Now I'm Here

Pagan Blog Project - Week Seventeen - H #2 – Hestia

My house is falling down.

We're renting, thank goodness. But since we moved into this place over five years ago there have been serious foundation problems: backed up plumbing, cracks in the wall and ceiling, damp spots on the floor, dirt in the bathroom...

I've had a strange relationship with this house. At first I was indifferent and uncomfortable. Haven moved from a really great place in Texas, North Carolina was weird and foreign. A friend visited with us a few months later and he said "oh, you have such a cute little witchy house!"

Hmm… maybe.

The indifference continued until a few years ago when I decided I hated this place. I was tired of it and all of its quirks. I wanted to leave, to rent or possibly by a new place. So, we shopped around for houses, looking at prices and financing. It was just not possible. Moving to another rental was also not really a good idea, either.

I'm not sure what happened first. Was it cocktails with my girlfriend, or my at-the-time Coven's ritual devoted to Hestia? But something changed in both my perception and relationship with my house. Slowly, but surely, it became my home.

As a group we devoted a ritual to Hestia/Vesta. I did a lot of studying on her before the ritual, and included a little lesson for the ritual itself. Though the ritual was focused around creating foci (in this case, a tool of devotional focus), looking back now I realize something else happened, at least for me. I finally bonded with my home. Most of all, I realized my physical space was not the source of my dissatisfaction, but I was depressed about more meaningful areas of my life. Changing my house wouldn't make me happy. I would have the same old problems but in a different box.

I needed to change the focus of my life.

In the center of my crappy little home is a huge fireplace, and while the Coven did rituals together in my living room, the fireplace was a natural center staging area, with the mantle and hearth serving as the perfect altar tables. I had always decorated the mantle with flowers and kitschy holiday decorations. But I found that over the years the mantle was less of a mundane seasonal piece of home decorating, but had become a seasonal shrine. And at some point I had begun using it as an altar, charging items or creating little charms. Over the years, my Pagan tools and paraphernalia weren't just hidden and tucked away, but were slowly migrating into the house and into my mundane life.

It wasn't just this refocus on my hearth that shifted my perception of my home, but the ritual itself and learning about Hestia. One of the ladies in the group was going through transitions in her own life and had suggested we do a ritual and lesson regarding reconnecting to our habitats, and Hestia was a natural choice for this.

Hestia’s domain is within the home. But she’s not just about cooking and cleaning, but about protection and nurturing energy. She’s about keeping our focus, and she’s about making sure our domestic energy translates easily into our public lives, and vice versa. The Vestal Virgins in Rome were priestesses who guarded the hearth and flame (may it burn forever!). Their energy in both a literal and a magical sense were devoted to the protection of Rome as both a micro and macrocosm, and this devotion and attention is a useful reminder to anyone who might be feeling a little scattered, a little discontented, a little out of sorts. In my experience, Hestia’s energy is useful for anyone who is looking for something with which to devote themselves.

After spending some time to Hestia, a shift happened in my life. I began to reconnect with and love my home. There was magic there now, in ways I hadn't realized. (Though to be fair, it's not like magic came out of nowhere. The magic had always been there. I just hadn’t really noticed it yet.) And an added and serendipitous bonus of working with Hestia was starting communication with Hermes, who is Hestia's total bff forever.

Most of all, this moment was a catalyst for meaningful change in my life. I got a promotion at work. I was given a car. I applied for graduate schools and was eventually accepted. I have a room now devoted to my Pagan tools and altar. Now I might even love my little house, even though the molding is coming down and my bathroom wall is rotting out.

Working with Hestia totally and literally change my focus, and that's powerful magic

Mother Love

PaganBlog Project - Week Ten - E #2 – Eating

“Of Gaia we sing… 

Queen and goddess, we invoke you:

 you are all-powerful and our needs are so small.”

I recently had the honor of partaking in a very beautiful, holistic ritual with some lovely ladies who really mean a lot to me. A lot of us are working through the book The Goddess Path by Patricia Monaghan. Our first meeting and ritual was focused on Gaia, and we discussed the concepts of abundance, guilt, and love. We also talked a lot about food. How else could we devote a ritual to Gaia without talking about and partaking in food?

We shared our stories of food over a delicious meal. We talked about our obsessions and apathy regarding food, of giving too much and having too little. We discussed our desires for more, our guilt at having too much, the mixed messages we receive in regards to “just enough.” We talked about how our childhood relationships with food and eating have shaped our adult perceptions, for better or for worse.

And what I learned is that our relationship with food and eating is incredibly, stupidly complicated.

Because fat women can’t eat certain types of food without being judged.

And skinny women can’t eat certain types of food without being judged.

And when I order a steak and my husband orders a salad, they always try to give me his salad.

And organic and local food is so much more expensive than the “bad” stuff.

And being sustainable is not really affordable.

And what’s wrong with being fat, anyway?

And so on and so forth… etc etc etc

But eating is really important., not just because of the obvious reasons. It goes deeper than that.

We didn’t just meet for a ritual, but for a meal. When we meet with our friends it often has a meal component. Sharing our food and meals and eating together is a very primal ritual. I’m pretty convinced that sharing of food and community eating is probably the first ritual.

Think about it – you’re a cave-person. You’re hungry most of the time because food is hard to find. You’ll probably eat pretty much anything – plants, animals, nuts, bugs, etc. So, if you’re not hungry, you’re doing pretty well. Like, if you’re not starving, you know you’ve won at life, and that means a lot. And if you have enough food to share with your family and friends, well, that’s just awesome. Because if you have enough food to share, then you must be rich. And maybe you think the gods are the reason that you’re doing so well, so you hunt and kill that wooly mammoth and then you share it with your village and then you set aside some meat for the gods because why not? And maybe you share some with your neighbors, too, and maybe they start thinking that your gods are pretty great so maybe they’ll leave some offerings out for your gods, and isn’t it just great to get together for these celebrations? Maybe we should do it again next year. Maybe add some dancing or drumming or something.

Because if you like someone enough to feed them, that’s a huge gesture of trust. You’re taking food from your own body, literally. Because there were times in our human history when there wasn’t enough food to go around to feed everyone. So if you have extra food and you give it to someone, then you must be the greatest person ever. You trust them enough to give them your hard earned food, and you do it trusting that one day they might feed you, too.

So that’s why I think the rituals of communion and breaking bread were the first human rituals, and probably the most important. In this ritual context, food is joy, health, prosperity, trust, thankfulness, and love.

In our modern world we think we’re removed from that, but we’re not. Maybe we don’t think we’re honoring the gods when we go out with our girlfriends for sushi, but I like them well enough to share my dumplings with them, and that means a lot because dumplings are pretty awesome. I have enough abundance in dumplings to share with those ladies, and I love them so I’m going to show them that I love them by giving them some of my food.

And sometimes we love God so much we want to give God our food, too. And sometimes the food is the God, but that really isn’t as complicated as it might seem. Isn’t it great how Jesus can be the vine, the wine, the flesh, the blood, and the son of God, all at the same time?

Once the Gaia ritual was over I had eaten a whole plate of food plus two homemade cranberry scones and a pile of homemade jam, despite the fact that I have been trying to swear off carbs and sugar, which is everywhere and like, impossible to do. In our modern world our abundance is actually hurting us, and we’re still trying to figure out what that means. But I think Gaia, who is as big and fat as the earth itself, reminds us that abundance, true abundance, can be had without guilt.

Abundance is where we can eat well and be healthy. Where we can be sustainable and afford it, too. Where we can eat, drink, and be merry before we die. Where we can share wine to both Odin and Loki. Where we can eat a pomegranate and see the cosmos within. Where we can share delicious food and wonderful stories. Where we can have a ritual and a meal. Where food is both tasty and nourishing. Where we can be as fat or a skinny as we want. Where we learn from our mixed messages and mixed feelings. Where we are overflowing, our cups runneth over. When we don’t have guilt over how much we have.

Abundance is where we can honor ourselves, one another, and Deity. We truly have so much love to share and so many ways to share it. And we deserve that abundance.

Dear Friends

Pagan Blog Project - Week Five - C #1 – Covens

 I like to brag that I was very lucky as far as my introduction to Paganism goes. When I was ready to really study and potentially practice the Craft, I was delighted to find resources all around me. Many of my friends knew Pagans or were Pagan themselves. A lot of the feminist theory I was reading applied to Earth Worship as well. Even my family was taking similar interests in Paganism. I remember with delight that my mom and I would often be reading the exact same books at the exact same time, unintentionally.

Not only did I have books and people to help me, but many of these people were in an organized group, a coven. The coven held public sabbats which were perfect for Baby Pagans. So, my first ritual ever was with the Serpents of the Vine, Midsummer 2005.

These people really had their stuff together. They had lots of experience and they all had lots of books and they’d pass them to me on a regular basis. Having an active message board online meant I could learn about the group, connect with the members, see upcoming events, and most of all, when I had stupid questions, they’d answer and help out. Through the coven I was able to participate in open sabbat rituals, open workshops, and even something simple and fun like Pagan coffee at a local shop. There was a community and a world opened up to me with the coven, even with only being an outer-circle person and not a member.

Through a system of me getting to know them, and them getting to know me, we found that we all liked one another. I was invited to a full moon esbat, and a few months later, invited to dedicate. With the dedication came a year of intentional study, mentoring, and real coven work.

Or course, having a coven has its ups and downs. There was drama, of course. Remember, Pagans are people, too! (and how!) There were breakups (with one another and the coven), gossip, cruel words, drama queens, people who took center stage, people who weren’t committed and didn’t do their work – all sorts of negative and toxic energy being spewed around by all of us, myself included. These things make it impossible to do magic with another person, but inevitably come up when you do magic with another person!

So what having a coven taught me was that it brings out the best and worst in people. It’s all part of being human, and Pagans are so very very very very human. (we almost make a religion out of it, don’t you think?)

I was lucky with my first coven, but I have dear friends who had horrible, scary first experiences. There are covens that abuse their members emotionally, sexually, and magically. For me, I was lucky. For others, they need to be smart.

I almost didn’t make it. We (the coven) almost didn’t make it. But I did, and we did. (Mostly/kind of.)

As people grow, change, and evolve, covens (should) grow, change, and evolve with them. And while I’ve moved away, and others have moved away, and others aren’t even Pagan any more, I still feel a connection with these people, a connection that I’ve never felt with anyone else (though I’ve come close, but different. Which is important to recognize as well. Different groups form different connections, and that energy takes on a different flavor. It’s different, but no less meaningful.) As a Baby Pagan, I needed a coven, but I also needed to move away from a coven in order to grow, too, in both my mundane and my magical lives.

And on my own in the big wide lonely Pagan world, I’ve learned that I had it very easy. When I went into my coven, they had already done all of the hard work. There was a system in place, with rules and tradition and protocol, and for the most part, it worked. It wasn’t until I was trying to start my own coven that I really, really appreciated this structure. It’s important to recognize, though, that some people and groups thrive under structure and some don’t. I guess I do. I’m lazy and I like it when people do all the hard work, and I just didn’t realize how hard it was help facilitate a coven until myself and others were trying to do it from scratch.

Not that my little coven was a failure. Far from it. I learned a lot, and it was a year of beauty and sisterhood and magic. While I don’t have a coven now, I have a group of women with whom I’m connected in a delicious, special way. What my experiment with covens has taught me is that being in a coven is hard. But they can be beautiful. At both their best and worst, covens can be a good way to learn and grow, and they can offer a way to facilitate those traits blooming in others, too.

Most of all, covens come in all different shapes and sizes. No coven I have now or in the future will be like my first coven, and I need to realize that. And what does or does not happen in my future will be unique and magical, and that’s special, too. That’s why we’re Pagan - so we can manifest our own destinies, magical and mundane, in whatever flavor we desire.

Stone Cold Crazy

Pagan Blog Project - Week Four - B #2 – Baubo

"The older one grows, the more one likes indecency." ~Virginia Woolf 

(shared by Ms. Pulstar)

How cool is Baubo? In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter it is recounted that Demeter is wandering the earth in anguish over the loss of her daughter. She eventually starts loitering outside of Eleusis, where she will eventually inspire life-altering mysteries that will change the face of the ancient (and our modern!) world. But in the meantime, she’s just kind of being sad and angry and very helpless, until Baubo/Iambe makes her laugh and then she kind of perks up a little. 

"Unsmiling, tasting neither food nor drink, she sat wasting with desire for her deep-girt daughter, until knowing Iambe jested with her and mocking with many a joke moved the holy goddess to smile and laugh and keep a gracious heart - Iambe, who later pleased her moods as well."  

~ The Homeric Hymn to Demeter

from tumblr

I’ve read accounts of Baubo being nothing more than a walking vagina. Or maybe she’s a nursemaid who lifts her skirts. Either way, it’s the act of raunchy old lady humor that finally wakes Demeter up from her slump (kind of. She’s still sad even after she gets a good laugh at Baubo’s vagina humor.)

Which I think is important. So many people like to pretend that men are just big dorks who laugh at dick and fart jokes, but to be honest, a good number of my lady friends are farting, burping, “that’s what she said” machines, too. This notion that women aren’t raunchy, sexual creatures is just silly. It’s never been true. Women have always been dirty, sexual beings. Even the ancient Greeks knew this to be true.

Women’s vagina humor is important, too. As much as I’m all for gender equality, I think it’s important for men to be with men sometimes, and women to be with women sometimes. There’s something about going out to a girl’s lunch, or drinking cocktails with the ladies, that is very therapeutic. (We’ve even talked about this a bit in social work school, too.)

Baubo in Anatolia

I’m a pretty raunchy person in real life and rarely withhold my liberal views on sexuality, but when I started social work school I was still adjusting when to hold back and when to give in, and the result is that I spent a few months where I was incredibly stifled. But we had a girl’s night and I drank a bottle of white wine (which shows how desperate I was, I usually go for red) and we talked about butt sex and our periods and bondage and Fifty Shades of Grey and how everyone thinks I have wild crazy sex all the time and how important it is to masturbate. All of these things are actually very important discussion to share about sexual health, but they aren’t easy conversations to have. But in a room full of women we swore like sailors and blushed like virgins and howled with Baubo’s laughter. And yeah, I'm still anxious about class, and one friend is still struggling with communication with her partner, and another still doesn’t know how she feels about anal sex, and another isn’t even sure if she likes sex, but the night and the jokes and the wine were still healing, therapeutic, and fun. It was most importantly fun.

As my husband said, “she loosens up a tense situation by showing her goodies to everyone and it’s really funny because she’s old? Actually, I don’t really get it but whatever; it made them laugh, right?”

And that’s the gift of Baubo. Sure, Demeter still misses her daughter and humans are probably going to starve to death and the gods are probably going to die from neglect, but there’s nothing that’s not funny about a vagina walking around on two legs. And there’s nothing wrong with women (AND MEN!) of any age to have a nice long laugh about sex, because let’s be honest, sex is pretty weird, and we really need a reason, any reason, to laugh.