Rockin' with The Raconteurs

I can't get enough of these guys. Made up of Jack White, Brendon Benson and two members of the Greenhornes, Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler, this band rocks my world. I can best and most succinctly describe them as just good all around feel good rock. And that fits into my mood. I had a good dream about my brother in which he told me he was alright and now I'm feeling better about things than I have in a while. So, here, have some good rock music from The Raconteurs and feel good with me for a few minutes.

Green Solace

We've had some luscious weather around these hills lately and I've been enjoying frequent inhalations of fresh, green air.  The days are filled with sunshine and cool breezes while the calls of a wondrous variety of birds float through the air and into the open windows. The nights are filled with seemingly a million lightning bugs putting on their beautiful show and just as many frogs and musical bugs belting out their songs.  Along with the occasional coyote calls and yips and our local bats the nights are always magical around here. I've always thought this place was blessed with its own kind of energies and I'm glad to say that my recent losses haven't deadened me to the point wherein I can't feel it anymore. I know it's there, I feel it, I just feel somewhat removed from it. Separated.

Don't get me wrong, I'm loving this weather and I wish these nice temperatures would hold out, but I'm just not the same person I once was. Loss has changed me, damaged me in some ways.  And I know these cooler days won't last. It will eventually get blistering hot. But for now, I'm soaking in the delicious air and I'm gazing longingly and lingeringly at the stars and burning the image of the sun into my closed eyes.  I'm trying to remember all the good things in my life. I'm clutching my good memories tight to me and holding on for dear life some of the time. But I'm laughing some of the time too. The sunlight on my face, the wind in my hair, the green that surrounds me, the birds, the bugs and all of it, they are helping.

Grief at Litha

Here it is mid-June and my eagerness for all things summertime is at an all-time low.  My strongest feelings about anything related to the heat is my hatred for the insects. Other than that, I'm just not all that interested or excited. I'm not interested in planting flowers or gardening. Not interested in fixing up the yard or setting up the pool. I've battled depression in my life before but the pain of grief is relatively new to me. Up until January I'd never lost anyone truly close to me. And the grief of that loss, and others, has sapped me of almost all enthusiasm. I don't want to pick up a book, don't want to make a collage, don't want to talk a walk.  About all I can summon the interest and energy to do is basic housework, watch tv, engage in various internet activities and download/listen to music. I guess there are worse ways to spend one's time but I'm just not all that productive these days.

I am trying. I've started blogging again which I think could be a good thing. I've done some late spring cleaning and I've nearly killed myself in the heat a few times as I'm very sensitive to it. But I haven't helped in that garden or really created anything new lately. I don't feel up to marking Litha with anything special, big or small. I wish I did, but I just don't. If I can get myself to light a candle that will be big deal. I guess it'll just take time to feel like working magic again, and I'm hopeful. I know that surely I've got to keep feeling a little better every day. I know it. I just wish I could hurry up and feel okay. I wish time could pass swiftly and get to a point where I don't have to remind myself of all I've lost and hurt like hell when I do.

Return to Magic

I've had a lot of shit go down in recent years and as it progressed, and got worse, I worked magic less and less. Now, as I look back, I realize I haven't worked magic in over 3 years. I've spoken to the moon, I've prayed, I've begged mercy of the gods but I haven't lit candles and gathered tools, raised and focused energy or any of it in ages. I wonder if I even remember how to do it; I imagine (hope) it's like riding a bike and it will come back to me. It's going to take some rehabilitation to get me back in the swing of things. I feel the need to brush up on just about everything. I feel the need to read through lots of funky spells on Lucky Mojo. I feel the need to gather all my magical tools, my gemstones and minerals, my candles, my mojo bags and all my stuff and just start creating. I'm so far gone I don't even have a particular goal in mind. I just feel the need to do something and reclaim my status as the witch of the family.

It's funny how sorrow and rage and grief can just totally bog me down so that I no longer feel capable of working magic. It's been as if so much of my attention has been focused on all the bad stuff happening in recent years that I forgot I could take steps to improve it. Or maybe I've been hurting so bad that I felt no amount of magic could make any difference. There's a lot of reasons tied up with the issue I suppose. There's only so many lies, and instances of theft, and general shitty treatment this witch can take before my magical conduit to the stars/gods/spirits gets clogged up with pain.

I'm hoping this will soon change. I feel the need to empower myself even if I just do a small candle spell or something else simple and sweet. I'm not ready for a full out, scripted, choreographed ritual, not that I've ever done many of those anyway. I want, no, I need simplicity more than ever. If I try to overdo it I may just scare myself away from doing magic at all. But first it's off to study, to read, to learn and soak up some magical information and maybe get some inspiration. Here I go!

All Things Considered

It's been a rough year. Death has been very active and especially cruel to my family lately. My brother died in January after being sick from the drugs for a long time. It's just about destroyed my family as I'm sure anyone who has lost a loved one can imagine. In one way it was a relief because he'd been in bad shape for a while and I'd felt it coming but mostly it's just brought tremendous, crushing pain. I'll never get over losing my best friend, even though he hadn't been any kind of a friend for years. Then shortly after he died one of my cats died suddenly and without warning and that was another blow. Then, a little over a month ago, my most precious beloved dog, Donkey, got bad sick and I had to put him down. It was like losing my brother all over again in some ways. I loved my Donkey more than many people in my own family. He was the furry love of my life and I'll never get over losing him. I'd never loved an animal before the way I loved him and I won't let myself feel that way again because the pain of losing him is sometimes more than I can bear.  I wish I had more words, or at least something cheerful, to say but I don't. I just know I feel like blogging again so here I am. I think it can perhaps be good therapy. So, we'll see where it goes.

A Flurry of Activity

My life is much busier now that I've gained an instant family. I have less free time, less internet time and less me time than I did before. My workload has grown and I've got more things being asked of me all the time. This mother phase of life is hard, no doubt about it.  I'm still in the process of adjusting and making new routines but it's all good. I'll take extra laundry and homework related arguments over being slowly killed by selfish adults and their drug addictions any day. 

My workload is not the only thing that's been growing. My social life has grown by leaps and bounds and I've been making lots of new friends online and in real life.  And while it does take some work it doesn't stress me like it once did. I also find myself enjoying more and more simple things, like driving. I used to hate driving, but sometimes it's almost enjoyable.  I'm growing by leaps and bounds and enjoying every minute of it.

Once again, my life seems to be keeping pace somehow with the progressing spring.  The leaves are almost completely unfurled and the brilliant and varying shades of green, along with bark browns, fill the country landscape. Everywhere one looks there are small jewel tone flashes of birds; their songs fill the air as does the buzz of bees and the fluttering of thousands of gossamer wings.

The very air is full of delicious scents that seems to be dominated by newly cut grass, sweet wildflowers and just the fresh, green smell that can only be found in a beautiful and largely unspoiled land.  The air is so rich and full of smell that it's nourishing not just to the soul but to the senses.  Sometimes after I've been cooped up for a while I feel hungry for something that food cannot satisfy. At those times I step outside, take a deep breath and instantly feel full and happy. May it be so for you.

The Pros and Cons of Rage

A while back Terri over at Aquila ka Hecate blogged about rage and, after writing a comment, I realized I had a lot to say about it and should blog about it myself.

The doctors say I have a mild form of bipolar disorder. Some people, even some I'm related to, have said that I'm a bitch and that's all there it to it. And maybe they're right. Maybe it's in my stars. Maybe it's all genetic or maybe I am just a heinous bitch. Or all of the above. (For those of you who don't know, my bipolar takes the form of depression and anxiety but not the delusional or hallucinatory kind of bipolar.) For the purposes of this blog I want to talk about the anxiety side of things, specifically, my anger that can sometimes boil up and burn everything in its path. We all have rage but mine could become truly frightening sometimes.

I've had temper tantrums, I've thrown things, I've made up foul words after I ran through all the mainstream strong language. That's not really extreme though. When it got really bad, however, my rage would take me much farther than that. I once punched a solid oak door off its hinges that had been installed with an electric drill into a solid oak frame. Punched it, barehanded five or six times and poof! off it came. I remember feeling fire flowing through my veins, in a purely metaphorical sense, and releasing it out through my fist. I don't even remember feeling any pain.

When I was a teenager I once hit my mom so hard across the face that her eyeglasses flew off. I've even been cruel to pets once or twice. These are things for which I am deeply ashamed but cannot change. Those things happened because I allowed my rage, my fire to get the better of me. Instead of expressing it or funneling it into something productive or creative I would stifle it and try to shut it up. And for that reason it would occasionally and unpredictably burst forth in an explosion of uncontrolled anger. Whoever or whatever happened to be closest to me would bear the brunt leaving them scared and hurt and me drained and riddled with guilt. It was, to say the least, not a healthy way of coping.

But not all rage is destructive. As I've moved past "young adult" and into "adult with grey hair and wrinkles to prove it" I've gotten better at coping. I've learned to express my rage in a more controlled way. Maybe "controlled" isn't the right word. I suppose I should say that I've learned, purely through trial and error, hit and miss, to let enough of it out to keep myself relatively sane and yet keep from hurting or scaring those around me. I've even come to appreciate my rage. Allow me to explain.

If you've followed this blog much in the last few years you're probably aware that, last fall, my family dispensed with the junkie situation. Our home and our very lives were almost completely destroyed by said junkies. And I think my anger, my fire, my rage kept me going. It was, for some time, all I had to keep me going. The junkies took away almost everything we had. They alienated all of our friends and family. They sucked up all the money and then some. They took away our peace and quiet and our security. They turned our home and our lives into hell on Earth. I've never been so angry for so long. I've never been so angry, period. And I think that rage kept me going. It kept me getting out of bed every day and doing what I could to keep my family from falling completely apart.

Rage is powerful, there's no doubt about that. It can be powerfully painful and frightening, this is true. It can be powerfully destructive, violent and traumatizing, yes. But it can also be powerfully motivating. You see for years my rage was my only strength; it kept me alive when the rest of me just wanted to give up. It kept me fighting, it kept me hanging on. The junkies took everything we had but they fed my rage and, strangely enough, that's the one thing that helped me survive them.

Things Stay the Same

The More They Change, That Is...

You may have noticed my love for spirals and other circle-like symbols. This isn't just an aesthetic attraction. Everything in this life, indeed, everything and everyone on this planet and I suspect the entire universe in all its glory, terror and wonder, really does move in cycles. Energy swirls and wheels and occasionally careens wildly but as it moves back and forth and behind and around it can sometimes come unusually close to its place(s) of origin. We, as mere humans, start at one point, seemingly, and while we gradually move away from our perceived beginnings we always come back to people, interests, feelings, etc., that we once knew and might have once sworn off "for good". And I am no exception.

Long lost friendships reforged, old notions of motherhood that have revisited and decided to stay, signs from the spirits, old familiar longings and dreams. They feel different now. They are different now just as I am. But they are only the matured desires and phases that were planted as seeds years ago. In my youth, when I was a maiden, I didn't fully understand all of the difficulties or the joys of these things. I didn't comprehend the depth and details and the enormity and importance of all these, and many other, things, ideas and people. And while I'm sure I have more to learn I'm glad to say I've gotten past the beginner stage. I am no longer a newbie.

Things that began years ago and have begun again are seemingly synchronized with our slowly but inevitably blossoming springtime. The trees are blooming and attracting the earliest of bees in swarms. Our backyard is truly abuzz with their music. I happened upon a dining hawk and a running bobcat on the road today and was thrilled to see them out and about enjoying the deliciousness of this sunny day. Tomorrow may bring yet another winter storm but for today it is blessedly sunny and warm, bursting with life, energy, sap and all the juices of plant and animal life. And while the next day may be miserable, today I choose to embrace all that comes my way, soak in the warmth and milk it for all it's worth. I encourage you to do the same.

January is a Bitch...

...and so is February.

I can't tell you how much crap I've endured in the month of January in my life. When I was a kid it was just the pain in the ass drag of going back to school after the Christmas/winter break. As I've gotten older it's gotten worse and the pain in the ass quotient has skyrocketed. Serious relationships grinding to painful halts, drug addictions taking over the lives of loved ones, ice storms that turn a region into a disaster area and every form of sickness popular with the cool kids.

I've really spent most of these past two months sick as hell with one damn thing or another. Strangely enough, my personal life has taken a decided upswing at the same time as my body has been producing all kinds of disgusting things. My motto seems to be: "it could be worse." And that has proven true around these hills lately. But me being sick all the time coupled with one of my furry children sustaining an injury (that he's recovering from) has really made me hate January and February.

So, here's saying goodbye to January and February, welcome to March and "Come on Spring!"

Oh Man, It's an Omen

Once upon a time, when I was entering into a new and potentially risky venture, I saw an omen or a sign. Without sharing too many gory details I'll just say I had made a decision that I wasn't entirely confident about. Here comes the omen: As I turned off our road and set out in earnest on this new path I saw a fox run away from the fence line and toward the woods on my left. At the same time an owl flew away from the fence line and flew toward the woods on my right. I told myself that this was a sign that I was making the right decision and that my doubts and concerns would prove to be unfounded.

I was wrong. My doubts and concerns were very much warranted. To be fair, I don't completely regret taking that risk. I had some good times and learned a lot about myself, about interpersonal relationships and life in general. I also learned a lot about pain and regret and guilt. So, it was perhaps an invaluable learning experience but also probably the second most painful time period in my life. If I had been a little less selfish I would have taken the opposite interpretation of the omen seriously. Or maybe I did but quickly discounted it.

They say hindsight is 20/20. And this is no more true than when speaking of omens. The above example is just one of the omens I've seen and either didn't recognize or interpreted incorrectly because I didn't take the time to think, meditate and perhaps research them. I know better now. If it strikes me on an emotional level I know the universe or the spirits of the land or the gods are trying to tell me something. This is especially true when I see something I've never seen before. I see it now and I know it.

To be fair, not all odd occurrences are necessarily omens. Sometimes a bird is just a bird. Sometimes there's nothing to learn. When I see a young eagle cruising a field and it's only mildly interesting to me and not visually startling then I know it's not an omen. It's just nature gracing me with a glimpse of its magnificence. The trick is something I've only learned with the passage of time. I've learned to trust my intuition, to listen to my instincts. May it be so with you.

Control

Idris over at House of Inanna recently wrote a blog post that really got my motor running about something I've been mulling over for a lot of years: control. Here's Idris:

Children had to [be] forced to the truth - and schools were created whose sole purpose was to break this natural urge to move to delight and love and force them to bend their knees to will of old and woman-denying men.

The above kicked me closer toward a conclusion that's been growing in the back of my head for most of my adult life: everything really is about control. It's not sex, it's not money or love, etc.; those things aren't secondary necessarily but are things to have control over. Starkhawk was/is very wise to discuss the idea of power over in her writings. (I really need to get her books off my dusty bookshelf!) And she's totally correct.

You know who else is correct? The BDSM crowd and the psychological folks: in every relationship there are dominant personalities and the submissive, weaker personalities. And some people just don't know when to quit or when to stand up and start. There are control freaks and those who don't want to be controlled by others but also can't or won't make hard decisions and stand by them.

The power hungry I can't really say much about other than that they've got serious ego issues that can, and often do, involve the domination of millions. They are of a breed largely unknown to me. I can only assume that those who feel the need to control many others are themselves very low in the self-esteem department and somehow think that if they dictate the actions of others than their own will be perfect. Or something.

Now the regular everyday controlling, bossy people are different. They like to keep their ducks in a row and have a handle on their particular situation. And I get that, I really do. Some people make better leaders than others. Some people are better under pressure and can make better decisions. And that's all well and good. My problem with some controlling people is their amazing ability to make everyone around them feel like stupid, barely evolved children who don't even have thumbs let alone the capacity for critical thought. I guess the only thing to do in that situation is to just ask them to lay off. At least, that's what I usually do.

As far as the rest goes, I've heard the phrase "passive aggressive" and always thought it was just a bunch of shit. I used to think, and I still do in part, that those who accuse others of being passive aggressive are just pissed cuz they don't get to rule the playground. And that is true, in one sense. But as I've gotten older I've learned that being passive aggressive can also be a wimpy, whiny ass way of doing your own thing while pretending to do what you know is best. And it's mostly a control and ego issue. There's a line in a Fiona Apple song that goes: "Do I wanna do right, of course. But do I really wanna feel I'm forced to answer you, hell no." And I completely understand that!

We've all got our own opinions and ideas and sometimes it's really damned hard to follow through on a stupid idea assigned by someone else. But being passive aggressive is agreeing to do something to a person's face and then doing something different once they've gone. Instead of having the guts to disagree with that person at the start the passive aggressive turd says one thing and does another. Passive aggressive people are experts at being two-faced. I oughta know, I've been one and occasionally still suffer relapses.

As I move further into the firey stage of my life I'm doing the passive aggressive schtick less and less. No, I'd much rather point out how wrong you are to begin with so I don't have to go through the charade of following your stupid orders. I'd much rather do that than add more bullshit to the already overflowing bullshit supply to be found in this world. I guess for many of us it's just a matter of age, experience and strength of character. I'm coming up with all kinds of new mottoes or mantras lately. My most recent is: I will not tolerate bullshit from others or myself.

Sacrificed Sense

Have you ever played one of those mind bending "what if?" games with someone? Ya know, you're passing the joint and you get to talking about weird shit? Or have you, like me, just pondered strange stuff on your own as you looked longingly at your stash box and tried to swallow down a cheap beer? Well, I have done the latter a lot lately and something I came up with was this: if you had to give up one of your senses which would it be? Smell, taste, sight, hearing, touch or speech? Without hesitation I chose speech.Why?

Well, my most important sense is hearing. That's a no brainer. While it makes communication infinitely easier that's not the reason I would never choose to give it up. Nope. I'd never give up the ability to hear because I couldn't live without music. Couldn't do it. "Oh, I can't hear anymore? You got a gun handy so I can stick it in my mouth? Sorry about the mess. Bang." No question. Take away my hearing and dig my grave.

My next most important sense is sight. I don't cherish it as much as hearing but I don't know how I'd handle never seeing a sunset again. I don't know what kind of life I'd be living if I couldn't see the afternoon sun streaming through the bright green leaves of spring. If I couldn't see the moon? Forget about it! I also know it would hurt like hell to not see my young cousins grow up. That would gut me. So, no, not willing to give up my sight.

Next most important is probably touch. And this is because I think daily life would just be incredibly difficult if I couldn't feel what I was touching. Can you imagine trying to use the bathroom if you couldn't feel? Or wash dishes or drive a car? I don't know how I'd function if I couldn't feel. And the biggie of touch is typing! I couldn't make it without that. I guess it's possible to learn how to function without feeling but I'm not willing to go there.

Smell and taste are up next. I put them together cuz, well, they just go together don't they? Peas and carrots, chocolate and peanut butter, toast and jam, smell and taste, see a pattern? While I would greatly miss the smell of rain and the smell of bacon frying I'd be much more willing to give those abilities up than others but there is another sense I would sacrifice in a heartbeat. And that's speech.

I've got very little use for the ability to speak. I don't like to talk all that much. In recent years I did most of my talking when I was stoned and now that's past and I'm back to talking only when absolutely necessary or when reunited with friends. I don't get to leave the house very often and I have only a very few friends to visit anyway. And, even when I do get to visit with friends, I talk for a little while to catch up and then I'm all talked out. When I was very young I virtually stopped talking for over a year. I did the baby noises thing and was starting to say a few words and then my sister was born and I stopped talking. Just like that, barely a word for a long time. I would answer a question but that was it.

And then, one day, I started talking in complete sentences expressing complete thoughts and ideas. So, clearly, while I wasn't talking I was still comprehending, I was still thinking and learning and growing. I just didn't feel the need to tell anyone about it. Later that night, as my Mom tucked me into bed, she asked me why I went so long without saying much and my answer was pretty simple: "I didn't have anything to say." I have no memory of any of this because I was too young. But I totally understand because I still feel that way. If I don't have anything important to say I don't talk. To me, speaking is necessary when answering a question or when expressing something important and that's it. It certainly isn't enjoyable or fun; it's almost a necessary evil sometimes.

There is one problem with this whole idea of giving up the ability to speak: I guess the ability to sing would go along with it. And that would seriously suck. I love singing, I love to sing! And I'm pretty damned good at it if I do say so myself. And I do. I can't sing like I could when I was a teenager. After all, I've smoked a lot of weed since then, had chronic bronchitis for a number of years and developed allergy induced asthma. And, to top it all off, I haven't done a scale since the day I graduated high school. There's also the sad fact that I haven't had much reason to sing about in the last few years. So, no, losing the ability to sing wouldn't make for too much of a change in my life. But I would still miss the hell out of it because when I feel like belting it out, and I really can, I love it.


If I was a nun-type person who took a vow of silence I don't think my chosen god would accept it as a virtuous decision as keeping silent isn't difficult for me, not in the least. I can happily go hours and hours and hours without saying a single word if given the chance. I'm just not a vocal, verbal person. Nothing infuriates me more than those individuals who, for whatever reason, talk incessantly. It's a waste of energy and incredibly irritating to boot. I don't waste words and I nearly always say exactly what I mean and nothing more. I don't play head games because they're all essentially games played with verbal tactics. And those things hold no interest for me. I say what I mean and there's no point in reading anything into it because if I had more to say I would just say it and not make you guess. Period.


As I've gotten older, harder and meaner I've become more like that in my writings. There aren't any hidden meanings, no insinuations, no intimations. There's no reason to read between the lines because there are no lines to read between. I don't play games and I don't employ much subtlety. I don't tolerate bullshit and I don't serve it up. I've got lots of ideas, opinions, questions and just outright blatherings to share but the internet is my chosen method for communicating these things. I love words, I love words! But I greatly prefer them typed and spell checked.

What sense would you be most willing to sacrifice?

Under Construction Part II

Well, after receiving some great feedback from various readers I came to the conclusion that the worry I'd had from the beginning, about the readability of the text over the awesome background, was well founded. Yeah, the template was gorgeous but I should have stuck with my hard and fast rule against transparent templates. It was great looking but it presented too many problems and really did make reading difficult. So, now I've changed templates again with no transparencies this time! I've yet to add my title image or any of my widgets but I'll keep at it.

You may also notice, or you may not, I dunno, that I've got a lot more posts than I did last time you visited and that my label count looks a lot different and is now topped by "photography". Well, that's cuz I merged Sacred Spiral Creations, my photography (and sometime collage and occasionally textile craft) blog with this blog. It just makes sense to include my creative pursuits, such as they are, with Magic in These Hills which has, over the last year especially, become much more personal. So, if you are so inclined, please check out the new labels and see some of my so-called art. And, as always, feel free to offer some feedback about it! I'm hoping that getting those pictures and such out to more readers will inspire me and get me moving back into a creative mode.

Anyway, when I first started this blog I was dead set against including anything relating to my personal life. It was gonna be all business: mythological discussions, pagan issues in the news, witchcraft tools, ideas, ethics, etc. And while I've included all of that, and more, somewhere along the way I began including more and more personal stuff. I guess that was just a function of time as I began to make genuine friends throughout the blogosphere and felt the need to vent about my deteriorating family situation.

So, that's the news, that's the latest scoop. I'm pretty happy with this new layout: it reflects my personality with its firey swirls and spirals. I'd still like to know what you kind folks think of it, but I'm pretty sure I'll be sticking with it. I'd also like to fess up that I've been a terrible reader these last few months. As my urge to write slipped away from me any pleasure I got from reading the blogs of others was also stripped from me. So, for the time being, I'll refrain from adding a huge blog list. It's going to take me some time to (re)acquaint myself with my favorite, and new found, blogs. So, if you used to be in my blog list but aren't just yet, don't fret; I'll get to it! Thanks everyone for all of your kind words and patience over the last year or so. I'm back in the saddle again and it feels good!

Change is Good

I have a confession to make: My name is Livia Indica and I don't like Thanksgiving. In fact, I hate it. I've felt this way for most of my life but only recognized the reasons behind these feelings in the last ten years or so. It's a big frikkin' mess and worry and bother and stress and money spent and family irritations all to celebrate the subjugation and eventual extermination of nearly 20 million American Indians by militant invasion and disease. I know I'm not the only person who feels this way but that doesn't change anything or make the holidays, and all its headaches, any easier to handle.

"But that's not what I came to talk about. I came to talk about the draft."

Uh, I mean, I came to talk about change and how it can be a good, if painful, thing.

You see, I still don't like Thanksgiving Day all that much. It is my very least favorite of all secular or American or religious holidays, be they Christian or pagan or Spaghetti Monster-related, etc. But this Thanksgiving is different. This entire holiday season will be, and already is, different. Why? Well, to be quite blunt about it: there aren't any junkies doing everything they can to ruin it. It's amazing how people who can't accomplish anything useful, or much of anything at all, for years on end can still manage to ruin holidays for everyone around them. All it takes is a few choice words, a few thousand dollars stolen, a lack of consideration or participation and a general discourteous attitude to make everyone involved in the holiday feel like total shit.

And my family doesn't have to face that this year! Yay!

Sure, we're broke as hell. The junkies left us with a ton of drug-induced debt. We're worried about our loved one and what he's done to himself. But we are determined to have a happier holiday season than we've had the last two or three years. And while everything isn't perfect the mere fact that we are junkie-free will guarantee a pretty nice time for us. And I'm honestly excited and looking forward to it. So, here, have some traditional Thanksgiving Day carols.





And to all my American friends out there: Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy your pumpkin pie and tryptophan-induced naps!

Welcome to the Mother

I'm really feeling my age this autumn. And it's a good thing, it really is. There has been sadness, rage and tremendous relief. The Samhain season, and all its implications, has been in full force around these hills as of late. My best buddy, of the furry kind, died after more than 14 years of companionship and love. Our parakeet, who lived a long life of ten years, died a few days later. Another part-time indoor kitty disappeared and, presumably, went off to die alone. These deaths weren't exactly unexpected but sad all the same. And there have many other things, situations, trials, attitudes and habits dying as well.

If you've followed my blog for very long you're probably aware of the junkie problem we've been suffering for several years now. Well, that is now over and we are free. I won't bore you with the gory family details but I will say that now that the melodramatic screaming is over and most of the moving is done I, and the rest of family, feel a whole helluva lot better. There are still some serious issues to be dealt with and worried over and eventually - hopefully - worked out. But the energy level and the over all vibe of my home is vastly improved.

It's as if an enormous weight has been removed from my shoulders. It's as if the foot that was driving me, and my family, into the ground is gone and gone forever. And now that we are free of the destructive toxicity of overwhelming greed, endless lies, disloyalty, selfishness and thoughtlessness we are learning to live again. The world looks and feels different to me now that I can stand up straight and see with clear eyes. I know it's really me that's done the changing. It's as if my senses, my creativity and my magical sensibilities are waking up after several years of a depression so deep I didn't think I could ever dig my way out of it.

My old tendency to self-pity is mostly gone now. It's a time and energy wasting activity that accomplishes nothing worthwhile. The sweet, sensitive girl is long, long gone. In place of the Maiden is a much harder bitch goddess. The trials of the last few years, as painful and frustrating as they were, have toughened me up quite a lot. I don't even take much medication anymore. It's as if I really have gone through the fire and come out stronger for it. Horrible cliche that, but it's true.

I've been noticing a few white hairs lately and am slowly moving into the Alpha female position in my family. It's strange and yet completely expected and, in a weird way, fascinating. I've become firmly ensconced in the ranks of adulthood and am enjoying my membership in the club. I don't have actual children of my own. But I am the caregiver of my family. I'm the one who runs the household and makes sure everyone eats and has clean clothes, clean beds, etc. I said farewell to the Maiden some time ago, I know. Now I think I'm ready for the next step. Welcome to the Mother.

Lack of Cycles

I've never had anything in my life that could be called a cycle. I don't seem to have any kind of internal clock that regulates either sleep, menstrual periods, mood, energy or anything that's supposed to follow a regular time frame. Humans have all kinds of clocks that just don't seem to function properly for me. Most of it's wrapped up in my head: chemicals that aren't produced in the appropriate amount or messages that don't get sent through the proper connections.

For instance, we are supposed to have an internal clock that regulates sleep and, usually, makes us want to sleep at night and be up and about during the day. I've never had this. I've always preferred being awake at night but never known, from day to day, if I would be. One day I'll be awake for 20 hours straight and sleep all day and the next I'll sleep 8 hours during the night and be up 18 hours during the day and the next I'll sleep 12 hours through the afternoon and night and wake up at 3 in the morning and be up 'til the next afternoon. And I've always been like this. Even during the times of my life when I had a regular job or regular classes I didn't have a normal sleeping schedule. I could work or study at the same hours day after day and my hours of sleep could still vary by as many as 4 to 6 hours or more.

I've never had a regular menstrual cycle either. (If you're a squeamish man who likes to pretend women don't bleed I'd recommend skipping this paragraph.) I got my first period a month after I turned 10 and the most regular I've ever been was when I was around the age of 15; I would bleed every 40-60 days. For those first ten years I would have such horrible menstrual cramps that I'd miss school and spend a day in bed moaning and crying and puking, but I could never predict when this would happen and never plan my life around it. My periods only got weirder as I got older; I've had a period last 9 months and I've gone over a year and a half with no period at all. And I'm only 32 so it's not menopause; it's just hormone weirdness.

I've never had anything approaching a predictable energy level or mood either. One day I'm bouncing off the walls and dancing to the music and the next I can barely drag myself up to take care of the basic necessities of the day. I can be writing away and grinning like an idiot for several days in a row and then damn near suicidal for the next few weeks. Bipolar really is a bitch, no other way to say it, and I don't even have the more serious form of it. I can't imagine what it's like for those whose bipolar forces them into hospitalization.

Anyway, I didn't come here to talk about all that, I came to talk about the moon. What all this has been leading up to is a theory I've recently thunked up. I think a large part of my attraction to the moon is its predictable cycle: new and dark, waxing, full, waning, new and dark, rinse and repeat. No matter what crazy shit my mind and body are up to I can always count on the moon to be doing its thing in the same steady patten it's been following for millions of years.

Even if my sleeping "schedule" has kept me from seeing her for a while I can always count on the moon to be in the phase I'm expecting. No matter how hyper and tense and nervous or depressed and sluggish I feel I can always look up and know what the moon is doing. The moon is beautiful, luminous, inspirational and dependable. She has, and always will be, a great comfort to me. Luna is the ultimate goddess.

More Internet Memories

If it wasn't for the internet I don't know if I'd be a pagan witch. To be clear, my first encounter with neopaganism was a Scott Cunningham book (yes, that one) that my cousin handed me after she discarded it. She knew I was always reading about mythology and religions and whatnot and thought I would enjoy it. And boy did I?! But if it hadn't been for the internet I don't know if I would have stuck with it. Back in the early days of my pagan path walking I was fortunate enough to have internet access and it opened up the wider world of what it could mean to be pagan. In the early years of this millennium I used to say that the internet was a boon to two areas of interest: pornography and neopaganism. I don't know if that's really true, I suspect it isn't, but it seemed that way to me. I guess that says a lot about me, doesn't it? I was a country girl bored with what I knew and thirsting for something that I could not yet name. And when I discovered witchcraft, mythology taken seriously as including life lessons, ritual and all the rest I finally had a name for it.

However, many people had a name for their beliefs long before I came along and long before the internet was even a dream in a nerds mind. And some of them really hated us newbies. Granted, there was a lot of fad fever going on, there was a lot of white lighting and dumb kids calling themselves priestesses and putting "lady" in front of their name a week after their learned the definition of Wicca. There was a lot of bullshitting going on to be sure. But there was a lot of honest, sincere searching and learning taking place too. Those of us who were new and naturally ignorant and inexperienced were not often greatly encouraged by the older, more learned. In fact, just because we were new we were sometimes automatically lumped in with the "fluffy bunnies" and disregarded simply because of our youth or lack of knowledge. This of course happens to everyone at some point but it was particularly prevalent in the suddenly exploding online pagan community.

Fluffy bunnies were a strange breed and I may have been included in their ranks at one point by some. In my opinion they tended to be very new and yet felt instantly entitled to the utmost respect. They knew very little of mythology or folklore or ritual or herbs or any of it and yet considered themselves high priests and priestesses even though they had never even attended a group ritual, much less organized or led one. They tended to wear huge pentacles on their person just hoping someone would start some shit with them so they could claim persecution. They reminded me of the peasant Dennis in Monty Python's Holy Grail: "Come see the violence inherent in the system! You saw him repressing me, didn't you?" It was comical and silly but it was also somewhat damaging. So many of the bunnies repeatedly regurgitated the "9 million witches killed during the Burning Times! Never again!" mantra that it lost its meaning and created a victim complex, making it nearly impossible for other pagans or anyone in the mainstream to take them seriously. And the bunnies never even bothered to research such an outrageous figure, never realizing or caring that such a number would have wiped out most of Europe. So, I guess they earned some of their enmity. But some of us felt a sting we didn't earn.

From my perspective it seemed like some of the older pagans truly hated the newbies. Looking back, I'm not ever sure if all of the anti-fluffy bunnies were Wiccan or other species of pagan. All I knew in the beginning was Wicca and I thought that's what everyone was: I guess that made me a fluffy bunny. There was so much information out there and 99% of it was Wicca 101. There were so many cheesy pagan websites it was dizzying sifting through them all. And the greater majority of them were saying the same things: correspondences and generic, uninspired spells and rehashed information. The way I remember it most of the pagan sites I came across from about 2001-2003 were utter drivel. They all included the same things: a calender of the eight sabbats, a usually vitriolic disclaimer that Wicca wasn't devil worship, a brief explanation of the common Wiccan rituals tools and that was pretty much it. There was very little personal reflection or interpretation and even less research and scholarship. You know what there was a lot of? Graphics! Shining, spinning, sparkling, color changing, blinking pentacles, triple goddess and horned god symbols on every page of nearly every site.
It was cute for about thirty seconds and then quickly became nauseating.

And here's a little sordid secret: I had one of those crappy websites too! It had some basic information but it mostly consisted of essays I had written for an online Wiccan college (I'm a second degree in a online school, yay!) that was, I believe, called Crystal Waterfall of all things. And while I was a better writer than some I realize now that what I really needed was a blog. My opinion-full essays didn't really belong on a sparkly deep blue website: they belonged in a personal journal. And while I'm not Wiccan anymore by any means I still look back with some fondness on those heady times of techno-paganism and watching the Witchvox membership grow by leaps and bounds.

These Dreams

A few years back I had a dream blog. I started it for a variety of reasons, but mostly because writing my dreams down by hand took much longer than it took to type them. I only posted in my dream blog for a few months before I moved on to other things and ditched it. But I've been thinking of starting a new dream blog for a while and I've been getting signals from the universe for a few weeks that a closer examination of my dreams would be a good idea. A startling dream here and there, dream related articles that pop out of seeming nothingness and other signs of synchronicity have been making themselves known to me.

I've done some digging and found that I am not the only weirdo who wants to keep an online dream journal. There are tons of dream journals out there ranging from the very visual yet amazingly language based to those with only the bare facts. In fact, I've found a great site called, you guessed it, Dream Journal and I'm really liking it so far. I know it makes me a traitor to the almighty Blogger but this is a unique site that keeps track of specific facts like whether the dream occurred indoors or in the past, if you were lucid, the setting and feelings, etc., and allows the user to see trends and themes over time. It also offers some interpretive help as well as opening up your dream to the interpretations of other dream bloggers. There's a forum and all kinds of other groovy, helpful things on the site; I highly recommend it. There are a few ads but they're tasteful and not obnoxious so I don't really mind considering the benefits. It's a helluva lot better and much more useful than a handwritten dream journal in my opinion; at least it is to me. So, without further ado I'd like to introduce My Dream Journal.

Farewell to the Maiden

My life has changed a lot since I first started down my pagan path. It was ten years ago on Imbolc that I dedicated myself to the triple goddess and the horned god and I'm only just now realizing how far I've progressed. Or, rather, I'm only just now accepting the latest changes that were set in motion when my current incarnation began. The phases of the moon really do apply to the life of a woman; I'm living proof of that. Up until a couple of years ago I really was a maiden: youthful, full of hope with few cares and worries. Oh I still had plenty of work to do, lots of responsibilities and required medication to keep me relatively sane. But a lot of things were different then. I didn't have addicts doing everything they could to ruin my family financially and psychologically. I didn't have a slowly deteriorating parent to worry over and do for. I didn't have but a fraction of the workload I have now. In short: the weight on my shoulders was much lighter than that which weighs upon me now.

I look back on those days of getting my work done and then settling back with my pipe and exhaling all my worries away as some kind of deceptive heaven. It was heaven in that once I took care of business I could relax and forget my worries. It was deceptive because it made me feel, even if for only a small time, that my worries and problems couldn't touch me and if I just kept smoking I'd be okay. And, of course, that wasn't and isn't true. Smoking what I still consider the sacred herb helped me get over some serious pain but it eventually became a crutch. And now that I don't have it I feel like I deserve its benefits much more than I did then. Not because I wasn't suffering hurt that it couldn't help me with but because the stress I'm under now is so much greater than what I experienced back then.

The Maiden is gone. She spent most of her time worrying only about herself, what she wanted, what she needed or what she thought she needed. She had high in the sky hopes of getting back to school and she still thought she was an intellectual. And while she cared for her loved ones she only sometimes put their needs ahead of her own. Most of the time she was more worried about what people thought of her as opposed to whether or not others came up to her own standards. She was neurotic, insecure and self-conscious to a fault much of the time. And while I miss her hopefulness and her energy-and her weed-I don't miss her gullibility or her naivete. I don't miss her dependence on other people or her blinding adherence to their ways.

The Maiden is gone; farewell.

The Internet: Then and Now

Or, How My Longest Lasting Addiction Has Changed Over the Years

Way, way, way back in the fall of 1995 I moved into a dorm that just happened to have a tiny computer lab on its ground floor. Now, when I say "tiny" I mean damn near minuscule. If my memory serves me, and there's no guarantee it does, I believe there were three or four computers crammed into a glorified closet. One thing I do clearly remember is that there was a two hour time limit for computer usage that was tallied on a sign up sheet. I must have signed that thing a thousand times before the internet got the better of me.

Before I moved away from my little hick town, in which I now live in again, I knew about the internet. I knew it existed at any rate. But I didn't really know what it could mean to me personally or what dangerous fun it could be. But that all changed soon after I discovered a little thing called ISCA. I don't remember what it stood for exactly but I know it was a service out of an Iowa university and it allowed users to talk in real time with anyone else who happened to be connected to ISCA. It was a chat room before they were called chat rooms.

It was such a rinky dinky thing compared to what we have now. There were no smilies, no wallpapers, no graphics, no pretty at all. There weren't even fonts; it was in MS-DOS style for shits sake! It was cuneiform compared to the high falutin' chat rooms around these days. But it was great; it was amazing! I remember for weeks tallying up how far away my chat buddies lived. Here's one from Florida! This guy is from England! Holy shit, this one is from Australia! It was mind blowing, it was awe inspiring and it was fun as hell. But it was also addicting.

Those last few weeks when it got really bad I lived my life in two hour periods. I'd be online for two hours then go eat, shower and perhaps sleep a little for two hours then right back to the internet for two hours. And I did this round the clock for days and days and days. I was hooked. I walked, talked, thought and breathed the internet as I knew it. I was addicted. Obviously, I didn't go to class, wasn't doing schoolwork and barely managed to keep my part time job at Burger King. It got so bad that I had no choice but to withdraw from classes before I had a GPA full of Fs.

That experience taught me a valuable lesson. Or, at least, it forever burned away my immense desire to chat online. I can count on one hand the times I've entered a chat room since then and I don't miss it a bit. In fact, I don't know how I ever enjoyed it. When I look back I think it must have been the fascination and wonder and glory of it all that really hooked me, as opposed to talking with strangers about usually mindless teenage crap. I'm such an anti-social hermit with no tolerance for small talk, i.e. bullshit, that I can't imagine having anything in common with that girl of eighteen.

And, just as I typed the above I realized that was nearly half a lifetime ago. My life can be divided between pre-internet and addiction to internet. After I went back to school later that school year I learned that the internet was much more than chatting. There was this wonderful thing called Netscape and it was wonderful! It was better than ISCA! I could find anything about anything! There was news from all over the world; there were trivia games; there was porn! I remember I was working in the English Department as an office assistant and on my mail slot someone had put a sticker that included my name in the form of a web address. I was a junkie discovering a new, updated and much more highly nuanced form of my preferred drug.

Coming soon: How the Internet Ballooned the Pagan Community, including discussions of techno-pagans, millions of cheesy pagan graphics, fluffy bunnies talking out their asses, the anti-fluffy bunnies talking out their asses and other fun and fascinating bits.