All Hallow's Eve

It's almost time.
 The squirrels are feasting on all the pumpkins on the front steps and the neighbors are out-doing each other in creativity.
 I remember one year when my kids we small and we were trick-or-treating in our neighborhood, the same place where we currently live. One corner house had its front door open and the storm door closed so that you still had to ring the door-bell. Their staircase faced the open door. My little nephew stepped up, rang the door-bell. The most horrible skeleton came whooshing down the stairs, causing my nephew to jump fifty feet straight backwards! No amount of candy could entice him back to that front door.
This year, I plan on dressing as Medusa. Naturally, my little granddaughters also want to be Medusa and they insist that their mom also dress as Medusa. I've got a lot of snakes to make!
 I want to do Medusa justice.
She's been given a bad rap these last few millenia. According to  The Women's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (1983), Medusa "was the serpent-headed Goddess of the Libyan Amazons, representing 'female wisdom'. She was the destroyer aspect of the triple Goddess, called Neith in Egypt, Ath-enna or Athena in North Africa. Her inscription at Sais called her 'mother of all the gods, whom she bore before childbirth existed'." Many of the sites I visited while researching her spoke of her great beauty which, unfortunately, caused Poseidon to be so smitten that he "had his way with her" against her will. Athena was so angry that this event took place in her temple that she punished Medusa by changing her beautiful hair into snakes! So much for justice.
And, while I have your ear, or your eye actually, let's talk about Halloween. In The Women's Dictionary of Symbols and Sacred Objects (1988), Halloween (or Samhain) is described like this - "Our Halloween rituals are relics of the pagan (pagan means "country dweller" from the Latin Paganus) All Hallows Eve, the original night-time festival according to the Lunar calendar, preceding the Solar day-time version that was Christianized as "All Saints". It was a "feast of the dead", when the cracks between the worlds was the thinnest. Relatives who were deceased could attend the feast and visit their loved ones.
 Let me say it again- LOVED ONES.
No demons or devils or ugly intentions. At least, not in the beginning. That's the celebration I have always honored. I put out an "ancestor plate" and a glass of wine before I take the kids out for some fun. My neighborhood is very kid-friendly and we all know each other so its great fun. This IS one of my very favorite holidays.
 Have a boo-ti-full evening!


Walker, B.(1983) The Women's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets. Harper and Row, New York, New York

Walker, B.G. (1988) The Women's Encyclopedia of Symbols and Sacred Objects. Harper's Collins, New York, New York

Unit five

I rarely use the word "but". To me, "but" implies some exclusion or some exclusionary action, like "I'd love to help you rake the leaves but I have to go wash my hair", leaving one to rake the leaves alone. Or, how about this- "We're all going to the park but you have to do your homework."
I like to use "and". To me, "and" is the little engine that could. "And" pulls everything together, includes all the parts. For example, 'I heard what you said and I didn't quite understand it." There, I've managed to convey that I heard you. I've also told you that I didn't get it.
It'll take a while and eventually I'll replace "but" in my life. I am trying to be as inclusive as I possibly can.
And, don't worry professors; I'll use "but" in all my papers.
I can please myself AND all my instructors.

The twenty-first century

Sometimes this brave new world scares me!
I'm in this new century, here all the way but some of the ways of this world are hard for me to grasp. Like "cutting and pasting".
What?
To cut, one needs a pair of scissors. To paste, one needs a tangible thing to paste! That's how its done in the actual world. In the virtual world, its all done with a keystroke.
A what?
Okay, a keystroke is what its called each time one depresses one of the keys on the keyboard.
Wow! I'm still reeling from watching a man walking on the moon. Not really. I was always a sci-fi kid so I could get to the whole space thing easily. I'm trying to put the computer process in the same light as buying a ticket to orbit the Earth.
Somehow, its easier for me to imagine strapping myself in for my orbit trip than it is for me to cut and paste.
I'll get it.

I'm back!

The world is a beautiful place and the people in it, or on it, amaze me more every day. I went out early, though not as early as I had planned, this morning to the National Mall to help with the set-up for a prayer vigil being conducted by the Thirteen Grandmothers. If you are not familiar with them go to http://www.grandmotherscouncil.org/ and check them out. They are being hosted here by Turtle Women Rising (turtlewomenrising.com) for four days of drumming and praying. 
 This morning was rain-washed clean and clear; the temperature was just the right amount of Fall frosty, really just a hint of the cool weather to come. The sound of the drums lead me directly to the spot, better than any G.P.S.  
At the entrance to the sacred circle, I was smudged and welcomed in. The smell of the fire combined with the smudge to make my spirit feel right at home.
The drumbeat will continue for the entire four days, straight through the nights as an unbroken thread, weaving us all together. I did a bit of drumming and will be back to the drums before its all over.
Here's a quote from the Turtle Women:
"We feel, hear, and see the heartbeat of the drum making connections all over the world; calling out to the women, men and children to consciously hold the energy of Peace. Peace cannot be given; it must be created in the hearts of the living. We cannot demand Peace; we can only become it. We cannot fight for Peace; we can only live it. We take only a stance of being for Peace; we promote the erasing of lines that separate us all."
To me, this is sanity.

new day

It's time for unit three; now we get graded.
Come on folks. Let's follow each other into academic splendor! The joy of being a word-smith par excellence will carry us into new heights of scholarly rapture. I hope.
Now the cat has MY tongue. The idea of being graded has nipped the flow of the stream of consciousness right in the bud.
I'll be back soon. It's hard to keep that stream dammed for long.

alchemy

Wow! Alchemy is real!! Those old farts in the medieval times had it right, in theory anyway. They were about trying to turn lead into gold for greedy reasons. What they weren't looking at is how the "lead" of separation of a man and a woman is turned into the gold of a new human being, a perfect expression of the Divine, expressed in the crucible of the female body. What an awesome event!! In the crucible of a tiny seed is contained the gold of perfect health, of the splendor and beauty of a rain forest, of an Einstein or, not so happily, a Dahmer. Yet it is all there, all in that one compact seed.
I think back to childhood days, sitting with my younger brother and sisters, eating watermelon on a hot summer's day. When we spit out those seeds, we were launching whole new worlds into the cosmos of our back yard. We were exercising the spark of the Divine, inherent in all of us.
Awesome.

Aftermath

Party's over.
There is colorful trash in bits and pieces like so much confetti in every corner. There's enough Play Dough on the floor to start a new trend in high fashion home decor. The fights and shouts of "mine!" are quiet (for  the moment ) while kid t.v. temporarily takes center stage.
All's quiet on the home-front. Time to get some homework done.
Homework is saving me from the housework which I am very deliberately ignoring.
Maybe it will go away.

birthday

Shhh! I am hiding out, taking a few minutes away from my two-year old granddaughters' birthday party. Hey, I've already paid my birthday dues! When her mommy was her age, I was quite the birthday maven, the renegade mom who threw the most fun birthday parties ever. I defied the fireworks law to have major sparks at my daughters' party. All the little kids (and lots of the parents) wanted to be on the scene.
Now it's my daughters' turn. That's as it should be. The world keeps moving on.
I overheard a birthday song on Yo! Gabba Gabba, one of the favorite shows of my grand kids. It was Brobbies' birthday and the other characters were singing about the importance of the day. They made such an excellent point, that it's not just about "hooray you're another year older." The celebration is of your birth, a momentous event, a happening from the Divine. It should be marked and honored. That show made me think of my own birthday, so close to Christmas and trumped by the holidays for as long as I can remember.
Next year I'm going to celebrate my birthday in June, a "half-birthday." And I'm going to celebrate for all the years that I was told "you know that Christmas gift I gave you? Well that's your birthday present, too."
 That's a lot of celebrating because I'm old as dirt.
Happy Birthday!

Beautiful Day

It's such a beautiful day in the neighborhood!
The rain has washed away the pollen that makes so many humans (and pets) so miserable.
Everyone is smiling, happy and cooperative; my husband is awake well before the crack of noon, his normal waking time. My little flower-fairies, my granddaughters, are actully enjoying each other's company.
All is golden!
These are the times and the mornings when I know in my heart there is something greater than even the sum of us all. And, whatever name one gives it, the nature is Love.
"Love conquers all", the saying goes.
This is the kind of day when I can read those words written on my heart.

Cat got your tongue??

Yo! Where are all my classmates? I'm beginning to get the feeling that I'm all alone here...
Now understand, that's okay if that is what should be happening.
I was told once that I was a "bell-wether". For those of us non-agrarian folks, a bell-wether is the animal in the flock that goes out first, the one that follows the uncharted path. The first one the wolf sees. The bell-wether lets the rest of the flock know which way to go. Not that my classmates need me to know which way to go; I'm only speaking from the mind-set of the one out there without companionship.
Hello?  Anyone out there?