Driftwood Conversations

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, Hilary Sloane speaks with Isha Marla, a 14-year-old student from Portland, Oregon, whose curiosity and discipline have already led her to develop a biodegradable, seaweed-based fabric called Alginifab—an alternative to fast fashion.
But this conversation goes beyond innovation. It’s a thoughtful exchange about creativity, persistence, community, and what it looks like to take a young person seriously as a whole human being. Isha speaks with clarity, steadiness, and a grounded sense of self—offering a refreshing reminder of what becomes possible when we listen without projecting or rushing to define outcomes.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with my longtime friend Steven Cuden, a writer whose creative life has spanned Broadway, television, film, and teaching. Our friendship stretches back more than four decades, and that history allows us to speak honestly about what it really means to stay with the work. We talk about doubt, discipline, revision, and the uncomfortable moments that shape a creative life—not as failures, but as necessary companions. This is a conversation about endurance, friendship, and the long game of making art.

This week’s episode of Driftwood Conversations steps away from a traditional guest format and turns toward listening to the moment we’re living in, to the questions people are quietly asking themselves, and to what’s emerging beneath uncertainty. As the year comes to a close, I reflect on themes of exhaustion, clarity, simplification, and integrity, sharing observations about how people are choosing to live, what they’re building, and what they’re letting go of. The episode closes with poetry by Stanley Moss, read by me, and an original poem written and read by Miri Hunter. We are inviting you to pause, listen, and rest together before stepping into the year ahead.

Changing the Dial: A Conversation with Charles Ftacek
In this week’s Driftwood Conversation, I sit down with Charles Ftacek, a clinical nutritionist, apothecary maker, and doctoral student whose life journey weaves together hardship, healing, science, and spirit.
You may know Charles from the Joshua Tree Trading Post, where he pours tea with an open heart and an easy laugh. But behind his grounded presence is a remarkable story of survival, transformation, and purpose. Charles shares candidly about growing up with depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts; finding himself in and out of rehab centers; and the diagnosis that changed everything.
In our conversation, he reflects on walking away from a promising country music career, rebuilding his life through food and functional medicine, discovering the root causes of illness, and learning how environment and lifestyle shape our well-being. We explore men’s health, emotional resilience, the mind–body connection, and the wisdom he’s gathered through years of personal and clinical experience.
This is a conversation about re-patterning, reclaiming health, and the courage it takes to choose a new path.It’s raw, illuminating, and full of heart.
Listen in, and let Charles remind you that healing is never a straight line—it's a life’s work, shaped by inner listening and the environments we choose to live in.

Ceremonial facilitator and coach Hester Van Hoeven Ward joins me to discuss spiritual awakenings, motherhood, breaking toxic patterns, and returning to herself in the desert. We trace her journey from New York and Venice Beach to Landers, Kenya, and back to Joshua Tree, exploring how joy can endure—a quiet flame—even during our darkest nights. We also briefly touch on her work with Missing and Murdered Indigenous Peoples and what it means to live as an ally, a mother, and a mystic in everyday life.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, James Morrison invites us into a radically simple and deeply human approach to acting; one rooted not in performance but in presence. We talk about letting the actor disappear, surrendering to the story, and creating from the belief that you are already enough. James reflects on the quiet moments that shaped his craft, the practice of returning to oneself through art, and the courage it takes to stop abandoning who we are. It’s a conversation about acting, yes — but even more, it’s about living with honesty, attention, and grace.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with artist Jed Ochmanek, whose work explores perception, presence, and the act of seeing. Our conversation moves through art, awareness, and the subtle ways the environment shapes understanding. It’s a dialogue about attention—how we look, what we see, and what remains unseen.
This episode features music from Dreams of Sleep and Wakes of Sound by Merz, Laraaji, and Shahzad Ismaily.
Listen on Podbean, or find Driftwood Conversations on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube to follow more stories about creativity, consciousness, and connection.

Driftwood Conversations with Bernard Leibov
In this episode, Hilary Sloane speaks with Bernard Leibov — artist, curator, and founder of BoxoPROJECTS in Joshua Tree, as well as co-founder of the Joshua Treenial: Desert Futures.
Born in South Africa, Bernard’s story moves through the contrasting worlds of apartheid and awakening, the energy of New York’s art and finance scenes, and finally, to the open silence of the Mojave Desert. Here, he discovered a sense of belonging that changed how he lives and creates.
This conversation explores what it means to build community through art, how silence and vulnerability can be forms of creative practice, and the tension between supporting others’ visions and sustaining your own.
For Bernard, art isn’t just what hangs on a wall—it’s how you live, how you listen, and how you belong to a place.
Listen as we talk about transformation, belonging, and the power of the desert to strip life down to what truly matters.
Learn more about BoxoPROJECTS and The Joshua Treenial: Desert Futures at boxoprojects.com and joshuatreenial.com.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with Sailene Ossman, a pioneering voice in plant medicine and conscious healing. Sailene’s path began with a near-fatal car accident at nineteen—an experience that reshaped her understanding of life, pain, and purpose. Out of that trauma emerged a deep calling to help others find balance and relief through the healing power of plants and fungi. For decades, she’s been a compassionate advocate, guiding people toward natural wellness long before cannabis or mushroom medicine entered mainstream dialogue. Our conversation moves through resilience, service, and the wisdom that comes from walking between worlds—science and spirit, pain and possibility, grief and renewal.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with artist and energy worker Abigail Kochunas, whose creative and spiritual journey blurs the lines between art, healing, and the unseen world. Abigail paints, acts, writes, and works with energy—bridging the physical and the spiritual through her deep sensitivity and intuitive gifts. We talk about what it means to be born open, how creativity becomes a form of communication with life itself, and how staying sensitive in a noisy world can be both a challenge and a calling. This is a conversation about presence, listening, and the quiet power of living from the heart.