Read about my experience at Abundance’s annual Death Faire.
It’s not that you would know that this place, The Plant, exists, necessarily. At the feed and seed in Pittsboro, you take the road across the street, Industrial Parkway Drive, which then turns into Lorax Drive. You drive a long ways through a cut over area that is growing back. until you turn the corner and a whole alternative-style village appears on the grounds of a former aircraft parts manufacturer. People are there, they walk around and fill the tables outside of the bars and restaurants that look like they were just set down in the middle of the woods. It’s a beautiful site. There is a hemp shop, a gallery, a Honey Wine manufacturer. The office for a not-for-profit incubator, Abundance, sits at the center.of it all.
Yesterday, the Plant, under the auspices Abundance, held its fourth annual Death Faire. As you know I was invited to show some work at Smelt Gallery, but there was a lot more to the festival, speakers, take a selfie in a coffin, a New Orleans-style Jazz Funeral parade, even an organization that helps to preserve rare owls. It was a day of bright costumes, skulls, lacy parasols, and honest talk about that most taboo of subjects, Death.
One of the moments where this honesty made itself apparent was my friend Brooksie’s launch for her new book, Heartspace: Real Life Stories on Death and Dying. The book is an anthology of people generous enough to share their widely different experiences of death. Contributors read moving passages and the audience listened with intent. It was an intense reading due to the subject matter, but the event was held with a moving, quiet respect that made listening possible and even necessary. I came out of the reading feeling better about my circumstance, a part of the human world rather than an outcast because of my disease.
I found it so heartening the gallows humor, the pure enjoyment of a topic like the end of life. Since, I have been going through the trials and tribulations of cancer, it has been important for me to keep a light spirit. It helps me enjoy the days I have. Death Faire I’ll mark as a great day in that regard, and I so hope I make it next year.
If you would like to read more about my show at Death Faire visit my post on the Abundance blog.