Blessed Samhain!

Hope this weekend found you and yours happily dressing in otherworldly garb...or at least role playing as a super-being/hero.

We had a whirlwind of activity over the 3 day holiday. My eldest son is in 1st grade and had his Halloween parade on Friday. He had been vascilating between going as a pirate this year or wearing the Buzz Lightyear costume one last time. The younger boy's pre-school doesn't do Halloween...so they learned some autumn flavored songs and had a little concert complete with sign language interpretation of the songs.

Following the pre-school concert he and I went to pick up our CSG farm share - another appropriate activity for the final harvest holiday.

On Saturday there was Soccer a friend's birthday party and TRICK or TREATing! Ronnie stayed with the Buzz costume and Evan became a SPIKEY DRAGON RAWR! He had been Woody for his dance/gymnastics class earlier in the week, but one of the favorite aunties had brought both boys Spikey hats with tails from her summer trip - and suggested that they were DRAGON hats. Evan decided that was way cool and needed a costume to go with it...so Auntie D made him a pair of fleece pants with a spikey dragon tail built in! We addd a black sweatshirt and away we went. If he decides he wants to re-play this costume next year we may add a chest piece and shoe covers, but it was a last-minute operation this year - and it was WET anyway.

On Sunday - more soccer and the BIG EVENT for me. Our Samhain Supper.
This ritual has been a tradition of mine for 12-13 years. I had participated in it with dear friends who eventually moved far away. I have continued it with my friends and family. The group has swelled and diminished over the years, as I have come to the conclusion that the smaller and more intimate the group the better for this ritual. Our current group is 7 adults and my 2 kids.

The ritual is basic; performed around the dinner table with a candle-lighting portion where we remember our beloved dead, then we use the symbols of pomogranate and apple to talk of about their path and ours. It is short and child-friendly. This year, my eldest lit the candle to remember our Uncle Ray, who died a couple of months ago. Ronnie and Evan had come with us to visit him in the hospital a couple times before he passed, so Ronnie had clear memories of him. Ronnie also helped perform the pomogranat and apple ceremony. Evan, on the other hand still didn't quite understand...
Directly following the ritual we had a pot-luck-supper that we shared with the ancestors, and ate by the light of the candles we had lit.

Blessed Samhain all. May the memories of your ancestors warm your hearts this season.
Blessed Be.

Happy Harvest!

August 1 or thereabouts, we celebrate the 'First Harvest'. Symbolized by the harvest of grains (corn/wheat etc), but certainly represented by any harvest ocurring now (early vegetables...beans, zucchini, cucumbers etc).

This year, however, mama nature and the spirit of the maple had an additional harvest in mind at my house.

This was about 1/3 of the canopy that came down...but it is highly likely that the whole tree is too diseased to stay.

He came down on Lammas eve ( overnight Friday - Saturday). My husband and I were awakened by the crack and swoosh...

Funny thing is...that when I heard that crack/swoosh I recalled having heard it the previous night too...but my husband doesn't have that same recollection. I wonder.....

Anyway, when we were looking at the photos we had taken, we found this....

Look closely at the bare wood...and see the sad old face.... so we thanked the tree for its shade, its witness over the passage of time and for the harvest of wood it would be bringing us.

My oldest had a harvest of his own this weekend too...his first "naturally" lost tooth...

Happy harvesting!

Samhain 07

Since Halloween fell on Wednesday this year, and the boys are still little enough to be pretty cranky if you try to let them stay up late....especially if its a mostly adult thing they're staying up for....we celebrated Samhain on Sunday.

This year's group was back down to "the usual" friends/family- a gathering of 9 including the kids. Not the extended group we had experimented with last year. It had just gotten too crazy.

Samhain is one holiday I have maintained tradition with for about 10-12 years now. I use the same ritual every year - it's one that the friends I started celebrating with had adapted for use with their kids. It's short and to the point - and everyone gets to light at least one candle to represent the people/pets they want to remember. The celebration uses the symbols of the apple (death with the promise of rebirth - star inside when cut crosswise) and the pomegranate ( life who's shadow is death - seeds kept Persephone in Hades).

This ritual is also closely linked with dinner - so things usually go like this :
I'm busy preparing dinner and I ask my husband to print out the ritual - I know it's the one we always use, so I haven't even looked at it since last year. I run around picking the ancestor pictures from among the others around the house; try to find candles and other things we'll need for the altar...folks start arriving.
We get the ritual going around the dinner table and are calling directions when I remember that South and West are switched from the way we usually call the directions and think - "Oh well I'll fix it for next year".
I get choked up on reading about remembering family and frieds who have passed through the veil.
Someone inevitably has trouble lighting a candle - this year it was DH who commented that his ancestors probably wanted to tell him to pay them more attention!

This year we replaced the usual candle altar - I've used an old vanity mirror/tray and free-standing votive candles for a long time. It was great if you wanted to try and scry in the patterns of the candle wax - however it was a MESS to deal with. Several years it "leaked" the candle wax onto the tablecloth below it and last year the mirror cracked when I was trying to clean it up. It's still in my holiday bucket, but this year I purchased a candle chandelier which can hang or sit on the table - each candle is enclosed in glass. We sat it on the table during ritual and then hung it from the ceiling while we moved on to dinner.

We set the usual ancestor spot and gave them a little of everything we were having...Turkey, stuffing, pasta primavera, and cranberry apple pie. A bit more traditional than the Morroccan style Mabon celebration!

As usual it was good food, good friends and a celebration of the season. Right now, the boys don't participate much - even as far as listening to the stories of their grandparents & great-grandparents, but it is good practice for years when they will finally take an interest and ask questions about those who have gone before us and who played such an inportant role in making us who we are today.

Another thing to mention in relation to the holiday, serendipity etc...
We had recieved a forecast for the first frost - for Sunday or Monday night, so - appropriately - I went out Sunday with the ladies and we harvested the last of the tomatoes and peppers in the garden - two large baskets of green and lightly-colored tomatoes and a couple of bell peppers.

Blessed Be!

Harry Reed Interfaith Hero - Found on the Net

Harry Reid, interfaith hero:
For the first time in history, a Hindu clergyman delivered the opening prayer for the United States Senate. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev, had invited Rajan Zed, the director of interfaith relations at a Hindu temple in Reno, to deliver the opening prayer to begin the session on July 12. It is common for chaplains and clergy from various faith traditions to be invited to say the opening prayer at the start of each Senate session. However, most of the time it is delivered by a Christian. It's a shame that the voices of intolerance and ignorance spoiled this special occasion. As soon as Zed began to speak, he was disrupted several times by Christian Right activists who objected to a Hindu prayer being offered on the Senate floor. Three people were handcuffed by police and charged with disrupting Congress, which is a misdemeanor. This saddens me, because I don't see how anyone could possibly object to the following words in Chaplain Zed's prayer: "Let us pray. We meditate on the transcendental glory of the Deity Supreme, who is inside the heart of the earth, inside the life of the sky, and inside the soul of heaven." These are beautiful words and certainly consistent with the Christian belief that God is omnipresent. In addition, Chaplain Zed ended his prayer by saying "peace, peace, peace be unto all." This was appropriate, because after the prayer the Senate was going to resume debate on President Bush's Iraq war policy. So I have to ask those who objected to Chaplain Zed's prayer: What's the problem? Why did you object to this? Did he say something that was so different from your Christian beliefs that you felt America was threatened and that it would bring down the wrath of the almighty? If so, I did not hear it. Chaplain Zed's prayer embodied what I so frequently refer to as the common moral beliefs and values that most faith traditions share. One of the protesters said that he was a "Christian and patriot." Now how can you claim to be a patriot when two of the founding principles of this country are religious tolerance and diversity? I am proud of Harry Reid for inviting Chaplain Zed to pray. He's my hero of the month and has done a lot to promote interfaith education as a solution for community and peace building by using this highly visible, symbolic and powerful venue to highlight America's religious diversity. Sen. Reid, who is a Mormon, said, "I think it speaks well of our country that someone representing the faith of about a billion people comes here and can speak, in communication with our Heavenly Father, regarding peace." Yes, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is not only a hero but also a champion of interfaith. He's a shining example of how we can use religion as a tool to build community and not divide it. You know there are these voices of fear and intolerance in this country that perpetuate what I call a state of enemy thinking, in which it's us against them, or Christian against Muslim, Muslim against Jew, black vs. white, gay vs. straight, rich vs. poor, etc. In other words, if he or she doesn't look like me, worship like me, or vote like I vote, then he or she is absolutely wrong and I am absolutely right. We should not let these voices of intolerance and fear prevent us from honoring the beliefs of others and accepting that there just might be another point of view with some validity. And you know what - when we peer beyond the labels that the voices of fear and intolerance use to divide us, we just might find a lot in common. I am not a Hindu, and I found Chaplain Zed's words comforting and consistent with my beliefs. Thank you, Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Rev. Jay Speights has an MA in public policy and is an interfaith minister and the main U.N. representative for The New Seminary in New York . You can learn more about his work at the United Nations at The New Seminary website or at harmoniousday.webexone.com. His email address is jayspeights@newseminary.org. © copyright 2007 by Jay Speights.

Nature is The Art of GOD - Dante

Think about it....If you were GOD and you created HEAVEN out of nothingness ... and you created beings to live there and enjoy your creation - your HEAVEN... how would you feel about what's been done to it? Some of that having been done in YOUR NAME?
We admire the works of Monet of Ansel Adams of Georgia O'Keeffe - but the original artist was "God" "Gaia - the living Goddess" or name any of the myriad "Creation God/Goddesses".
"Judgement" for the sins of pollution, waste and hatred is happening every day. The climate is changing; garbage gets thrown carelessly everywhere; hate causes everyone to live in fear - with locks and walls.
And again : You MUST BE the change you wish to see in the world. No one is perfect; but how can we increase "walking the walk"?
I have a friend who just recently brought my attention back to an issue close to her heart: water. "WOW, as a family of 4 you must use (waste) a lot of water. I can honestly say that I try to be aware of this consumption. I make sure I run a full dishwasher and full washing loads. I turn the water off while I'm brushing my teeth (which we never did as kids). I use soaker hoses to water the garden when it hasn't rained for a while. So, I feel pretty good about myself....however I could do better.
Sometimes I use a large bowl to wash veggies in - sometimes I use running water.Sometimes I use the veggie wash water to water plants - inside and out - sometimes I dump it down the drain.I NEVER turn of the shower while I'm soaping up or washing my hair. And sometimes I let it run longer than necessary to come to temp.I sometimes let the water run while rinsing dishes and loading the dishwasher.
And that's just water.
I also heard a news story this week about plastic recycling. There are several industries which grew up around USING recycled materials as raw materials for their products; newer carpet factories are one.
Well - they can't get enough raw materials - and in-fact 75% (3 of 4) plastic bottles (soda/water etc) used in this country are NOT recycled even though there is a demand for them. Why? Because there is no HANDY recycling container. Sport/Entertainment arenas are a big culprit. What can be done about this?Letter/e-mail writing campaigns - to law-makers and to the centers themselves. Encourage/Demand easy recycling access or ask for fines to be levied.If you attend these events - TAKE YOUR CONTAINERS HOME to recycle.
And the biggest thing you can do is THINK. Think about - "what if everyone in the world did what I am doing; treated people as I am treating them" - what kind of world would we leave our children - our grandchildren?
THINK - AND DO - AND CHANGE.
Peace!

Courting the "MUSE"

This Moon's theme is "The Muse" - As we have progressed in our study this year it has been amazingly affirming how frequently our We'moon calendar has corresponded with the monthly theme - and how frequently our own lives have taken us along for the ride.

The book we are using as our 'study guide', "Ariadne's Thread" by Shekhina Mountainwater, though frequently irritating in its datedness (it was concieved of and written in the 70s/80s), usually has some tidbits to learn from.

This month we are pondering "The Muse" and once again We'moon has some treasures:

Sometimes, the Muse
this poem
flung out of my pen
one day.
the ink wanted to go
like that.
excerpt Marni Norwich 2005

Volunteers she called them
Volunteers she called them,
my eighty-five-year-old friend Dorothy,
those flowers that appeared mysteriously
in her Ohio yard
without her planting them,
sown by the wind
or perhaps by bird droppings.

Volunteers, I call them,
those poems that appear
in the poet's dooryard,
unsought,
of uncertain origin,
gifts from the bounty of the universe
Karen Ethelsdattar 2005

Several weeks ago as I was writing in my We'moon calendar and reading the current offerings, I decided to visit their website - to see what the '08 theme was going to be. Once there I found that the 08 calendars are indeed on sale, and they are still accepting contributions for '09. The theme for '09 will be "At the Crossroads" and I just happened to have several pieces of my own that were in keeping with that them which I have now submitted...again a chance happening which goes along with the monthly theme - honoring the MUSE!

I have also found that I am particularly verbose on my blog this month.....where usually I think of things I want to write about but don't ever type them in.....

Carbon "Footprint" - How do YOU help save the planet?

On Friday I took the "Live Earth" carbon footprint test -http://www.earthlab.com/carbonProfile/LiveEarth.htm?ver=10 .

I can't find my emailed result right now but I think Iremember it being 250.

The national average for the USA is 350 - so my family is doing a little better than the rest of the nation...but there is a lot more that can be done.

I also signed the "Pledge" http://liveearthpledge.org/answer_the_call.php.For me this is more than just a "nice to do" for the environment.

This is saving MOTHER EARTH, GAIA, The Goddess - and making sure there's something of the NATURE I knew growing up left for my kids and my kid's kids.

What I do currently:

Recycle all paper and cardboard, plastics, glass, metals - curbside

Recycle batteries at the recycling center - approx annually

Compost vegetable materials from the house and garden

Most of the time:

turn off lights /equipment when not in room/or in use

Use dishwasher/washing machine only when full

Keep temps higher in summer (hardly use personal air conditioners at home anyway)

Keep temps lower in winter

Grow/purchase produce that is "locally" produced for the most part.

Freecycle unused household items http://www.freecycle.org/

What I am committing to do going forward:

Re-use plastic store bags as frequently as possible - currently we use these for garbage recepticals as well and do not purchase separate "kitchen" trash bags.

Install more compact flourescent lights and replace some multi-bulb fixtures.

ALWAYS turn off lights/appliances when not in the room

ALWAYS turn off my monitor when leaving work

What do you do currently?

What can you pledge to do going forward?

Now, I GET IT!!!!!

Last night as I was driving home I had an a-ha moment. Actually, I had 2 but I can only remember the content of one. Anyone who has 2 kids less than 2 years apart can probably relate.

This particular a-ha moment was music related. Anyone who knows me well, knows that I have been a musician practically since I was born. My primary instrument was violin, but over the years I had lessons on recorder and piano, and viola - which almost became my primary instrument during my highschool years.
Most of my musical experiences up to high school were pretty much fed to me by my father. He was a dance-band and orchestral musician, so Classical music was the biggie with Montovani and the like a close second.

One summer when I was in High School, my brother and I went to sleep-away music camp for 3 weeks. I got in on a viola scholarship, which meant I had to play viola in most of the groups I was scheduled to participate in. They did let me play violin in one quartet. However, to my GREAT disappointment, the music that was selected for that quartet to play was (horrors) a MODERN selection. With "MODERN" being spoken with the same disgust as a dirty word. It was dissonant and had a meter that constantly shifted. It wasn't the Mozart or Vivaldi I was used to - that I knew I could play.

I despized that piece of music - I was depressed that the only chance I had to play the violin was compromized by my lack of appreciation for the "ear-shattering" dissonance of the piece. I don't even remember who wrote it. I do remember that it was a brand new piece and that our little quartet would have been only the second formal performance of it. I say "would have been" because the four of us disliked it so much that it was never performance ready. Our coach - who picked the piece and LOVED it - was highly disappointed in our obvious disrespect and disdain.

That summer, I was introduced to another idea. The idea that music was linked to or could draw out our emotions. I heard one of the counsellors comment that the Brahms trio my brother's group was playing "made them cry" it was so beautiful....

That was new for me. I had always looked at music as a very mechanical thing. You played the notes on the page - with the inflection required by the composer - loud/soft/fast/slow etc. That gave me something to think about, and aspire to. But I didn't connect any of that to my dislike of the "Modern" quartet.

Years have passed - about 25 now - and I've been through a lot. Relationships have come and gone. My life philosophy has undergone stress and modification. I understand and appreciate everything from Gregorian chant to Heavy Metal. I don't ALWAYS want to have to listen to either, however. AND - my big a-ha moment - I LIKE music with"tight" harmonies. AKA dissonance. I frequently prefer it, in fact, and have for many years now...

Jazz, folk, rock, "Modern" classical.... It resonates deep within my heart and soul.

It is about emotions, it's about fear and loss, it's about getting to the other side.
It is about LIFE.
And Modern Life is not always - or even usually - harmonious.

Found on the Net

Rules for LIFE

1. You will receive a body.
You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours the entire period.

2. You will learn lessons.
You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have
the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.

3. There are no mistakes, only lessons.
Growth is a process of trial and error: experimentation. The "failed" experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately "work."

4. A lesson is repeated until learned.
A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.

5. Learning lessons does not end.
There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.

6. "There" is no better than "here."
When your "there" has become a "here," you will simply obtain another "there" that will again look better than "here."

7. Others are merely mirrors of you.
You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself.

8. What you make of your life is up to you.
You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.

9. Life is exactly what you think it is.
You create a life that matches your beliefs and expectations.

10. Your answers lie inside you.
The answers to life's questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.

11. You will forget all this.

12. You can remember it whenever you want.

Ten of Cups

Last night some friends and I met to do some divination work.
We shuffled the deck of tarot cards thinking about all the myriad things we are in the process of doing, all of the things we need to do, and all of the things we want in our lives.
We laid cards (face down) to represent each thing. And then - instead of picking a card/cards from the bunch and selecting something - we removed cards - eliminating things. We left ourselves with only one card - and each of us had a powerful message.
Mine was Ten of Cups. I wish I had the exact card image to display...I might try to get it and scan it to post later....It is a beautiful card with a rainbow and ten golden chalaces - calm waters and happy, satisfied people.
Here are the explanations I have found on the 'net...

10 of Cups: Count It All As Joy (c) Cheryl Lynne Bradley 2006
Joy is the will which labors, which overcomes obstacles, which knows triumph. -William Butler Yeats
The excursion is the same when you go looking for your sorrow as when you go looking for your joy. - Eudora Welty
Capacity for joy Admits temptation. - Elizabeth Barrett Browning Aurora Leigh (bk. I, l. 703)
We live in a world which is increasingly difficult to understand and to navigate. Morals, ethics and justice seem to be taking a back seat to greed, rampant consumerism, hatred and misuse of power on a global scale. The problems facing our world are all products of the corruption and self-destructive, self-absorbed lean of our society and our increasingly pessimistic view of what the future could hold. It doesn't look promising at all.when we see how many people in our world don't get enough to eat, don't get proper medical care, live in battle zones or have known nothing but war, unrest and persecution (real or perceived).
The 10 of Cups in the Tarot is a happy card. It contains images of happy families, rainbows and gives us a sense of joy and emotional fulfillment. Wouldn't it be wonderful if life could always be this full of happiness and contentment. The reality is that life is hard and sorrow is always plentiful. Our situations can change quickly, without reason or rhyme. As I always say, people can be cruel and disappointing far more often than they can be compassionate and supportive. Sometimes I think people are bored with their own purposeless lives (and so boring) that they have nothing better to do than be mean, petty and hateful. This card tells me that the people depicted have chosen to count only joy.
I believe that this card is telling us that no matter what is happening in our lives, no matter how difficult the situation we are in, that we have to count and consider it all as joy. We have to learn to fill ourselves up on the beauty of the past and the hope of the future, and to keep only these things in our heart. It is easy to get stuck on thoughts of what might have been, what could have been, what should have been and what we wanted it to be. It is much harder in some situations to accept the reality of what was. It is difficult to be clear and in the present when we are dwelling on events in our past that cannot be changed, but that may have been deeply devastating or traumatic for us. It overshadows any of the joys we may have experienced in that same past, but those joys were there, they did occur and they deserve to be remembered.
http://members.tripod.com/TarotCanada/10CupsCountItAllAsJoy.html
I do not see the 10 of cups as completion, (10 Fish in the Merlin Tarot by RJ Stewart).
I read the 10 of water as fertility it's self, (this is key). Emotional openess equals vulnerability and fertility. This is the type of vulnerability and openess that precurses pregnacy. (note:pregnancy is not an end result, quite the opposite actually). The Ace of Fire penetrates the 10 and we have conception, conception of an idea, an action and or a life
In this, the 10 of water stands as emotional history and the perception of that history and it's not repeating. Not knowing what to expect leaves one feeling vulnerable, (to say the least) regardless of how positive the difference. Simply being open to new experience leaves one with feelings of vulnerability and various levels of fears, but not locked into any one particular state. The 10 shows the openess, the movement, the changeability and most of all, the fact that there will be movement out of the 10.
The 10 is not as much about the current state as it is about how the current state can and will change.
http://www.care2.com/c2c/share/detail/247414
With the 10 of Cups as your Daily Tarot Card... (This is the ACKNOWLEDGMENT card! It says: I appreciate what I have!) Today you ought to count your lucky stars, and revel in your good fortune! You have something to be happy about, so why not allow yourself to smile and enjoy it? Take the time to acknowledge whatever it is that is so good in your life now, for this is a day to take a break from the challenges of life...and stop to smell the roses instead!
http://www.tarotscopes.com/10cups.html

Giving Thanks

As the kids are taking their nap I'm taking time to sit back and reflect - ....I think I spent too many years on my own with the ability to have things "just so" to have things stay cleaned up for more than a couple of hours...etc - in those days I was sad - because I didn't have anyone to share life with. And now I get aggrivated every day with all of the little things that pile up - that need to get done over and over and over because of little messes.

The fact is - I wouldn't change any of it. I love my kids, I love my husband, I love the process of keeping the house, and the garden...I even really like my job - ok mostly - The problem is that there is just not enough time to do it all well...to take my time with it and enjoy it in the moment as much as I'd like.

This year has been a year of settling in - to the house, to the marriage and being together all of the time, to the kids - now that Evan is more of a participant....

My goal for next year is to stop worrying about what can't get done - and to enjoy what can be done more. To be in love with my life as much as I love my life - so that I show it more to all of the people I love.

This year, I am thankful for:

My children they are bright active and fun...healthy sassy and LOUD! They make life exciting and wonderful!

MY husband -who is the best daddy I know, loves our family, works hard making our house a home we can be proud of, allows me time for myself and accepts me for who I am.

My parents - who helped us make it through the year. From staying with us when the 4 of us had a stomach virus to keeping the kids for several weekends and Shakespeare evenings so Clark and I could do things as a couple.

My spirit sisters - for being there and listening and understanding and sharing life's ups and downs.

Grammy, Jill, Leana, Donna, Kim and Lizyy for emergency childcare!!!

Leana & Clyde for MANY evenings of dominoes, tea and chocolates!

My job - that I got a new one with a decent boss and moved to the Morristown office.

Blaize - for all of the years of companionship and love and loyalty and mouse hunting.