Lughnasa and the Michaelmas Moon
Sunday gratefuls: Jon, Ruth, Gabe. Chicken pot pies. Kep and Rigel. Another cool night and morning. Dish soap and dishwashers. Permanent press shirts. Orgovyx. Fatigue and hot flashes. Rain. Grief. Kate’s ashes. Always, Kate. Sadness. Tears. Vulnerability. Mortality.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Grief. And, Kate.
Tarot: The High Priestess, #2 of the Major Arcana
On October 2nd I’ll begin a four week course on the Tree of Life tarot spread taught by Mark Horn. He’s the founder of Gates of Light Tarot. He spoke to the one class of the Tarot and Kabbalah course I missed. Rabbi Jamie recommended him and I wanted to keep my Tarot learning underway.
He asked for 250 words for an introduction to theothers in the class:
Charles Ellis (Rev. Dr.) has studied mysteries since the garden spider wove its web outside his kitchen window 66 years ago. All of the natural world, including us two-leggeds, has fascinated me ever since. Religion, first Christian, then Unitarian-Universalism, Taoism, and now Judaism are gateways of mystery and to mystery. Philosophy, too, especially process oriented philosophy and existentialism.
I’m more pagan than anything else, a Celtic influenced follower of the seasons, the Great Wheel explains so much.
At the Denver Kabbalah Experience and at my home congregation of Beth Evergreen I’ve studied Kabbalah for four years with Rabbi Jamie Arnold. I recently completed his Tarot and Kabbalah class, learning of Mark and this class through that. If you asked my place on the journey, I’d say I’m the Fool, always ready to take the first step, happy to have my dog and the road ahead.
Looking forward to the class. In fact, I seem to be in a sop-it-up mode right now. I’m also looking for an online cooking class. That will fit in with the kitchen remodel and my new life as chef for a single client, me. So many things I want to learn, so many ancientrails I’ve already followed. Thinking about going back to Ovid and Dante, too.
This evocative article. Last Glimpses of California’s Vanishing Hippie Utopias. Memories of the Peaceable Kingdom, the most poorly named commune of all. Judy and me. Then, Johnny Lampo. Then, the mechanic and his wife. Steppenwolf. Psilocybin. A long, very cold northern Minnesota Winter. I fled one of the least well-conceived and executed ideas in my life.
Ancientrails. The old days when most folks didn’t understand the difference between hippies and radicals. Most hippies were radicals, but fewer radicals were hippies. I made a mistake and added myself to the hippie/radical lifestyle. Nope. Plain old radical me.
Although. With Kate I was able to revisit the back to the land idea. She was my Earth mama and I was her worker companion. We dug and planted and harvested and tended. Raised dogs and two sons. Artemis Honey. A sweet life. And in the ‘burbs at that.
Yesterday. Made chicken pot pies. Ruth wanted them and Jon was happy. “Your pot pies are delicious.” I started them on Friday night, making the chicken soup. Mirepoix. Mine was celery, carrots, red onion, and garlic deglazed with sherry cooking wine. Then, water and a whole chicken in the wire insert for the stock pot. Simmer for an hour and a half. Bag of frozen green Peas. Bag of frozen Corn.
Wore. Me. Out. Friday I had energy. Wednesday and Thursday I struggled. Yesterday. Struggle. Realized I had begun to force myself up the stairs with the same doggedness I felt when caring for Kate. Not a pleasant touchstone.
Jon, Ruth, Gabe came up. Jon still much clearer, less edgy and angry. Beta blockers, he says. I had them take Kate’s ashes to Upper Maxwell Falls by themselves. Too weary, too short of breath. And, I also thought it would be good for them to have their own good-bye to Mom and Grandma.
I prepared some of Kate’s ashes for them. Put them in the Ball jar I used on August 18th.
As they left, beginning to move things from the sewing room, I got a rush of sadness. She’ll never be in the sewing room. Standing at the kitchen window I watched them load. That window has become a place for calling Kate back from the Other World to come stand beside me. Watch it rain, snow. Consider the house, the life we built together.
Tarot: The High Priestess
from the DTB: Present yourself before the mysteries of life and before the Goddess in humility and with reverence. Open to the stillness and the depths within you to gain strength and wisdom.
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, and shouldn’t be mistaken for weakness or inertia. Be open to your dreams and intuitions.”
