Ann Kreilkamp

After receiving a doctorate in philosophy in 1972 from Boston University, I was hired to teach full time at an experimental college in California. After one year I was fired, as “too experimental.” I then became a student of astrology, working and writing in that field for over two decades. Along the way I founded and published three experimental magazines, one of which, “Crone Chronicles: A Journal of Conscious Aging” (1989-2001), was twice nominated for “Utne Reader”‘s annual awards. (www.bbimedia.com)At the end of 2008, I agreed to serve for three years as Founding Editor for a new crone magazine, “Crone: Women Coming of Age” that publishes twice per year. That service is now done!My book, “This Vast Being: A Voyage through Grief and Exaltation,” which tells of the multidimensional experiences during my first year of “conscious grieving” after my husband died of a heart attack, was released in March, 2007, and received a Best Book award from USA Book News in 2008 (www.tendrepress.com). I lived for 20 years in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, most of that time in a 20-foot diameter yurt surrounded by wild animals. My forays into art started there, when I knew I needed to enter “beginner’s mind,” and art was the most scary place that I could go.I moved to Bloomington in August of 2002, four months before my husband died of a heart attack and left me alone and bereft in a new, and, I discovered, sweetly nourishing town. I live in “Green Acres,” where I’ve established the GANG (Green Acres Neighborhood Garden). I work with others to transform our neighborhood into a sustainable urban village. (www.ganggarden.com, www.greenacresneighbors.com, www.ganecovillage.org).I was a member of the Initiating Group for Transition Bloomington (www.transitionbloomington.org) and continue as Vice-President of the Association for Regenerative Culture (www.arculture.org)In early 2010, after a seven year sabbatical, I returned — very part time! — to my profession as a professional astrologer. In January 2011, noticing that I belong to two cultures, one metaphysical and the other pemacultural, I launched a website/blog at exopermaculture.com that bridges/blends Above and Below. This blog is very active, featuring about five posts per day where I either post original material or material from others with original commentary. (www.exopermaculture.com)In February and March of 2013, I traveled to Southeast Asia, to learn Vipassana Meditation in Thailand and tour the places in India and Nepal where the Buddha was born, received enlightenment, taught his first students, and died. (Chom Tong Insight Meditation Center: www.dhammathai.org/e/meditation/page28.php)I see my life as a constantly evolving experimental process, my actions in the outer world in response to ongoing inner promptings.