The Work, Pleasure, and Play

There's Moonshine watercolor shadow work in progress. It seems to be activating some of the murky sludge that's apparently in deep retreat at the bottom of my current cauldron. It's feeling very turbid, and... ominous even. So I'm taking and making time with all the facets of this fascinating and - dare I say - daunting exercise.

On the lighter side of creative expression is a focus on Pleasure (after all, it is the lusty month of May). So I'm amusing (and, quite frankly, distracting) myself with inks, paints, pencils, pens, etc., with zero expectations of outcomes, in a way that is pure play. And I dig it.

This is a season that reminds me that "workdesk" takes on meaning that includes the shelves of seedlings 'n' plants still down in the basement under the grow-lights, and the plants in the greenhouse, and the plants hardening of on the table outside the greenhouse... workdesks, one and all. 

I sporadically join the weekly creative fun of What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday, and this is one of those days. Join the fun, or simply visit the creations of this week's sharings at WOYWW. 

Peace. 🕊

Galium aparine, a vernal ally

...one of my botanical sketches from days gone by... 

Here in my realm of the world, and quite possibly yours, the botanical Galium aparine is just beginning its vernal reemergence from Gaia's belly, so I'm returning to my Materia medica to share this beloved plant with you...

Unblocked

 

Today I woke early. Most folx who know me would likely say I wake early every day. And I do. So, when I say, “Today I woke early,” I’m talkin’ two-ish, ante meridiem. This has been happening intermittently over the past week or so. This is unusual for me. So when it happened again this morning I honored the early morning darkness that was clearly begging for my attention. My attention started with consideration of my relationship with coming off this recent full, eclipse, Libra moon now in Scorpio as it leans into its waning. It seems my still waters are flowing deep, and I’m swimming in them.

I leveraged the dark, quiet time to engage my heart breath*… to feel my heart fill to overflow with love, to fan the flames under that love, to feel the grounding verve coming up from the earth’s core to meet my heart, to feel the cosmic verve from the core of the universe reaching down through me to that heartful space within, that I may stir it all in that pulsing cauldron until it overflows like fluid steam entering my body, by being, spilling over into my intimate world, out to the community, and expanding outward with every exhale to fill the earth and all the kin, the atmosphere, extending deep into the mystery of the universe… the one voice, cycling back and forth and heart-blending with every breath.

I emerged from this daily rite to put the kettle on, prepare the beans for the coffee pot, and snuggle with my spouse until the water boiled. He poured the water, set the timer, as I started my morning ritual of doodle-journaling, which continues throughout the day. My written journal asked for attention as well, which was nothing more than to note a mantra that surfaced five days ago: Look back. See forward. So that’s what I did. I looked back through the pages of this word journal - an ol’ school composition book - and saw that I (re)started the practice last May Day. As I paged through, I took notice of so many serendipities, and felt a fresh waves of inspiration bubbling up from those still, deep (and dare I say, muddy) waters of mine. Of ours.

These inspirations wash over me now, offering an odd and lovely cleansing and clearing of a kind not felt in decades, refreshing me and my passage forward. A passage made aware to me in January; a passage blocked, and blocked no more. I sit with this and recall a February musing, “When I first started blogging back in 2004, the writing was for me, myself and I. I may need to reclaim some of that.” And yeah, I’m feeling that shit. And it feels like Good Shit. Good shit unearthed from the blessed egregore that is my Moonshine coven.

Peace. 🕊

*I was re-introduced to the heart breath years ago while learning with Nicki Scully, and now adapt it to my needs in the moment. 

Vernal Blessings

 

Here in my realm of our shared reality, the season of spring arrives later today with the vernal equinox. My long-time tradition for this transitional occasion is to offer focused attention and active blessings and gratitude to and for the season of winter as it shifts off the seasonal stage. As I type this, there are flurries dancing on the other side of the windows, and they offer sweet, if not comical, validation to this ritual.

By evening, spring will be fully with me, despite the chill of the day. The days around the vernal equinox are days of balance and harmony for me, as I hold the suspension of day light and dark night in my heart as I await for the glorious, if not incremental, increase of daylight over darkness. I honor this season for this escalation, and look forward to the days ahead when intense signs of awakening, sprouting, growth and expansion and undeniable and pregnant with promise. The gods know this world needs promise.

But today, I’ll make time to bundle up to wander our blessed little acre so that I may honor and gift winter with my gratitudes. I’ll harvest a twig to bring indoors where a fire will be burning to warm us as I embellish the vernal sprig with expressions of my desired expansions, and springtime accolades.

Tomorrow, on the first full day of spring, I’ll delve deeper into honoring and gifting this regenerative season with my vernal gratitudes.

These simple acts, rituals, and ceremonies are magick and Medicine to me. I invite you to to join me in this sacred seasonal honor, in any way that pleases 'n' delights, nourishes 'n' sustains all the best parts of you and your world.

And to my friends in the southern hemisphere, I offer you autumnal blessings.

Peace. 🕊

Fullness

 

It has been a full week. Full, as in overflowing. Full, as in so much of the Work culminating with mystery, validation, and clarity. I see the peaks and valleys of the Work I’ve been doing for decades, the more recent Work that I’m doing with the support of my Moonshine coven, and I see the Work that lies before me… and the portal I prepare to step through to work the Work.

The coming days will be focused on alert 'n' conscious chewing and digesting of all The Things that have culminated over (and under and around) these past several days. Absorbing and assimilating will follow, for sure. And elimination too, eventually.

The digestion metaphor is really working for me right now. While journaling this morning I cracked myself up when the term “Portal Potty” manifested. Crude, perhaps. Funny, for sure. And, in this moment in time, fully fitting.

Yesterday, during a superlative reading - a reading that stands up ‘n’ out among decades of readings that I’ve received - I expressed out loud how grateful I am for my sense of humor. It holds me, comforts me, carries me, and it accompanies me to the deep, dark spaces that offer the hard Medicine, the shadow Medicine, the Medicine that heals like no other.

So, today I’m feeling full. I have Work to do, and preparation for passage through the portal that awaits me. But today, I relax with the fullness, the focus, the chewing, the humor, and deep gratitude for the privilege to have such opportunity.

Peace. 🕊

Siamo Uno

Today, March 13, marks a long time of loving anniversary.

I first laid eyes on my spouse in 1976, during college orientation. It wasn’t a romantic moment, as I may well be the least romantic person you’ll ever encounter, so romance has never really been a thing for me. It was a moment, though. I saw this mop-headed guy sitting at a table looking as if he was trying to fold himself into himself. Know what I mean? I probably thought something like, “What a sad sack.” And maybe I added something like, “Cute, though.” Well, maybe not.

1977 came along and we moved in together. Ten years after that, on Friday, March 13, we were married in our living room by some justice of the peace (what an obtuse title), the ceremony witnessed by two beloved friends. I was dressed in black. There’s backstory to all that, and maybe I’ll revisit it at some point in written form, but today is about honoring our own personal storm of love. And, sweet gods, I do love storms.

Today I smile as I consider the number 47. It adds to 11, and that adds to 2. And that feels about right. Balance, harmony, a union of two ones. Siamo uno.

I can’t imagine sharing these 47 years with anyone else. We were chatting about this long time over our early morning coffee. He said he’s glad I still love him. And I do. He said he’s glad we’re still friends. And we are. He said he’s glad I’m happy. I responded, “Who says I'm happy?” And we laughed. We’re blessed to have a lot of laughter in our life together. Siamo uno.

So, yeah, today we observe our 47 years together. I’ll celebrate by pulling together our tax kit, and other stuff. He’ll celebrate by working on the chick brooder he’s making, and other stuff. The forecast is looking unseasonably pleasant, so we’ll likely make time ‘n’ space to sit on the deck, as we so often do, and raise a bottle of ale to us, as we often do. Just another day. Another day shared. Siamo uno.

Peace. 🕊

The Mighty Pause Button

I sit in the early hours of the day with that single page note in my mind and in my heart, knowing I'll reread the physical thing at some point, but in the meantime, I need to trust my memory, my feels, my intuitive knowing. As I sit with the memory and consider the words that were written, as I recall them, I settle on just a few, with one word - admittedly - difficult to decipher, but I’m confident of my decoding. I'm hit with a realization that those words were offered not as a request for communication as was implied, but rather, as the saying goes, with ill will.

Of this I feel a mighty certainty. Why? Because I already knew it.

When I place space between myself and others I do it either with their blessing, or I do it silently. When I do it silently, and others read their own trappings into that silence, the space, that has nothing to do with me. Know what I mean? When they choose to take their own trappings and turn them against the silence, the space, that's not my plight. It's theirs. They're conjuring their own... silence, their own space, their own stuff, not mine.

And I see how personal they’ve taken my silence, the space I chose to create when my mom passed. And it’s space. It’s malleable. I mean, I communicate with others within this space. But I digress. It’s a talent.

To not take things personal is a challenge, for sure. Yet it is a worthy cause, and one that can offer mighty Medicine. My mom and I had some lively discussions on this topic, as she pretty much took most everything personal. It seems a deeply rooted familial quirk. I still struggle with it. After all. I grew up in a very take-things-personal environment. Yet do my best, thanks to decades of the Work, to press my pause button when I feel those familiar jolts. I pause so I may digest, discern, possibly evolve ‘n’ heal, and - in the interpersonal realm - avoid reacting. From here I may respond from a place of solicitude, or stand mute. 

For now, this is where I rest, where I sit, where the Work will do what it does... what we do together.

Peace. 🕊

Foul Language & Good Medicine

Yesterday was a good day - for me - until it wasn’t. In the grand scheme of this world we share, doing the personal, healing Work that I do sometimes feels petty to me. Yet that Work is mighty Medicine, and it does support me in what I might deem the more important work of justice in which I participate. Anyhoo…

So, there I was, moon void of course, embracing High Priestess verve, feeling some deep internal harmony that I’d not felt in a long while. And it felt so rich and nourishing. I had taken action that morning on something that felt good, and right, and ripe. I was feeling poised, comforted by my choices and actions. It was - for me - a sweet day. And then the mail arrived.

An envelope with the point of origin obvious seemed to glare at me, challenging the good Medicine of the day that had blessed me. I might have set it aside, as I’ve done with similar correspondence in the past, to open and examine some other day, but some internal impulse tore one side of the envelope and pulled out the contents. There was a second sealed envelope that I set aside, and I unfolded the single sheet of paper and read the words. My palms began to sweat, a heavy, coiled lump of a feeling settled between my solar plexus and my heart. As I type these words in this moment those visceral responses return as I wonder if the tormentor, the tormentor I just wrote of the day before, has an ally?

I engaged my grounding heart breath between each read, as I steadied myself to understand the short message, and not make assumptions. Yet each read knocked me off my center. I felt pissed, I felt frustrated, I felt a familiar intrusion… and then I felt wonder.

Wonder and curiosity are things I understand, and hold great honor for, as they have guided me well through so many aspects of my life, and the Work. Yet the curiosity perceived in the words I read and re-read are born - I am confident - of the shared fabrications of the tormentor. Serendipity. Fucking serendipity. I thought, “this fucking Work, it’s fucking magick, and it’s fucking Medicine. Will fucking wonders never fucking cease?”

I continued to engage my heart breath, and settled in that place of wonder… wondering how it is that there are folx in the world that have so little interest, meaning and value in their own lives that they’re compelled to poke around in the lives of others. How it is that there are folx that are unable to tend to their own business, their own lives? How it is that there are folx so empty that they reach into the personal matters of others to fill their void? And do so with nebulosity.

From that place of wonder I settled into the sadness of it. Theirs, and mine.

Today I wonder if I’ll respond to that correspondence… tomorrow, next week, next month, ever?

So, now, on this gift of a leap year day, I sit with it… and await the Work that will guide me on this healing journey. And wouldn’t ya know… it arrives in my email with March’s Moonshine guidance. Serendipity. Fucking serendipity. Fucking magick. Fucking Medicine. And I feel the gratitude. The fucking gratitude.

Peace. 🕊