Culture Projects: Building and Exploring, Together
The Pigweed Zine
I believe ideas and humans (and most plants) are not inherently harmful. Each can be a source of community, cultural, personal, and spiritual power. However, when our strengths are leveraged to create a monoculture or to seek/maintain control, humans and ideas (and some plants) can end up becoming toxic.
Pigweed aims to highlight the complexity of truth and humanity. Beautiful, abundant, prolific, powerful, capable, AND, when exposed to or viewed through a lens of perpetual harm or desire to control, humanity has a capacity and knack for concentrating what it’s fed.
Pigweed is the folkname given to various plants in the Amaranth genus - think gluten- free super-grain. Recently these incredible plants have been getting a lot of attention on the Noxious weed list - Palmer Amaranth, Redroot amaranth. They are not inherently “dangerous,” they are accumulators. Under normal growing conditions, pigweeds benefit the soil health, succession and other plants growing around them by drawing up otherwise unavailable nutrients. Under heavily controlled conditions, they do what they do best —keep accumulating, even to toxic levels. Once worshipped by the Aztecs as a source of community sustenance, and spiritual empowerment, Amaranth was banned by the Spanish colonizers with the intention of disempowering the people and gaining control.
In this issue:
Plants N' Things: Rethinking food
Health: The impact of lying on our psyches, bodies and lives
Spirituality: What is a pagan anyway?
Gender and Identity: Definitions and Stories
Poetry and Art: Various Authors and Artists
Society: Highlighting Propoganda
Technology: AI and Algorithms
Environment: Water
For The Brave: Two unique challenges that foster personal discovery
The Boathouse (new photo coming soon)
From the time I was a small child I have enjoyed creating spaces where people can feel free, and imagination and creativity can flourish. I have continued to pursue opportunities and careers that have some element of intentional culture creating and the freedom to facilitate or provide space for others to explore their dreams.
Aside from being a functioning raft shop and boat storage space in the Summer months, Wyoming River Trips has become a place where people feel they can be themselves, feel welcome and can explore what’s next. We have hosted many informal “dream and schemes” and had many impromptu creative times. We are currently exploring becoming a venue and community space as a means of continuing to explore with others. Boathouse Riffs are intended as a time to express/ practice/ share/ try out, poems, songs, writings, performance, and recipes with other creators who can offer encouragement and supportive meaningful feedback. The main goal is to hold space and practice iterating together—challenging the idea that we have to have it all figured out and know where we are going to end up, before we start.
A Boathouse Show will be a listening room style scheduled performance. It will be attended by reservation and prepaid cover for a limited number of guests. Members will have priority of attendance. There will be locally cheffed food and beverage options. Performances will range from local artists to routing through artists, poets and performers. We are working on our 2027 line up.
Ethnobotany Raft Trip
Each year Wyoming River Trips and Wyoming Rivers Co-op host this trip for one or two days. You can view the next scheduled trip at the “trip” link.
Check out Native Memory Project and John Mionczynski’s other projects, regardless of if you join us for the float trip. This is an incredible knowledge base.