This is our spell for the season: the cheapest, richest gift you can give. Picture your most powerful council, and then write a love letter of recommendation for the person you most want your council to know, in the ways that you know them. Amplify the pleasure of storytelling, story-weaving the bonds between us all. F*ck capitalism and sing of your love. Because “love is an action” as the great Spirit bell hooks taught us, and it is an action that re-enchants the world. Merry Merry and thank you for listening. RIP bell hooks.
Amy on Risa: Risa Dickens is an explorer … she’s the rare type of human who can navigate with equal grace through forest trails and city streets, mainframes and mind maps, in darkness and light, through the real and surreal.
In her education and career(s) she has consistently integrated technology and humanity, building communities and creating spaces where creativity is actionable, where communication is essential, where every moment is an opportunity for enchantment and activism.
Risa enacts a blended triple goddess in all her work. At once enthusiastic and energetic, warm and nurturing, staid and wise.
Travelling through space and time with rooted intelligence and thoughtful confidence, she is always discovering new aspects of both her internal and external worlds.
Risa is a great Sage in the making. She draws her own maps to guide her course, but lucky for us all, she doesn’t consider a journey complete until she has shared what she learned along the way.
Risa on Amy: Amy is a cloud of fireflies around a bonfire. When I first saw her she was singing in front of two drum kits, screaming electric guitars, a wall of monitors turned all the way up, and she soared over. it. all. Amy is a thunderbird. Her voice and presence called the ghosts out of that old firetrap venue to keen in polyphony their sacred and profane truths. That’s what she does. She calls out the truth. When we first met it was in a tiny, grubby greenroom backstage in another old firetrap. I asked if I could join her, and she said do you mind if I smoke (as she rolled one up) and I said: let’s. Plants, and a backroom art-making vibe, have fashioned our friendship ever since. She is best friends with trees and toads. She calls out the art in you and she is that perfect collaborator who always follows through.
Amy was born a Witch. She is an oracle and an unapologetic mean aunty and a lifesaving friend who will cut your bullshit at the knees, while in her other hand she offers you the pure gold she saw in your sinews. She has had her heart and other organs wrenched and tortured by the world’s injustice, but it only rooted her more deeply in the vast power of this moment. Her vast power in every moment. She is a magnet for people who love to laugh and make music and triumph love and tell the fucking truth. Amy is a mountain, and a windsong, and the song always says: Tell The Truth. Tell The Truth. Tell The Truth.
