Driftwood Conversations

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.

In this Driftwood Conversations episode, Lia, a homeschooled researcher gathering an oral history of Morongo Basin creatives, and Kiki, a traveler, musician, watercolor lover, and aspiring teacher, offer a glimpse into the lives of teens and local culture today. We discuss self-directed learning, retro music, and surf culture, as well as the impact of social media on attention and confidence. We explore what it truly means to be “best friends” and why documenting this moment in Joshua Tree’s art scene is important. There’s college dreaming, band practice, Swiss chocolate, Argentine meals, and yes… a cameo of favorite desserts.

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with Jef Harmatz—news director and morning show co-host at Z107.7 in Joshua Tree. Many of you know Jef as the quick wit behind your morning news, but his creative life extends far beyond radio. He’s been a cartoonist, a cook, and now a podcaster in his own right.
Our conversation weaves through art, humor, and the anxiety of making a living as a creative person. Jef reminds us that the value of creative work isn’t about chasing perfection—it’s about showing up for the process itself. From comics to hot dogs to community radio, his story is a reminder that creativity lives not in the product, but in the act of making.

Hunter Prosper is a nurse, storyteller, and now author of Stories From a Stranger, a collection born from his journey of asking hundreds of people to share their lives with him. You can follow his work and ongoing storytelling on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. 

In this episode of Driftwood Conversations, I sit down with Virginia Campo—a Colombian-born community builder whose life has carried her across continents, love, and loss. Virginia shares what it meant to immigrate as a child, to grow roots in the U.S., to find unexpected love in a Joshua Tree layover, and to walk through the profound grief of losing her father. That passage of grief led her to train as an end-of-life doula, bringing presence and compassion to others in their most vulnerable moments. What emerges in this conversation is Virginia’s deep resilience and her willingness to be remade by life’s turning points, to say yes even when the path is uncertain.

In Part Two of my conversation with Prema Saraswati, we move from her childhood in Laos and the flight from war into her years growing up in America. In Sacramento, Prema was expected to serve in silence, yet she excelled in school, pursued higher education, and carried the weight of her family’s survival. Her path led through poverty, dislocation, and an abusive marriage, but also toward resilience and discovery. From these struggles, she found her calling as a healer—drawing on Reiki, hypnotherapy, past life regression, and ancestral wisdom to guide others through trauma. Listen now to Driftwood Conversations on YouTube and Spotify. 

Driftwood Conversations with Prema Saraswati (Part 1)In this deeply moving first part of our conversation, Prema Saraswati shares her extraordinary journey from a mountain village in Laos, through the terror of war and life in refugee camps, to starting over in America. A member of the Hmong people, she carries the weight of her community’s history—survival under unimaginable circumstances, resilience in the face of displacement, and the quiet strength to keep going. This episode is about loss, courage, and the unseen wounds of war that safety alone cannot heal. Join me as Prema opens her heart about her family’s escape, the challenges of starting anew, and the beginnings of the path that would one day lead her to become a healer.

In Part 2 of my conversation with Katherine Hervey, we dive deeper into the heart of her journey—from leaving the public defender’s office to immersing herself in art, storytelling, and prison reform. Katherine shares how she met Chris Blackwell, a writer and leader working from inside prison walls, and how their friendship has evolved into powerful creative collaborations. Together, they challenge the narratives surrounding incarceration, bringing humanity and healing into spaces often defined by isolation and punishment. This episode is a window into Katherine’s ability to hold complexity with empathy, transforming pain into art and connection.