Sometimes it is the back of a drum that first indicates the energies that will be coming to its call.
During the grounding ceremony I conduct with a newly made drum, sometimes a tiny passenger climbs aboard and sticks to the wet skin in such a way that the energy dries with the skin. This autumn-frosted red huckleberry leaf brings an ancient lineage of service as food to the animals and people of the BC coastal rainforest.
When the thongs that make the interlacement pattern for the drum's back holder are woven into place, the energies present may become framed in such a way as to jump up into awareness.
After the hide is completely dry, I finish a frame drum with a coat of raw Shea butter. This is worked into all outer surfaces of the skin as well as the lacing. The Shea butter lifts the cloud of the lime solution, so the patterns remaining belong to the drum and not to the process. Each step in this way to finish a frame drum is really about lifting the veil between us and Mystery, so that revelations emerge.
As a birthday gift to a new drum, I recently have begun using my Journey Oracle cards to conduct a reading about how the drum might be coming to be a spiritual companion--see you next week with a new Oracle card reading for this drum.
