends in this neck of the woods. I am sincerely interested to know which of our relations is getting disturbed..?

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Posted in reply to the post by briahn:

here west of town the howling has, unfortunately, been freaking out the wildlife. personally I wish people would sing instead.

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So deeply grateful for community, for the 8 pm connection of sounds that weave through the trees and the hills...some nights we have bells and conch shells joining in symphony with our human animal howling. I feel you all out there...I want to find you and bow in gratitude and give you a big hug! It means so much to me to know you are all here...we ARE the ones we have been waiting for...together, keeping strong heart and bright spirit! Sending love and blessings of well being out to you!

:heart:

Exuberance

The feeling I get when I howl and hear others howling is exuberance. Exuberance is not something I feel very often in America. I felt exuberant at the Women's March. I felt exuberance at the demonstration against guns. Long, long before that I felt exuberance when Kennedy was nominated and then elected. I felt hope then, a relief that we would not go to war in Vietnam. That hope ended when the Military Industrial Political Complex assassinated him and we did go to war in 'Nam for no purpose other than to enrich Big Defense. A long line of presidents who did not inspire exuberance--okay there was a twinge when Carter was elected, but he got so played by the Republicans--but GHWB, no exuberance. Clinton, nope. W., C'mon, really? Some exuberance over Obama, but his political actions destroyed any semblance of exuberance.

Now Trump. Depression is the antithesis of exuberance. Trump and the Republicans and the DINOs are destroying any hope of policies that would result in exuberance. So, I love that in enclaves up and down the west coast of America exuberance is breaking out. Pure affirmation of life, of love. We are here! We believe in values we acquired in Berkeley or Marin or Sonoma in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. We celebrate life in the midst of a soul crushing conservatism. Howl! Howl for life! Howl on, my fellow citizens. Howl on.

Star Man

Howl On!! And I love it when sometimes a neighborhood dog or two joins in!! Aloha, Lilith

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Posted in reply to the post by Star Man:

Exuberance...

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Posted in reply to the post by briahn:

here west of town the howling has, unfortunately, been freaking out the wildlife. personally I wish people would sing instead.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9J5Zt2Obko

So, if you wish people would sing, then sing! The people who are howling feel empowered when they howl. If singing would empower you, then sing! I encourage you to sing. Sing for the doctors and nurses. Sing for the EMTs and firemen. Sing for all the people who are going to essential jobs that keep us functioning during a pandemic. Sing. Sing. Sing.

The image that comes up for me when I join neighbors in howling is of wolves. There have been videos on the internet of wolves howling. That's what it feels like to me. I howl and then listen for responses and then howl my rejoinder and listen again for return howls. American society is so fragmented in the present era and so it is doubly (or more) rewarding to know that at least in this regard my local society is united in support of our caregivers. Ow...oooh. Ow..Ow...Oww....ooooooooo.

Star Man

Every night at 8, in our animal selves, with wolf wisdom guiding us.

We are the wolf pack, strong and connected!

AAwwwoooooooooooooooooooooo!!

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Posted in reply to the post by Star Man:

The image that comes up for me when I join neighbors in howling is of wolves. ...

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I'm tired of howling. It was fun at first, neighbor kids, clearly antsy from being kept in, it was fun to support them in an outlet for natural frustration. Now they are bored too, and our pitiful meuling is totally wining. My own young ones never got to howl, to close to bedtime. Priviledged.

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Posted in reply to the post by rossmen:

I'm tired of howling.

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How sad. Sounds depressed. Tired of howling? Yeah, I know people who got tired of not using drugs or drinking alcohol, people who got tired of going to meetings even though the meetings were saving their lives. I feel sad hearing that your children were not allowed to howl. Sounds joyless. So what if it was too close to bedtime? Seems arbitrary to me. Just my observation. BTW, that's how I was raised and I am so grateful that I have shed the restrictive carapace of my parents' conservatism. Oooooowwooooo. Ow Ow Ow...oooooo.

Star Man

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Posted in reply to the post by wildinspired:

Every night at 8, in our animal selves, with wolf wisdom guiding us.

We are the wolf pack, strong and connected!

AAwwwoooooooooooooooooooooo!!

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IaYm3NjJnM

Keeping bedtime routine in the semirural area where I live, and howls would not be answered, is more important in uncertain times. Where I've been working, and the neighbor small ones howl regularly, I've noticed the change in tone over time. You assume much from my words.

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Posted in reply to the post by Star Man:

How sad. Sounds depressed. Tired of howling? ... I feel sad hearing that your children were not allowed to howl. Sounds joyless. So what if it was too close to bedtime? Seems arbitrary to me. ...

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