Ingvi, Lord of Winter?

Full Cold Moon (Age: 16 Days)

Current Sign: Void of Course

Weather: Bitter cold, windy, some lake effect
Snow Pack Depth: 3 in, approx.

Drought Status: Moderate

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So many people point to Freyr as the lord of spring and summer. I will confess, I was one of those people. Then life got interesting. Over the last few years, I am finding that things between him and I become more ... intense in the time of year from Samhain to Beltane. I was inclined to consider it my attention was drawn more to him because there was less stuff going on to distract me.

Now, I'm not entirely sure that assessment is correct. I have a feeling that there are people who are going to get offended with this. But, he is very strongly encouraging me to put this out there for others to take and consider. Freyr is a gentle god. But he is not always gentle. And he is not always what we would perceive as kind. He has kindness in him. I am not saying that is not there or that he is maliciously inclined. Woe betide the one who earns his anger. I've glimpsed his anger. It is fearsome. He is not one you should seek to intentionally cross or offend. He will simply destroy you. Consider it fortunate, Freyr is not quick to anger and the things that move him to it are not small matters. Things like the business of what is happening in Aleppo are what moves him to fury. People choosing to act inhumanely and with out regard for other lives, they are the ones he gets angry with. Failing to properly observe your devotional activities or act in proper ways, tends to get exasperation in my experience.

Right now, the weather is bitter. Depending on how the winds shift, we may have blizzard like conditions tonight at my home. The wind is blowing hard enough that it has nearly blown a partially filled bird feeder off of the branch it hangs on and we have a draft. It seems an odd time for Freyr to be so viscerally present right now in my awareness. And yet, he is here. His presence has a sharper edge to it than during the warmer months. I feel him with me in many ways. He smiles. It is a beautiful smile, but it makes me uneasy because he challenges me.

I was sitting here quietly panicking over the idea of dealing with some relatives that I do not have a very good relationship with. Suddenly, he was here. He said to me with a mixture of bemusement and confusion, "My brave, beautiful girl. Why don't you know how wonderful you are? Why don't you know how courageous you are? Who stole that from you?" It knocked me for a loop. All of this was on the heels of a health problem that forced me to seek help from others in situations that were, for me, humiliating. The act of sitting in the doctor's office in so much pain that I could not breathe properly and depending on my husband to help me figure out words to describe what was wrong was painful and difficult for me. It just got even more so as time went on, resulting in trips to the hospital for pain and a few rather terrifying incidents where I found myself even more dependent on others for help. And then, not five minutes after Beloved said to me, "Do you even know why you are apologizing?" and I realized with great grief that I was expecting emotional harm for being vulnerable from someone who has never and would never do so, the cause of all my pain was revealed and a solution was given.

I was shaken by Beloved's question. I was equally shaken by Ingvi's question earlier this evening. They say that in winter, he goes into the mound. Some say he goes into Hel's realm for a time. Others say different things. Either way, in winter, he comes to me. And he challenges me. The same one who pushes the plants to grow from tiny, hard seeds by cracking their painful, confining seed coat and drawing them up through the cold earth, he comes to me and breaks the hard shells of unhealthy thoughts and habits that surround me. He pushes me in a manner that is hard and unyielding. To the person looking from the outside, this seems uncharacteristic behavior of Freyr. Freyr is the gentle, golden god who pined for Gerda and was so distraught by love sickness he sent his friend as a go-between.

Ingvi, however, is also a lord of a fearsome host. It is my experience that he joins the Wild Hunt in their winter ride. He laughs and moves through it all with a fierce, if not possibly savage joy. In winter, he is the force of life that thrives despite the cold. He is also the one who keeps company with the dead and leads them forth when it is time to go a-hunting. Some people will be highly offended by this characterization of him. Some may say that I am not actually dealing with Freyr but an imposter. That may be their thought, but this is who I know him to be and how he has revealed himself to me.

And I love him in all his ways. Even when the lessons I am learning are painful. Because I know that he is leading me to healing and deeper love.

Roses for Ingvi

Waning Buck Moon (Age 28 days)

Sign: Cancer

Weather: Hot, humid
Still in Drought status

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I wanted to do something special for Freyr. Today is Lammas, Chelanya, and Freyfaxi. I have dear friends who are holding rites to celebrate today. I didn't have the luxury of time for something extravagant. I found myself out running around getting things ready for the start of school in about a month and taking care of the stuff for summer school that is going on now. Not to mention the pile of stuff I needed to do for just housework and such (not finished by even half, to be honest). That, however, is not a bad thing.

This, the first of the harvest celebrations of the season, is for me a holy day of work. Thus, I spent my day at work and mindful of the blessings that I am currently reaping. I found it fitting that the field that I regularly pass on the way to drop Beloved off at work before I bring the boys to summer school was harvested today. Every day I passed it, I thought of Ingvi. Even as I worried about our drought and how the harvest was going to fare.

I bought him a bouquet of roses. They're yellow. In the Victorian practice of floriography, they mean friendship, joy, and jealousy. Generally, if the flowers are given inverted with the left hand, the negative meaning is the one conveyed. (I did not do so with these.) Also, a full bouquet is an expression of gratitude. I not only happily gave him the full bouquet as an expression of affection and joy in him. I also spent some time at work with my plants in his honor. 

This is something that has become a bit of a bonding time for the two of us during the course of an average week. I don't get nearly as much writing as I wanted to do done. But every week, I have to spend about an hour (actually longer in the outdoor growing season) tending plants. That makes for an hour that I spend exclusively focused upon him. Some people argue that I may be overgeneralizing the concept of Ingvi as the 'Greenman' of Wicca, but their gnosis is different from mine, which is different from someone else's.

Letters to Loki # 29

Dear World Breaker,

To say that my life has been shaken up over the last several days is an understatement. I'm inclined to say it is the doing of simple life circumstances. While I know others would blame you for the chaos in their life, I know that 99.9% of the time it is due to the derpiness of humanity and events unfurling that we really have no legitimate control over. I know that some of the chaos is because I'm trying to get things back to rights (or as close to the 'normal' state) in the wake of NaNoWriMo this year and in the beginnings of the Advent season.

It is not exactly a time that is conducive to calm. As such, I find myself to some extend spinning in circles trying to get the apartment cleaned up for me to begin Yule decorating. At the same time, I am trying to help the boys reach their goals for the reading program. (I forgot to write down all the books they read over the Thanksgiving break. I told them to pile up the books and now I'm finding piles in random places. Mostly under laundry and toys.)

Getting my eldest to do his mathematics homework is still a trial. He decided he wanted to do half of it on his own last night, so I let him. I looked at it, I could see it was obviously wrong, but I knew that he sincerely thought he was correct. I decided that I had neither the energy or time to walk him through the process and help him correct his mistakes like usual. I've been exhausted over the last several days, which makes homework time particularly challenging.

My exhaustion is because I haven't been sleeping well. That has been because on Saturday, I got my PTSD triggered by a stupid meme on Facebook. Since then, I have been having anxiety over sleeping because I find myself afraid of nightmares. It took me most of Sunday to get myself to where I didn't feel like I had to walk on eggshells. That was hard because the kids were pure mischief that day, so I kept getting very frustrated, which increased the feeling. I was a little better yesterday. I will admit, you were right. I did need that nap, as much as I needed the one I took this morning. I'm not happy about it, but as you said, what I need trumps what I want.

I completed NaNoWriMo over my word count goal by about 20k. I'm not close to being finished with this draft. I have been getting a mixture of frustration and compulsive need to finish it before I work on something else. The fact that I didn't do anything with it yesterday feels unnatural. I am now, however, juggling two manuscripts at the moment. I found one that I am way behind on that I'm trying to get caught up in over the next month. I honestly don't know what I am doing right now. I just feel like I need to write and I am again getting to where I feel like I need to work on everything all at once. I have been resisting that urge, with some difficulty, but it is there.

I feel like my mental health issues are on the verge of coming to the fore again. The PTSD has been active over the last few days. I suspect that my difficulties sleeping are going to make the bipolar start up if the fact that it is the holidays doesn't do it. I wish this wasn't always a bad time of year for me. I know I once enjoyed it. But that was before N- happened. And before I really came to grips with the fact that we truly had less than others in ways that made every element of the holiday season a sacrifice, in the unpleasant sense of the word. Now, those are the two things that dominate my thoughts. Add in my social phobia and this time of year just is horrible for me.

I want to do something different. I want to change how this time of year hits me. But I feel like something in it all has to break to change. Something about the egregore that has been created needs to shatter so the rest of it can come apart. I am having real difficulty making that happen. If you have suggestions for how to approach it, let me know. I want this to be the year that I am finally happy with this season again.

Equinox, Super Moon, and a Solar Eclipse walk into a bar...

New Egg Moon (Age: 0 Days)

Sign: Aries

Weather: Cold, partly cloudy,

light breezes and snow flurries

Snow Pack: 1 in, approx.

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Magically, I can feel the tides are pretty high right now. There's a lot going on celestially with the equinox, super moon, and solar eclipse happening today. I haven't been doing any magic today because I have been busy with the kids being home from school. Also, I have had the distinct feeling that I should refrain from it until after Hiatus is over. I did notice, however, that at the time of the solar eclipse, I did briefly awaken from sleep (as it was 3 am here and all was dark). I don't think, however, that was of much significance because my reason for awakening was due to my husband's snoring. (As my psych issues have improved, I have found that I sleep a bit lighter but get more rest. I don't claim to understand it.)

I was going to observe a partial fast today and made it to the middle of the day. Then I grabbed something quick from the store on my way to a parent-teacher conference and my abstaining from sugar got shot by the bottle of cola I had. I did manage to refrain from meat until dinner, so I suppose that counts as a success. I wanted to at least keep myself in some sense restrained in my observance of Hiatus and I didn't do quite as well as I had wanted. Life got in the way as it had through out the whole of Moura.

Last night, as I was falling asleep and communing with Freyr, I talked about my frustrations with keeping such things. He was bemused and told me that he was my dispensation from austerity. I was a bit flustered by this. It seems that Freyr is becoming more of a primary figure in my spiritual experiences. This is not too much of a surprise because of the relationship I am in with him. At the same time, I thought that things with Dea were going to stay very focused and front and center. When asking Freyr about this, he smiled and told me that she was still there and interested in me. My vow to her still binds me and Freyr will not contraindicate it. But he also told me that I was focusing too much on the 'form' of worship rather then the 'heart' of it.

Again, he was bemused with me as he said it. Called me his 'overly serious scholar' and told me that I am in no way to become something like an anchorite. It threw me for a bit of a loop until I realized that my tendency to cloister myself away from the world was less a spiritual act and more of an outgrowth of my social phobia. He was quick to tell me that solitude is part of my path but I needed to be in the world more. I was also told that I needed to reacquire my sense of humor or Loki was going to 'help' with that. 

I'll be honest, the little bit of playful 'malice' with Freyr's comment flustered me more and made me more apprehensive then the prospect of Loki helping me find humor. Loki's been laughing at this all day. Generally going with comments along the lines of "You're getting what you asked for. It's adorable to watch you flail. He should do this more often." and "Bit off more then you could chew, I guess you'll need to swallow." The latter was accompanied by some explicit gestures. Which rather made me flustered again and Flame Hair laughed again. I don't know why, but I forget that Loki's sense of humor does include a fair amount of lewdness. When he displays it (he was suggesting I use the phrase 'whips it out', for example), I tend to get mildly embarrassed and flustered. He jokes that I am a prude because of this and makes a point of making such comments at times where it gets a particularly strong response.

I wound up through a confluence of incidents going out to do stuff out of the house in public with out my head covered but my hair bound (in a very loose fashion by a ponytail). It felt somewhat odd. I have the feeling that my taboo is relaxing somewhat as my hair lengthens, though I am still encouraged to do so and have my hair bound up in some fashion when I go out of the house. The silence from Dea has me unsure if this is the case or my misinterpreting things.

At the time of the equinox, the boys and I were actively cleaning the house. I think this sets a tone for what the season will be like. We were working relatively well together and I wasn't overly stressed out by it. I hope this means that the season will exhibit more of this. I haven't done divination yet for the season and the upcoming liturgical year. I'm going to do that tomorrow at the beginning of the liturgical year.

Blessed First Harvest!

Moon phase: Waxing Corn Moon (age: 3 days)
Moon Sign: Virgo
Weather: Fair skies, warm but seasonably so; drought still persists
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In my own manner, I have been observing the festival of the first harvest for a little over a month now. I started with the first strawberries from my plants (subsequently, the only ones due to this drought). I then moved on to the wild black berries and my herbs. Today, I harvested the first pepper (which was tiny but so flavorful) off of my pepper plant.

It is my hope that with careful and diligent watering, my pepper plant will put out more peppers and the tomatoes will actually fruit, not just survive this beastly drought. With each bite, I said out loud or within my own little head a small prayer.

Hail to the Green Man! He who feeds us with his flesh!

It was unfortunate that my wheat didn't sprout and grow. If I am lucky, however, I may be able to get some gleanings from somewhere around here. Quite surprisingly, actually, I have a bit of wheat growing in the pot where I attempted to re-pot my very sickly orchid. The orchid, unfortunately, was too weak to take being repotted. But somehow, wheat seeds found their way into my MiL's bag of orchid potting mix and into the pot that had held my orchid. I'm hoping these seeds will continue to grow and I may get some ripe ears out of it, but I am not going to hold my breath.

I feel truly blessed right now, even with the pain in my leg (from a fall back in early June). I am home with my family. I have my plants growing as well as they can despite the drought. My children are growing up fine and strong. My husband has work and we can pay our bills. It is a collection of relatively small things compared to what goes on in the world, but I am deeply thankful for them. Sometimes, the greatest blessings are the ordinary things that we take for granted.

To have food to put in our bellies, clothes to cover us, and a roof to shelter us is to be in possession of a great many blessings that others are not so fortunate to have. Thus, I am thankful.

In my tradition, the First Harvest is a blessed day of work. Work is sacred. Just as the planting of the fields is a holy thing, so too is bringing in the harvest. I am profoundly thankful that I am home to go about the work of being a housewife and mother. Last year, I was in a hospital for my psychological illness. It was as different from today as night is from day. I have grown from that experience and I am thankful for the wisdom that has come from it.

Thus, the celebration of harvest season begins officially for many other Witches and Pagans. I too join in their ranks to take as much joy from life as I possibly can right now and to savor the plenty that is abundantly available before Winter comes. I may not be ready yet to make preserves to store up what I have grown in my garden, but each memory preserves the Summer to comfort me.

Blessed First Harvest, everyone.

Contemplations and a compilation

Waning Strawberry Moon (18 days old)
Moon Sign: Aquarius
Weather: Mildly humid, seasonably warm, fair skies with light haze
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I have been busy with my garden and my children recently. The strawberry plants are getting berries on them. My oregano is growing like crazy and the new pot of thyme that my MiL got me is doing so too. I keep checking on my tomatoes and my pepper plant. I get nervous that they're going to be attacked by aphids or something. Every day, just about, I have been out among my plants. If I'm not watering them, then I'm pulling weeds or just checking them over to make sure they're in good health.

They're like another set of children, to be honest. Speaking of children, my boys are growing as fast as the plants. My eldest is in preschool and they asked me if there were any special family traditions or religious observances I wanted them to keep in mind. I was thrown for an absolute loop when they asked me that. I honestly don't know how to answer that question. A part of me says that it would be wrong to bring up our religion even as another part of me says this is a perfect opportunity to educate the general public about witchcraft.

To say the least, I've been giving it a lot of thought and prayer. I may even do some divination on this matter and talk to a few other witches. At the moment, I think I would have really loved to have Stargazer's and Rose's thoughts on this topic. They, however, are not about me at the moment but elsewhere on the Otherside. You can't exactly pick up the phone and leave a voice mail for the dead to call you back. It generally doesn't seem to work like that. They come and go as they do and on their own sense of time.

And then there is the other things I have been busy with. I've been writing articles about various facets of Wicca for the novice witch. My goal is to take the knowledge that I've learned and put it out in easily understood bites this way the young witches and seekers out there have at least one good source of information. Below is what I have done so far.

Wicca 101
Ancient Myths & Modern Man

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part3

Spiritual Self-Defense & Protection

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4

Wicca 201
Divination

As I write more articles, I'll post links to them on here.

A season of preparation

There are several people I know who are not Catholic and they are practicing the annual observation of Lent with abstaining from something for the period of time between Ash Wednesday and Easter. If you read some of the history surrounding Lent it becomes clear that the practice of fasting for 40 days is a point of much contention or if fasting was practiced at all by early Christians. With all of this historical uncertainty surrounding the practice, it leaves the question of why this season of fasting has persisted even into modern Catholicism.

Some of it could be light-heartedly ascribed to the same mentality that gives us the lightbulb joke that one of my Catholic friends told me:

Q: How many Catholics does it take to change a light-bulb?
A: Change! Catholics never change!

This, however, fails to recognize the value of this practice. Before I discuss this, however, I should point out two things about this practice. First, the word Lent comes from the Teutonic peoples who lived in central and eastern Europe. Originally, it simply meant early spring time. In early spring time, we find a practical reason for the fasting of Lent when we look back at the people it comes from. At this point, the weather is still cold and foreboding. The food stores gathered the year before are heavily depleted and the game which had been more plentiful earlier are now more scarce due to a combination of attrition related to the cold weather and relating to hunting. Here, fasting serves to conserve valuable food resources until the warmer weather of spring arrives to make food resources more plentiful.

Secondly, the role of fasting within any religion is fairly apparent. It serves a dual purpose. The first is to purify the body and the second is to induce a state of trance. It is a component in various religious rites all around the world from times in deep antiquity to today's melange of contemporary belief systems. In the structuralized setting of Lent, it serves not only to purify the body but also to guide the one engaged in the practice to a deeper understanding of their beliefs, often in a quasi-mystic sense. This, however, is frequently an unspoken thing in modern Catholicism due to various political factors that I am not going to discuss here.

Voluntarily surrendering something for the sake of focusing upon another is nothing new. In many ways, it can be a routine part of our day (like the diet to lose x number of pounds by summer). When a specific goal is held in mind, letting go of various things becomes easier. The practice of Lent serves to focus the Catholic upon their faith and what it means to be a member of the body of Christ. It is the same as the purpose of Ramadan in Islam, to help the practitioner of their faith to refocus upon their beliefs and what their role in the religion is.

Lent and Ramadan are both seasons of preparation. (Advent is supposed to be one as well but modern society has reduced it down to the annual shopping orgy that it's all but forgotten in a spiritual context.) Within the belief system of modern Witchcraft, there is no season of preparation. There is no season of preparation because we live suffused into the world with out a specific thing to prepare ourselves for, such as the return of a savior. This, however, does not mean that we should neglect our need to refocus ourselves and meditate upon our beliefs.

Farmers and gardeners use the early spring to prepare for planting. We witches would do well to follow that example. There are things that we all shall work towards over the coming seasons of growth. Let us take the time to plan for them and meditate upon how we wish to see ourselves spiritually develop and blossom over the coming year and what we wish to harvest as our accomplishments come Mabon. It will soon be time to begin planting, the Equinox always comes quickly.

Imboleg 2010: preparation

Moon: Waxing Ice Moon, sign of Taurus
Weather: Unseasonably warm, overcast, light rain and humid
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I think this year I am going to actually hold a small ritual for Imboleg and invite some folks from the coven that Rose was head of. I also think I am going to invite my sister-in-law and my aunt. I know it is this weekend, but I also know that the ritual does not need to be precisely on that day. I'm actually leaning towards the prospect of combining the ritual with a full moon observance. Saving the private observance of Imboleg for myself at home.

This year is going to be a year of changes. I can feel it coming. I think that we all need to get ready for the coming year and that the changes are going to be big enough that we need to sweep away the remnants of the past year. I am going to be a bit of a sassy thing and bring a little bit of the paganism with me to the game I'm attending this upcoming weekend. Actually, the more I think about it, the more I think it really wouldn't be fair to everyone. So, I believe I'll just let it remain separate.

For the ritual, if I can manage it, I want to do a candle blessing and purification ritual. I don't know if this thaw is going to hold. If it does, however, I believe that I want to take the opportunity to burn slips of paper with the things we're purifying ourselves of. I also believe that I want to burn slips of paper with prayers for the new coming spring. I'm fairly sure that it will be a straight forward and simple thing. Some of the best magic, however, is the simplest.

Because Imboleg is deep winter's end, I want to reflect this. The last of my winter altar images are going to get put away. I believe that the altar 'furniture' is going to be rearranged somewhat as well, with a new altar cloth laid down. I think I'm going to replace the rose quartz sphere with the marble egg. I also believe that I'm going to replace the raw rose quartz piece sitting there with a clear quartz point. The stalks of wheat that are in the vase sitting on the altar in a position of honor are going to be replaced with a small pot of soil. I'm not fully decided on this. I may just let it stay until it...

Actually, I just figured out what I should do. I should take one of my small bowls that I use for offerings and put seeds in it. I'm going to need to think about what kind of seeds, but it'll make sense soon enough. The colors pink are frequently associated with this Sabbat because it's so close to Valentine's day. I don't know if I want to do that, though. I'm thinking something closer to a spring green. And I'm also thinking that it'd be more fitting to have a small pot of flowers rather then the seeds on the altar.

I don't know what'll be best. I suppose I am rambling, but I do know that enough time has passed that we really should do something. Rose would be heartbroken to see how the circle has fallen apart with out her.

St. Distaff Day?

Waning Snow Moon, Sagittarius
Cold but seasonal, light area wide snowfall, winds from the north-west
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In Medieval Europe, the day after the Feast of Epiphany was known as St. Distaff day. This was the day when women resumed household work and the holiday season ended. It was a day when pranks were played and men and women embraced the new year. I am not Christian by any stretch of the imagination but there's something to be noted about having a day where work of the home is celebrated.

On my little altar in the living room here, I have a little braided wrist distaff and my spinning materials are all about. I've been ill and much of the household orientation has been upended as a result. Instead of it being done by intention, it was by necessity that my husband took on the role of Mr. Mom for the last few weeks. To say the least, the children were a bit taken aback by the change in routine. In medieval households, such changes were light hearted and done with a sense of exuberance to brighten up the dull days of deep winter.

It was good to have the experience, I think both my husband and I learned a lot from it. I learned that I needed to step back and let him handle things when I can't do them. It's not easy to do that. He learned what I did everyday and the challenges and joys of it. I don't think he's laughed quite as much as he did last week at the antics of the boys in a long time at work. I may intentionally incorporate something like this into the observances of the year, this way we have reminders like this when we need them.

I'm also fairly certain that the little boys will make fine Lords of Misrule. They've got a good start on it as it is right now.