The 8th Annual Thank The Lake Day

    Joseph FireCrow

Thank The Lake Day is an annual event that takes place at Sears Park in EastHampton every third Sunday in May to give thanks to Lake Pocotopaug. “It’s about raising awareness, we need to pay attention to our planet,” explained Priscilla Connors producer and founder of Thank The Lake Day. Connors is a dynamic and creative women. She is owner of Positively Clean, a unique cleaning service company out of East Hampton, who offers nontoxic organic cleaners and sacred space clearings. Sacred space clearing is a way of using energy to clear a home, building, or natural landscape of negative energies. With a variety of techniques Priscilla clears the land’s energy, and then cleans the home or business with organic nontoxic supplies that she makes with pure essential oils. “If you know about Reiki, this is the easiest way to explain it. It’s Reiki for the land, using symbols and co-creating, by working with the land and the earth’s magnetic grids to bring your property to it’s highest frequency and vibration,” explained Priscilla. Encouraged by her husband to write down her cleaning recipes and sacred space clearing techniques she wrote a book, The Field Guide To Vibrational Cleaning. “Positively Clean addresses the self, the home, the community, and our sacred Earth.” PositivelyClean.com

 

When Priscilla and her family brought a home on Lake Pocotopaug she fell in love with the lake and it’s natural beauty. Lake Pocotopaug whose name was derived from the Pequot Indians is a 512 acre natural lake. Back in the early part of the 20th century Lake Pocotopaug was a resort community that attracted hundreds of tourists during the summer season. Unfortunately the lake has seen better days. Each year there are large algae blooms. According to Wikipedia,“In recent years the lake has become a place of ecological study due to the large scale algae blooms that resulted in 2000. Tests have shown that longstanding shoreline development and fertilizer use are causing increasing issues.” In the early spring and summer the lake is clear. From the beginning of July to the end of the season the lake is green with algae, “ The algae blooms because of the phosphor. It’s like a green infection,” explained Connors. The phosphor comes from water runoff. Lake Pocotopaug is in a watershed and whenever people use toxic chemicals there is runoff into the lake. Gas powered motor boats add to the problem as well. The algae was so bad one year that there was a large fish die off. In an effort to help clean the lake and educate the community, Priscilla put her space clearing techniques to work and produced Thank The Lake Day, now in it’s 8th consecutive year. The first year of Thank the Lake Day Priscilla did a sacred space clearing of Sears Park. The following year Sears Park was awarded a large grant to improve the park. “Ever since then, every year, there’s always something a little bit more done to the park to improve it. That’s what happens with sacred space clearing, it may happen right away, or it may take a few years, but there’s always positive change.” 

When the idea to produce Thank The Lake Day came to Priscilla, she reached out to Joseph FireCrow. FireCrow is a renowned Native American flute player, he won a Grammy as guest artist on David Darling’s “Prayer For Compassion”, as well as seven Native American Music Awards. Connors met FireCrow while attending various Native American Pow Wows. A Pow Wow is a gathering of North America’s Native people.  Priscilla explained, “When I got the idea for Thank The Lake Day, Joseph FireCrow immediately came to my mind. I contacted him and I said, our lake is in peril, we need to bring awareness to the people about it, and educate them on the watershed and better ways to maintain it organically, and he said, “Absolutely!” Now eight years later Joseph FireCrow still comes to share his flute, drum and stories to raise awareness about the importance of the planet’s health. For FireCrow, caring for our community goes beyond our backyard, and this caring is essential for our environment today. So many people are detached from the earth. Using his flute and drum Joseph shares stories and songs from his ancestors. “The Flutes that I play evoke strong emotions and thought.” He went on to describe how music can be a means to open people up, to connect them to each other, and the planet. “ The drum represents the heartbeat of grandmother earth. The heart beat of our people. When we drum we are the earth,”  he said. Since the first Thank the Lake Day eight years ago Joseph and Priscilla have seen the water change on Lake Pocotopaug, the return of wildlife, and more people coming each year. “ I would not imagine it would be where it is today. The involvement from the community all the artists and artisans that want to be there to share in our humanity, and how we connect with our grandmother earth, and with all the animals. I am simply amazed!”

Festivities begin at 1PM with local music, yoga, and vendors. There will be food for sale by Higher Grounds. Stop and Shop donates flower petals to spread on the lake. Also, Positively Clean will be hosting a soap drive to benefit East Hampton’s Food Bank. For more information visit Thank The Lake Day on FB, or visit positivelyclean.com