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An Ordinary Pagan

September 20, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Lughnasa and the Michaelmas Moon

Monday gratefuls: My sisters: Mary, BJ, Sarah, Anne. My brother: Mark. My ancient brothers: Tom, Paul, William, Mario. Family. It is both what you make it and part of what made you. Three-hole punch. Internet recipes. Cooking. Inogen. Rain and a cool night. Living on the Mountain top.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Rain on the deck

Tarot: Nine of Stones, Wildwood Deck

The Wildwood deck bases its suits and major arcana in Celtic myth and lore. And, it correlates them to the Great Wheel. I’m learning from the deck, deepening my own thinking about the Great Wheel, about this World, this Earth onto which I was thrown along with each of you reading this.

My interest in the Great Wheel ignited during my search for a theme, a focus for writing. Kate suggested I look into my heritage. At the time I knew about Richard Ellis, my indentured servant ancestor who arrived in the U.S. in 1707. His father, a captain in William and Mary’s occupying army in Ireland, came from Wales. Denbigh. I also knew that the Correls, also on my father’s side, immigrated during the Great Potato famine in the late nineteenth century.

So, things Celtic. I expanded my reach later on into Northern European myth and legend. Genetics put this strain of my family history as more significant than the Celtic, but I was well into the Celtic material before I got genetic information through 23andme.

This learning coincided with my leaving the Presbyterian ministry and moving toward Unitarian-Universalism. I found(find) the UU movement liberating, but thin soup. It’s a nice refuge for folks fed up with traditional religious institutions, but in itself it offers only a bland diet of warmed over religious thought disconnected from its roots, decent poetry, and a laudable willingness to take action for social justice.

Though I transferred my credentials to the UU, I found my attempts to enter its ministry regression. After a couple of embarrassing and unnecessary attempts. (Kate told me I was making a mistake.) I needed to write, to be away from religious institutions. Not try again in a profession which did not fit me from the beginning.

After I left my ministry monkey back in its theological jungle, I became a flat-earth humanist. Atheist. No afterlife. Death=extinction. No world beyond the phenomenal one. And that one only as it can be understood through science. Logic. Yes. Data. Yes. Facts. Yes. Myth. No. Other World. No. Spirituality. No. Learning from poetry and the world’s religious traditions? No.

Oh, I used the Celtic and Northern European folk traditions in my writing, yes. But, did I believe it? No. How could I?

Yet. The Great Wheel. Fit so well with my Thomas Berry inflected view of climate change work: creating a sustainable future for humans on this planet. It helped me into the thought world, the faith world of the early Celts.

When Kate and I moved to Andover in 1994, I’d already written three novels using the faith worlds of early Irish, Welsh, Scots, Cornish, and Breton folk. And, one using the Ragnarok idea from Northern European faith worlds.

We wanted to grow perennial flowers. Have fresh cut flowers every day. So, I learned about spring ephemerals, corms, tubers, bulbs. Food for them. The culture they needed in terms of soil, light, protection.

Then vegetables. A degree in horticulture by correspondence from a university in Guelph, Ontario. An orchard. Bees. A fire pit.

Our life together, Kate and mine, had Irish Wolfhounds, Whippets, and plants. Lots and lots of plants. We worked together, sweated together. Got sticky harvesting honey. Steamed from canning. Drying and freezing became a usual part of our fall.

It was hard manual labor and I loved it. So did Kate. We also loved each other and who each other was when working outside. When putting food by.

As the life of our gardens became our lives, the Great Wheel began to make deeper and deeper inroads into my heart. The Winter Solstice became my High Holiday. Or, my Deep Holiday. I celebrated the Celtic holidays, wrote e-mails and blog posts about them in addition to using them in my novels.

At some point I realized I had become a pagan. Not in any particular sense like Wicca, or Druidry, or Witchcraft, just an ordinary pagan, a person who found his religious life adequately nourished by the turning of the seasons, by the natural world, by love.

I’ll get to the nine of Stones later, but it supports this journey in a very specific way.

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Let go (Note: correction below)

September 13, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Lughnasa and the Michaelmas Moon

Monday gratefuls: Tara. The Ancient Ones, holding space for my eventful life. Peregrenatio. Rigel, lying down with me last night. A long night asleep. Orgovyx. Exhaustion. Hot flashes. Cousin Riley, his wife. Diane and Mary in Indiana. Bailey Patchworkers. Kitchen remodelers. House stainer. Jon, Ruth, and Gabe.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Death

Tarot: Death, #13 of the Major Arcana

So many help me. Jon, Ruth, Gabe came up Saturday. We had chicken pot pie and I sent them home with two. They also went to Upper Maxwell Falls to scatter some more of Kate’s ashes. I didn’t feel quite up to going and I wondered if it might be better anyhow. Allow them their own time, their own way of saying goodbye.

And, it was so. Here are Gabes’s (correction) words about it:

“Grandma’s metaphorical ashes. The ashes that stuck to the bottom were the parts of grandma that will stay with us forever. The cloudy ashes that eventually dispersed to go to the Atlantic Ocean were the parts of grandma that were temporary and that we don’t need to remember like pain and suffering. And, the glass was the vessel like our bodies, useful but not permanent.”

Leaving for Durango, Bill not pictured. Tom, Paul, me, Mario

The next morning I take a walk with my Ancient friends: Paul, Mario, Bill, and Tom. We spoke to each other in our minds, through the spirit air waves as Mario suggested. We gathered afterward. They’ve allowed me a lot of time to process my ongoing, eventful life. And, I love them for it.

Afterward I went over to an organic breakfast spot, Taspen’s. Been here almost seven years and it was the first time. Meeting Tara, my friend from CBE.

We talked. Tara is a great listener and an empath. When I told her I felt I’d expressed self pity when Jon and the grandkids left on Saturday, she said it sounded like love. Ruth had said, See you, grandpop. And, I said, my voice catching, I hope so. Sounded needy and self-pitying to me at the time.

After talking with Tara, I thought. No. I was vulnerable, sadly hopeful. And I don’t experience vulnerability with them too often. Maybe that’s changing now.

Today I’m going to the meeting of the Bailey Patchworkers. Kate’s stash and other sewing accessories will be given away to her friends there. I asked for a couple of minutes to speak. I’ll tell them that Kate loved them. That they gave her friendship and motivation for sewing. And, right after we got here. She went faithfully as long as she could.

They were a very different crowd from her ordinary social circles. She spoke her political truth often, to folks who didn’t agree. As Lauri, her engineer friend said, “I should have disliked her, but I adored her.” That was Kate.

These are those who helped me just in the last three days. A lucky guy, I am. And, of course, Rigel and Kepler.

Tarot: Death, # 13 in the Major Arcana

I’ve been drawing cards in what some call a daily oracle. Pick out one card, see how it speaks to the day. Oracle is a poor choice of words in that it has a predictive connotation. I don’t find the tarot useful as prophecy. I’ve found it astonishingly useful as a mirror to my inner world. It shows me things I ignore, or overlook, or diminish, or things I didn’t know were there.

Let’s see. I’d call it, I guess, The Daily Mirror. Ha.

Anyhow my point here is that I’m doing my own thing with these daily cards and I’m not only reading the day, but the trends. I’ve had so many cards that spoke to my anima. I’ve remarked on this before. I’ve also had cards like the Hanged Man that speak to a transformation in values, in beliefs, in life way.

The Death card is the apotheosis of that trend. Yes, indeed, it refers to death. But, to death as transition, as transformation, as a severance with the ways of the past (including life, eventually. for Kate, already), an entry way to the new. If you recall the High Priestess from yesterday, she blocked the way on the path. She encouraged waiting, going down into the depths. I’d call it wu wei.

The death card opens the way, suggests I embrace the changes that the anima cards have hinted at, the inner knowledge that the High Priestess wanted me to attain before going on. It also suggests letting go.

Let go, Charlie, of the flat-earth humanism of your post-ministry years. Let go, Charlie, of the old life you had with Kate. (note: this does not mean an end to grief or a diminished view of life with her.). Open yourself to the tarot, to astrology, to kabbalah, to the other world. Open yourself again to the creative life of writing and painting. Live into it. Live with it. Live. Let go of the caregiver, let go of the inner skeptic, the inner editor, the inner cynic. Embrace the mystical, the soulful, the beautiful. Let go.

Die to the old ways and be born again into a fourth phase of life. One focused on creativity and the other world. Let go.

“Meaning: Initiation and transformation. The core structure of initiation involves an experience of death followed by an experience of rebirth…We often have to die to our old ways of thinking, feeling, or behaving before we can open to our new life.” DTB

* “After a period of pause and reflection with the Hanged Man, the Death card symbolises the end of a major phase or aspect of your life that you realise is no longer serving you, opening up the possibility of something far more valuable and essential. You must close one door to open another. You need to put the past behind you and part ways, ready to embrace new opportunities and possibilities. It may be difficult to let go of the past, but you will soon see its importance and the promise of renewal and transformation.

Similarly, Death shows a time of significant transformation, change and transition. You need to transform yourself and clear away the old to bring in the new. Any change should be welcomed as a positive, cleansing, transformational force in your life. The death and clearing away of limiting factors can open the door to a broader, more satisfying experience of life.” biddy tarot

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Uh-oh. Changes.

September 8, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Lughnasa and the Michaelmas Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Orgovyx. Biologic Pharmacies. Money. CBE. The New Year. Rigel, sweet girl. Kep, happy boy. Dan Herman. Rich Levine. Alan Rubin. Marilyn Saltzman. Jamie Arnold. Judy Sherman. The Ancient Ones on peregrinatio. Safeway pickup. Cool breeze last night.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Dan’s honey

Tarot: Ace of Swords

Big news. $800 a month co-pay for Orgovyx. Not my first encounter with the predatory pricing of American pharma. Kate had a drug, I can’t recall the name right now, that was $500 a month. I’m applying for assistance. Yes, that’s enough, with the hit I took from going to one social security check and losing a third of my pension, to bite. In the decision making process between Orgovyx and Lupron. Lupron has a higher incidence of cardi0-vascular side effects. But, it’s only once every three months and covered by insurance.

Can’t imagine what folks do who don’t have resources at our age. And, that’s the bulk of us, I understand. What if you had to choose between rent and your cancer drug? Or, between food and your cancer drug? Self-triage.

On the other hand life is valuable. Sure. And, I want to do what I can to sustain mine. Let me see? Universal health care, anyone?

Boy, that Safeway really steps up. I put in a pick-up order for 8 am. They sent me a text at 6:00. Ready. Come whenever. I’m glad. It makes the morning simpler.

Barring more illness on Jon’s part or another wreck on Ruth and Gabe’s, we’ll finally distribute some of Kate’s ashes at Upper Maxwell Falls this Saturday. When Jon, Ruth, and Gabe can make it. Ruth told me she wanted some of my chicken pot pie so I’m making some on Friday. It’s been a while. Usually makes four to five full pie tins. Freeze well, too. I’ll give her two and keep two here. A good incentive to actually cook.

This will be the last of the family remembrances originally planned for August 18th. I’m planning a Kate offrenda for Dia de los muertos. I’ll burn a yahrzeit candle. (a twenty-four candle burned on the death date, but it seems appropriate.) Mix up the cultures a bit.

Which brings me to Yamantaka. The mandala at the MIA. Where I learned to accept death, my own. Long meditations on my corpse. Greeting the change, the transformation with excitement. Still sad. Yes. But also, what a moment!

Realizing I’ve been such a flat-earth humanist for so many years. Death=extinction. No god. Life is absurd. Don’t give me any of that metaphysical stuff. Changing.

Oddly, part of the stimulus for the change is a Korean tv show I’m watching, Hotel de Luna. It’s on Netflix. Instead of seeing a psychologist, Seoah saw a mudang, a shaman. Kate and I met him. The Korean worldview is a complicated mix of ancient folk traditions and high-tech, global capitalist culture.

Near Seoul, Kate. April, 2016 Visiting Seoah’s mudang

Hotel de Luna includes an Asian emphasis on ghosts, vengeful ghosts, shamans, an afterlife, and reincarnation. I’ve always dismissed reincarnation. Part of my existentialist, humanist, empiricist worldview. But. Kabbalah includes reincarnation. Buddy Mark Odegard once said he believes in reincarnation. The Buddhists, do, too. Hindus. None of this is evidence of more than a human desire to continue life in any way. Or, is it?

I’m beginning to open myself to the idea. What does it mean? What could it mean? I can feel the consolation it brings and consolation is pretty important. I know that right now. What about my embrace of the Great Wheel? Was I a Druid in a past life? Or, at least a believer in the auld religion?

When I mentioned how hard I find the idea of synchronicity, Jamie said, “Ah. The inner skeptic.” Yes, exactly. What if the inner skeptic needs an equal, perhaps stronger inner believer? What if I could find him again? I knew him once, right after college and on into seminary. He got a lot of learning from Christian mystics, ascetics, the Celtic Christian Church. He saw Jesus, Moses, and Abraham perched together on the sliver of a crescent moon while meditating.

I miss him. That guy that could embrace the irrational, the possibility of an Other World. And not cringe. Not shrink away. He was a bad boy of the Enlightenment. Oddly, the place I’ve retained most of him is in my Taoist thought. Wu wei? Yes. Sometimes. Follow the chi? Yes. Always. Experience the contradictions of consciousness and dreaming? Oh, yes. Follow the I-Ching? Yes.

Then there’s this Tarot. How can it be so damned meaningful, so consistently? Sure, it evokes archetypal thoughts, realizations. Yes. But, where do those archetypes come from? Is it the collective unconscious?

Changes on the horizon, I can feel them. Not there yet. The inner skeptic is still ascendant, but maybe not for long.

Ace of Swords:

“Keywords: Clarity. Clean break.” DTB

For example. I drew this card before I wrote this post. I didn’t look at its meanings until I finished. I mean… How?

The two commentaries below are from the Rider-Waite card, but the Druid Craft card I drew differs from it in a way especially important to me. This is Excalibur, lifted up by the Lady of the Lake. The intellect (the sword) rising from the unconscious.

The Dawn breaks at an inlet between the Loch and the Mountains to either side. I can see those Trees as Birch or Aspen. The Flowers look like Blue Bells. Both Minnesota and Colorado have the unaltered Natural World as substantial aspects of their identities. Birch or Aspen. The Mountains. A Lake.

This card speaks directly to my inner world. The Celts, Jung, my two favorite places on Earth. Appropriate that it should signify a break through. There are dark clouds there, too, and a Bird, maybe a Heron? The Heron is the on the card for the King of Vessels in the Wildwood Tarot.

I drew that card two nights ago. I’ve begun drawing a card at night, something to meditate on before I go to sleep.

Here’s a description: “As a bird that welcomes the dawn and often lives alone, the heron is known for its awareness and spiritual thoughts that its creator offers. This bird, defending ancient secrets, is said to stand at the gate between life and death, acting as a mediator between the Celtic’s journey of the soul to another world and reincarnation.”

Don’t understand how these things can be so closely linked, but perhaps that’s the point. I don’t need to understand, but accept.

“New ideas, new plans, intellectual ability, victory, success, mental clarity, clear thinking, breakthroughs, ability to concentrate, communication, realising the truth, vision, force, focus, intensity, stimulating people and environments, new beginnings, new projects, justice, assertiveness, authority, making the correct decision.” Tarotguide.

“As with all the aces, the Ace of Swords indicates that one is about to experience a moment of breakthrough. With its sharp blade and representing the power of the intellect, this sword has the ability to cut through deception and find truth. In layman’s terms, this card represents that moment in which one can see the world from a new point of view, as a place that is filled with nothing but new possibilities.” Labryinthos

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The Weight

August 18, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Lughnasa and the Chesed Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Kate, always Kate. Her 77th. Sadness. Grief. Down. Plunging. Rigel, the slow to wake. Rain. Kate’s ashes. Touching them. Canning. Kate in the kitchen. Cancer. Treatment. PSA. 7.4. Life is short; death is sure.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: BJ and Mary here

Tarot: The High Priestess, #2 of the major arcana

Feeling the weight. Yesterday. Today. A sinking in, slowly, a light burden tied around my feet. Watching joy and peacefulness go by. The surface getting fainter. Can’t say I’m surprised.

Wish it would have waited a day or two. The folks coming today. Kate’s ashes. Her birthday. Being a host not my thing. At all.

Even my fingers seem slow. Not as nimble on the keys. An opaqueness behind my eyes.

Talked with Diane yesterday. A good talk, mostly about cancer, but still good.

Afterward I loaded almost all the remainder of Kate’s personal belongings in the Rav4, ready to donate to the resale shop in Bailey. Two and a half cases of nutrient liquid and adult diapers for Mt. Evans Hospice. Felt weak. I mean, geez.

Waited on a call from Urology Associates. Got it. Rocky Mountain Cancer Care will do my pet scan. If my health plan approves it. They often drag their feet, the nurse from Urology Associates said of my insurance carrier. This may have been the stimulus for feeling the burden.

It took me back to the bad old days before my radiation therapy and just after the recurrence, the first one. When I found out on the day of the test that a pet scan would not be covered. I felt abandoned and devastated. Then.

Now. The specter of an insurance company closing its fist around my life. About all the various incidents with insurance around Kate. Around the imaging studies. The constant trips, waiting rooms. Diagnosis. Prognosis. Each time a little worse, not better.

Feeling it all. In my chest, my face. My vision. A lassitude creeping over my muscles. An inertia in my bones. Not wanting to move. Take action. Be present.

Grief. Sadness. The profound exhaustion and stress. Kate’s long illness. Today. All present. Visiting me at the same time.

Won’t last. Will pass. Equanimity shattered for the moment.

My practice.

Name the moment: Kate’s birthday. Cancer matters swirling. People coming. A celebration of Kate’s life.

Name the feelings: Loneliness. Sadness. Exhaustion. Inertia. Grief. Resignation.

Choose: Yes, I’ll let these come. They all feel appropriate, timely. Necessary.

An instant feeling of relief when I chose. No longer pushing them away, trying to rationalize, or deny. Yes. These are my feelings. And, I am not my feelings.

The Jewish idea of the lev: the heart/mind. Which suggests to me, again, that the heart and mind are one, yet severable in a moment. The heart affects the mind and the mind affects the heart, they work in synchrony. Except when they don’t.

Right now my lev is one. Wracked and wrecked. OK with it. Need help today. Especially. A tough one. Yes, there it is. I need help. Today.

The High Priestess: “Entering the stillness. The High Priestess seems to bar our way forward-don’t be in a rush to move onwards…true passivity is strong and fertile…Open to the stillness and the depth within you to gain strength and wisdom.” Druid Craft Tarot Deck

Over the last week plus I’ve drawn the High Priestess card three time and the Queen of Swords twice. My anima. Gaining ground, becoming stronger. Taking me down and encouraging me to stay strong, to act when the time is right. Wu wei. The Te, the integrity, of the Tao, the way. Strength for me right now, the path, involves surrender, slowing, resting in my inner sanctuary.

She who is me. And the feminine side of my intellect. Together. Nourishing each other. Counseling my animus to be still. To wait. To feel. To ask. Yes.

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Movement

July 20, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Tony’s Market, always a treat. The receptionist at Hearing Aid Associates who fixed my hearing aid. A walk around my neighborhood. Kate, always Kate. Tom, coming for a visit. The Post Office. Mail. Money. Sarah and her organizing for the 18th. Rigel. Her funny character. Cool mornings.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Tony’s.

Tarot card drawn: Seven of Pentacles

I’ve been intending to get out and hike more. Decided to try a walk around the neighborhood. Could have done this a long time ago, but hadn’t. Nice homes. Meadows with white, yellow, and blue Wildflowers. Green thanks to the Rain. The route goes up and down with good variety, past my neighbors’ properties. Some with Horses. Most with Dogs. Views of Black Mountain. By the time I got back I was worn out and my leg, the p.t. focused right upper leg had begun to complain. That’s ok. Cardio.

Hearing aid stopped working a couple of days ago. Nothing. Happened once before. Tried to clean it, but my tools were inadequate. Over to Hearing Aid Associates. “We have a little vacuum tool. That’s how we clean them. Try it out.” Ah. Words came into focus.

Thought about aging. Lenses in my eyes to replace my cataracts. A hole through my iris to drain fluid creating pressures. Glaucoma. An aid to my hearing. That five-year old titanium knee on the left side. The repaired Achilles tendon on the right. A missing prostate. This old car’s been in the shop many times, but keeps on running. May it last for a while longer.

Mailed out money to Sarah for the Beatle’s cover band tickets. Red Rock. Kate’s family celebration. Checks to Diane, my cousin, to send on to Mark. Checks I mailed to him in Saudi Arabia last December. Got them back last week with a note in Arabic from the Saudi Postal Service. Maybe it said, Return to Sender? Also $9 to Ramsey County Marriage Records to get a certified copy of Kate and mine’s marriage license. Need it for Social Security. Can’t get spousal benefits unless you’re the spouse. And, yes, I have a copy. I know I do. But where?

An errandy day.

Pine pollen still driving me nuts. Sneezing, dripping, clogging. Ick. A gift from my father I forgot to mention last Sunday morning.

Red snapper, salad, and sourdough bread for dinner. Or, lunch. Depending on.

Seven of Pentacles. As you can see, a gardener. Leaning on a stave as I leaned on a hoe or rake many times in Andover. I felt an affinity for this guy. He’s admiring, with some fatigue, the results of his work. A healthy vine, heavy with Pentacular fruit. He’s harvested one as a reward to himself, but knows that the better wisdom right now is to let the bush or vine grow.

Each minor arcana suit: pentacles, swords, wands, and cups has an association with one of the four elements. Wands Fire. Swords Air. Cups Water. Pentacles Earth.

This particular card sends a slight tingle up and down my arm. One of my avatars, horticulturist Charlie. An avatar I love, with whom I spent a lot of time, and an avatar who shared with Kate the wonder of Plants and Bees. To see a horticulturist, leaning on what could be, probably is, a gardening tool, admiring the plant. I know that guy!

Gardening, like marriage, only flourishes with cooperative relationships. The plants, like spouses, need tending, nurturing. With thoughtful, regular care amazing things become possible. It allows for the wonderful moment depicted in this card where the work has gone well and the Plant flourishes. The relationship between Plant and gardener has succeeded. Will succeed. That’s the message of the six pentacles remaining on the vine. Further growth will come. A bigger harvest.

Guess I’m an Earth guy. At least this avatar of mine is an Earth guy. Following the Great Wheel has made me sensitive to the changing of Earth’s seasons, what they mean, can mean, will mean.

In the flow of cards over the last week we’ve come to a culmination. The seven of pentacles suggests investment and effort pays off. Or is about to. I don’t think it’s in my immediate future, but perhaps in my near term future. My investment in Kate’s life, in our relationship. My efforts with her up to and after her death. My investment in my own worldview, nurturing a pagan, earth-centered way, one influenced by the ten thousand things. My willingness to learn, to adapt, to change, to transform.

Worth it. Even with the struggles that the transition has created. Not yet finished, but the seven of pentacles suggests the next phase may not be far off. May it be so.

*”The meaning of the Seven of Pentacles relates to investment and effort. It follows the Six of Pentacles which refers to the end of financial or material hardship. If you have been putting in time and effort in your work, it signifies that your efforts are paying off and they are going to pay off in the future as well.

If you are looking to invest, the Seven of Pentacles suggests that you are ready to put in a lot of effort, time and work into whatever you want to achieve. It reaffirms you of your long-term vision and helps to show that you are not confined to seeing results in the short term only. It shows how much you value the investment because of the effort that you are willing to put in.” Labyrinthos

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Simple Gifts

July 19, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Monday gratefuls: Rigel eating and running. Mary’s pictures from the Van Gogh show and the Beach. Hsieh Ling-yun. Shan-shui poetry, creative sensibility. Wabi sabi. Fermented foods. Korea. The United States, as a vision. The United States, broken.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The cool Wind off Black Mountain yesterday afternoon.

Tarot card drawn: The Lovers, number 6 of the Major Arcana

The gifts of our parents. The Ancient ones theme for our Sunday conversation. As it happened, Bill and Ode went first. Happy childhoods, role model parents. Smiles and good feelings. Tom, a thoughtful assessment of what his parents inherited from their parents and how that made him more accepting of what they had to offer him. Paul found gifts. There must be a pony in there somewhere.

We described our mothers as gentle and well-liked. We recognized from our childhood the post-depression, post-World War II definition of motherhood, realized in the women who birthed us.

Fathers were different. More individual in our telling. More difficult, sometimes, but also more formative. My father, from whom I was estranged most of my adult life, gave me a willingness to express contrary opinions in the public square. A willingness to use analytics to solve problems, to understand political life. A tendency to wander, to find the curious and the unusual. A conflicted version of hard work. That is, he modeled hard work. Always. But he expected it of me just because he was my father.

My mom modeled compassion, a desire to meet each person without judgment. She supported me, honored my gifts, which my father challenged, belittled. To this day I don’t know why he did that.

They were both conventionally Protestant; not overly affected by their faith, but committed to it. Both of them prized intelligence and learning though my father denigrated it in me. Why? Don’t know. They kept in touch with their extended families, Mom’s in Indiana, and Dad’s mostly in Oklahoma.

At 74 I love learning, love figuring out how and why things work, what the facts and the possibilities are. I try to meet each person without judgment and to exercise compassion for their journey. A radical analysis of our economic, educational, health, religious, and political systems, mine since college, represented a working out of my father’s liberal views carried to what I consider their logical conclusions.

My impact from both parents seemed less profound than any of the other four in our group. That may be because my mother died young. I never got to know her after I became an adult. And Dad and I never overcame the distance between us.

We all agreed though that whoever we are now, in the elder stage of life, came through choice, intentionality. We are not the sock puppets of our parent’s gifts or their curses. Yes, they shaped our lives, no doubt, but how we use compassion, a sense of humor, a genius for invention, gentleness, a hard-edged approach reflects how we have chosen to incorporate them in the now long stream of our life.

A touching conversation.

The Lovers. A sequelae. As a change, a transformative wave, pulses through my life, as it creates difficulties, struggles, it does point toward a new creation. What will that new creation be like? Not sure yet. My sense, if I have to choose between important and unimportant (see below), I’m thinking of the difference between the Chinese literati role model and the engaged political and religious life I have known. Perhaps between passive and active. Learning and doing. Which will inflect my next path more?

There is a distinct and strong part of me that would read, write poetry, paint, listen to music, dine with friends, go for hikes, travel some. That has always felt like a lifeway that needed to wait. Come the revolution, maybe that would be ok. Come publishing. Then. Yes.

Now. In the wake of Kate’s death I’m once again reexamining my primary inclinations. When I met her, I leaned into writing, a definite change from life as clergy/activist. Perhaps I could see that change as a step toward a more reclusive, monastic life, a way only partially taken.

Is now the time? There’s a Trappist/Benedictine soul in this body. With those words referring to lifestyle, not content. There’s a Taoist soul in this body. One which does not take up arms against a sea of trouble, but rather flows around them, with them. There’s a mystical soul in this body. One that finds nourishment in odd places: tarot, torah, astrology, astronomy, poetry, paintings, sculpture. There’s a Great Wheel soul in this body, one that desires only a place in the natural process, a moment of birth, a short life, a long death. There is, too, a Jewish soul in this body, one committed to others, to community, to justice, to learning.

Will I try to rebuild my past life, only at a different age and place? Will I listen to the murmurings in my soul? Will I follow what I believe to be the deeper path for me? Deeper at this moment in time. The Lovers card suggests I will need to choose. Are these the choices? Not sure. Are these the best choices? Again, not sure.

*”This is one of the times when you figure out what you are going to stand for, and what your philosophy in life will truly be. You must start making up your mind about what you find important and unimportant in your life. You should be as true to yourself as you can be, so you will be genuine and authentic to the people who are around you.” Labyrinthos

“There is an approaching conflict that will test your values. In order to progress, you are going to have to make a decision between love and career. Neither will disappear forever, but the choice will shape your priorities.” Trusted Tarot

Dogs, Family, Feelings, Health, Kabbalah, Memories, Shadow Mountain, Tarot, Third Phase

Still Changing

July 18, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Rigel’s bad leg. Her sweetness. Fire mitigation and a moderate Smoky the Bear wildfire risk. Staples. Envelopes. Colorado Furniture. Subway. Radiation induced proctitis. Cool mornings. Kate, always Kate.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Black Mountain, stolid.

Tarot card drawn: Reversed Ace of Wands*

Low energy. I get up, feed the dogs, go up to the loft, write Ancientrails, workout, eat breakfast. After that, errands or pruning. The usual nap. After the nap, sometimes nothing. Just. Don’t. Feel. Like. It.

My five days a week, seven weeks worth of radiation created an inflamed and bleeding lower bowel, radiation proctitis. Most of the time it’s not a big deal. Last couple of days has made me wonder if I need to see my G.I. doc.

An odd circumstance makes me hesitate. When Kate was alive, I could ask her opinion at times like this. Should I wait for it to declare itself? A doctorism of Kate’s. Or, perhaps abate on its on? I trusted her and almost always followed her advice. She would laugh reading this, I know, because she’d say I never followed her advice.

I have to revert to the situation all of us find ourselves in, at least those without a doctor in the house. Does this rise to a level of concern? Or is it a nuisance? My own sensibility is my guide now. And, I don’t trust it as much as I did Kate’s.

Added to this is a desire not to start down the path Kate found herself on. This one is irrational. This is about a bleed, an intestinal bleed. Which marked the beginning of Kate’s long decline. I’m not Kate. I know that. But I do not want to follow her into a long, slow deterioration. No indication that I will, but I worry about it anyhow.

Also, Rigel’s been a bit down the last couple of days, not eating as well. She’s been holding her right rear leg up, as if it hurts too much move it or it’s too weak to use confidently. Same issue. In the past I would ask Kate. Should Rigel be seen? And, by whom, a neurologist or an orthopedist?

Together these questions and conditions put me in a low state for a while yesterday. Low energy. Proctitis flaring up. Rigel’s leg. No Kate. All on me. That’s the downer insider thinking. Untrue. Not all on me. I have choices and support with physicians and veterinarians.

Just fussin’. I’ll make a decision tomorrow morning about both.

Not a surprise then to draw a reversed Ace of Wands. It fits with the general direction of life right now as the other cards I’ve drawn have underlined, too.

Reshuffling. Reimagining. Reconstructing. Me. Me alone. Me without Kate. Learning how to be me without her counsel, her love (well, no, not without her love, without her physical, loving presence), her support. The task of grief.

Tiring. Dispiriting. Exhilarating. Exciting. Back and forth. Some fear, too. Will I ride this out, find another path? Or will I wander, like Dante, in the dark wood lost?

I’m trying to move forward and rest at the same time. Tough. Taoism has some insight here. Let it be. Flow with the uncertainty, the challenges. Neither try to stop them, nor hurry them to resolution. Live in the reversed Ace of Wands space. It will not last.

This is evident in the illustration. Both upright and reversed the ace of wands has a wand with leaflets. It’s alive and growing, not stopped, not dead.

The cards let me see my psyche in a mirror, to reflect on it from a perspective I might have not noticed, or avoided. And, I admit, they’re doing a damn good job. Yes, a major change. Yes, perhaps the deep grieving is past (mostly) and, perhaps, yes, it is a time when I can close off the Kate (a living Kate) chapter of my life. Perhaps it is a time of big change. Yes.

What these cards have helped me see is that this is not an on/off time. I’m neither done completely with life with Kate, nor am I ready to move into a fully realized life without her. I’m in the transition space. Draining, hopeful. Energizing, scary.

Conclusion? Be easy with myself. Work at things in increments, but keep working. Pruning. Don’t get stuck in the mud.

*”The reversed Ace of Wands indicates trials and tribulations that you will face in the near future. You might not have any direction, which leads to being uninspired or unmotivated. At this point of your life, you might not know what you really want to do. You don’t know how to get out of the slump.

…When you draw a reversed Ace of Wands, you should consider taking some time off to allow inspiration to come to you. You feel so weighed down by your current commitments and responsibilities that you can’t come up with new ideas, or muster the passion to push forward in your projects.” Labyrinthos

Astrology, Family, Feelings, Garden, Kabbalah, Memories, Minnesota, Third Phase

I’m Still Learning

July 15, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Grant Property Medics. The Wildflowers in the back. Their Pollen. Tarot and Kabbalah. Loki. Rain. Cool night. Alan. Breakfast out. Mussar. Its folks.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: I’m still learning.

Tarot card drawn this morning: 6 of cups

As you can see, I’ve added a new section. Rabbi Jamie’s Tarot and Kabbalah class started yesterday. A guy named Luke, a Tarot reader and scientist, has a co-teacher role.

The first class involved introductions and brief comments about the Tarot and its relationship to Kabbalah. Rabbi Jamie talked about the evolution of the standard deck of 52 cards used in various games in the U.S. He sees a direct line between the Tarot deck and the Bicycle cards shuffled and dealt thousands of times everyday. Probably millions of times.

Luke and Jamie suggested drawing a single card each morning, looking at it, considering its meaning, then doing an internet search for interpretations.

One way of reading Tarot cards involves an intuitive consideration of the art on the card. There are many, many decks designed over centuries and Luke’s guidance invited us to pick a deck whose illustrations speak to us.

The three decks I own, a reproduction of a very early deck, the Tarot of Marseilles, an Aleister Crowley designed deck, and one whose origins I don’t know, don’t appeal to me as reading decks. For example. I selected the six of cups from the Marseilles deck. It has six medieval style chalices, three on side and three on the other, separated by an abstract floral motif. Didn’t send my imagination into overdrive.

The Rider-Waite deck, however, which I ordered yesterday from Amazon, has the delightful scene above. With just a gentle nudge from the interpretations online I can get going with it.

For example: “The VI of Cups is rooted deep in the past, but it is also a card closely bound to your happiness. It suggests that your family, your old friends, perhaps even past lovers, are in the process of adding greatly to the joys in your life.”

Or, “With the Six of Cups reversed, you can finally close accounts with the emotional undertow that has been part of your life. You can now revisit those wounded places calmly, without the fear that you will be drawn back in.

There is no lingering emotional residue or entrenched nostalgia remaining. You have finally digested those past experiences. They can now be put to rest.”

Whether the card is right side up or reversed influences the meaning. This morning I drew the six of cups reversed.

When I look at the Rider-Waite card with these ideas in mind, I see first the man walking away from the main scene, staff in hand. Perhaps the mature fool (the first card in the major arcana) setting out on a journey. He’s walking away from the pleasant associations in the foreground. A boy and girl enjoy a flower, a star shaped flower, perhaps one they grew together, as Kate and I used to do in Andover.

The man, a pilgrim?, has had to leave this wonderful memory behind and now walks alone. Perhaps not wholly alone though. The card suggests to me that as he’s leaving, it is this memory that he’s carrying with him. A pleasant, joyful one. A time of innocent love made clear through a link to the natural world, to flowers and stars and attractive scents.

He’s headed toward buildings of an antique style, but I imagine him only passing through them on a path. Perhaps they represent the past that innocent love created, a life of joy in small things. Flowers. Dogs. Music. Creating quilts and novels. Cooking. Traveling to foreign lands. A past he’s now able to leave behind, yet also a past that sustains his present and gives him joy.

What’s beyond the buildings? Unsure. A future though. One that sustains the joy of unconditional love in new ways and in new places and with new people, new events.

I find the notion of synchronicity, or no coincidences, difficult to swallow. My reason and logic say, hooey. On the other hand each instance in our life has a direct connection to whatever shows up in it.

That sounds obvious, is obvious, but it may obscure that these links are always known through our world of meaning. We interpret them through that world, our idiosyncratic web of associations. Each event and each particular in the event has meaning within our understanding, our way of making sense of this blooming, buzzing confusion we call consciousness. There are never any coincidences then, only new contexts for the worldview we take us with on our journey.

This six of cups card, drawn from a deck shuffled repeatedly, is not then a coincidence, but a direct link to my immediate past of mourning and grief, now resolving in favor of joy. A profound and innocent love, expressed often in our life together through nurture of the plant world, remains with me, sustaining me, as I head out towards an unknown future.

Family, Jefferson County, Memories, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Travel

Quiet days and pruning

July 11, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Marilyn and Irv, their two dogs. Dick and Ellen, their two sons. Chicken. Good conversation. Safeway. Grocery pickup. Pruning. Continuing. Picking up a bit. A cool morning. Sky a gauzy blue.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Bread Lounge’s Sourdough, Pullman style

A Saturday. Got groceries. Went over to a friends for dinner. Did more pruning downstairs. Nap. A quiet day. Today, the same.

I like quiet days. When Kate said, let’s take a cruise, I was skeptical. Thinking Princess ships with 8,000 people having FUN. Our first cruise, in fact all of our cruises, were on Holland America instead. 2,000 people or so. Still a lot, but an older crowd, more interested in fun, not FUN.

We flew to Florida, Ft. Lauderdale, I think. Boarded the ship there and proceeded to sail (motor?) through the Caribbean, to the Panama Canal, then onto the Port of Los Angeles. Several stops along the way, but the days I liked best were the days at sea. On the Gulf or the Pacific, nothing else to do but relax and enjoy the ride. Quiet days.

I like quiet days and, as I’m discovering, I like living alone. Of course, I’d have Kate back in a heartbeat, but since I can’t. On quiet days I can focus on what I want to, at the pace I want. If I need attention and love, Kep and Rigel come. Not what I expected after Kate’s death.

As the pruning proceeds, I’m moving lots and lots of Kate’s things. Clothes, jewelry, shoes, coats, hand creams and foot lotions, old meds, her black bag with the stethoscope. Her sewing room. Filled with squares of cloth for piecing into a quilt. Sewing machines. Plastic forms for cutting angles in cloth. Rotary cutters. Threads of all colors. Quilting magazines. Batting. The material world she left behind.

Yesterday I e-mailed Mt. Evans Hospice and Home Care to see if they wanted the two boxes full of tube-feeding supplies and some adult diapers still in packaging. The long-arm left, as I said, Friday.

As this work continues, I’m finding space opening up in the house. Neither of us had the energy to consolidate, organize, reshape our living area over the last couple of years. And, she had her spaces, closets and rooms, as I have mine.

The opening space feels good to me. Again, not something I expected. It’s the not the absence of Kate’s stuff; rather, it’s the creation of space, of space not filled up. This may be a Marie Kondo moment for me. Sort of. Seoah likes minimal furniture, often an Asian preference. I’m finding I do, too.

We’ll see how it all works out, but I have a clear plan. Up to a point. I know furniture I want to sell or give away. I have places I want to move current furniture. Storage will begin to take on my scheme, not better than ours together, but one that conforms to my biases.

In mussar we often say the outer affects the inner. That is, if we change our behavior, we can change our character. In order to increase generosity, be generous. In order to increase compassion, be compassionate. I suspect this changing of my home’s physicality is the same. To live in Charlie’s best manner, redesign Charlie’s house.

What is this place? 2015. Vega and Rigel.

My imagination says that when I get the house redone, perhaps with the aid of an interior decorator and some remodeling, new staining on the exterior, then my interior life will change as well. Just how, I don’t know, but it seems likely.

The loft will undergo less rethinking, but I do have a plan to make the eventual disposition of my library easy for my heirs. Donate some now. Make sure the best loved and used books stay nearby. Organize the rest so they can be boxed and carried out to Half-Price Books or the Evergreen Library or some other place. Less clear on all my files, my 9 complete manuscripts and the ones still aborning. Those four plastic bins filled with printed pages of Ancientrails. My art. Noodling.

Faith and Spirituality, Family, Feelings, Memories, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

What a Beautiful Soul.

June 29, 2021 Charles Leave a comment

Summer and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Mary in Texas. Diane making plans. 44 again this morning with Rain overnight. Paying bills yesterday. Chicken Saltimbocca from Easy Entrees. Jon, Ruth, and Gabe coming up Wednesday evening. Blue Sky. White Clouds. Bright Sun.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Touching conversation with Kate’s friend, Lauri Knox. Learning how Kate talked about loving me to her. Grief. Memories of Kate.

Much as I dislike it I spent time on the phone yesterday making sure our dental insurance got changed to one person, paying a bill dating from cataract surgery last fall. Changing credit card numbers for ongoing billing. Fun. Exciting. Domestic thrills.

My goal right now is to clear out all the outstanding bills, medical and otherwise, then get started on the new, regular budget. Have to get Social Security survivor’s benefits. That will help. Today.

Even though it’s nit picky and detail oriented (to this big picture guy) I find this work satisfying. I like paying people for services they have rendered. Makes the equation balance.

Got the house cleaned yesterday. Marina Harris and Furball Cleaning. The place feels so much better afterwards. Smells better, too.

Once the bills and budget stuff finish up working on Kate’s clothing, jewelry comes next. Pruning the walkout, that big closet next to the boiler. Various drawers and shelves. Kate’s chest of drawers.

Lauri Knox came over yesterday to look at Kate’s long-arm quilter. She’s a friend of Kate’s from Bailey Patchworkers. As she left, she said, “What a beautiful soul she was.” We talked then about Kate, about how she was. About her spot on the bench, a place made holy by her presence there. On a bench made by Jon, designed by her.

She also said Kate used to talk about how much she loved me. This brought tears to both of our eyes. Lauri couldn’t remember the words, but the feeling of unconditional love, she said, was always present. I find these moments so special, as if Kate has reached across the veil and touched me. The tears they produce are lacrimae, sacred and purifying.

She also asked me if I was going to move. “A lot of people just can’t be in the house. So many memories.” No, I said, I plan to stay. I’m not that kind of person. I didn’t say that memories of Kate in this house make me smile. Feel good.

Both Lauri and Jackie, our hairstylist, live in Bailey, a small mountain town further west from Conifer about 15 miles. Both of them, too, have a latter day spiritualist understanding about death. Lauri has a memory bench where she goes to talk to her mom and dad. “I’ve not sensed Kate, not yet anyway. She’s off on her own adventure.”

Jackie has offered twice to give me the number of a psychic who lives in Indiana and helps her communicate with the spirit world. When I was in last week to get a haircut, she said about Kate, “She’s up there channeling right now.”

Christianity is a similar story. It’s not hard to see how it can produce offspring in secular religiosity. When I go to my class reunions in Alexandria, I stay at a Christian Spiritualist camp in nearby Chesterfield. Not a huge movement anymore, but one with roots well down in the soil of Victorian England. Check out what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle thought was his most important work. Hint: It wasn’t Sherlock Holmes.

Not a lot different from the day of the Dead, Samain, All Saints. See the wonderful Pixar movie, Coco.

What happens on the other side? Hell if I know. My best guess is extinction. But it’s just that, a guess, and no more well-informed than any other guess. In fact I hope I’m wrong. It would be delightful to think of finding Kate again, of finding Celt and Vega and Tully and all the others. Playing in the Fields of the Lord. Whatever that might mean.

Not holding my breath though.

Breakfast, then calling social security. Big fun.