Godspousery Notes: A conversation between Loki and I

 Loki: You're not afraid.

Me: Yes I am, but I also feel numb.

Loki: No, you're furious to the point of mild dissociation. The fear is recycled from the past.

Me: What do you mean?

Loki: How old do you feel?

Me: *thinks about it* 12

Loki: What was going on in your life at 12?

Me: Dad was spouting racist jokes, trying to scam people, and being a terror.

Loki: Hmm, seems to be some parallels.

Me: Goddamn it. You're right. What I am going to do?

Loki: What you've always done, tell the truth no body wants to hear.

Maybe there's hope yet.

 I'd do my thing where I note the lunar position and age, along with drought status and weather conditions but it's all out of sorts right now so that I can't quite do that today. It has been a rather trying day with two grumpy teenagers. While the heatwave has moderated some, the humidity remains and it has been randomly pouring. I am out of sorts because I had a migraine in the night last night so I get to have the post migraine fun of my brain being even more out of whack than usual. I sat staring at my daily journal going 'wut r werds?' for a solid thirty minutes this morning before taking a nap. It's a special experience that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.

All of that rambling aside, I wanted to share with you something that my youngest son said to his big brother. They were talking about the possibility of bullying in high school and his brother was getting pretty wound up. Next thing I know, I hear my youngest say "Thor told me something and I'm going to share it with you. If you see bullying you should stop, observe, and then act. It's something you should think about and maybe talk to Zeus about."

This is the first time my youngest son has said anything about any of the gods speaking to him. That good ol' fashioned practical advice is right out of Thor's playbook. My eldest son gave up speaking with Zeus after he was put through a lot of social pressure to not be practicing the religion he was. When I offered to teach him the finer points of witchcraft he said to me 'No thanks, that's not for me.' He's wandering and trying to figure out what he believes and wants no guidance from me. At the moment he is leaning towards a personalized variant of Christianity, one where he doesn't have to be baptized or go to communion. He just has to follow Jesus's rules to be a good person. We'll see where that goes over time.

My youngest, however, may want to follow the path of a heathen oriented witch. I admit I kinda hope at least one of my sons will. It hurt when my eldest said what he did. Especially after him spending his formative years in an active Zeus. A part of me hopes he will cycle back because Zeus hasn't forgotten him. I hate cultural Christianity with the fire of a thousand suns. It teaches the children of 'fringe' religions that their beliefs don't matter and that they're not good people unless they pay lip service to whatever version of the Christian god people around them are vocally expressing worship of.

As my eldest son explores Christianity, I do take time to point out things that are biblically accurate across multiple versions of the bible that he has ethical questions about and some major disagreements on it. I am trying to put  my theology education to work helping him suss out the parts of this religion he agrees with and the parts that he doesn't. He still thinks original sin is bullshit. Who knows where that is going to go as time goes on.

Their paths are not my own. Their dreams are not mine. And I have to accept that it is quite possible that they're going to move farther away from the things I taught them. Though the core elements will remain about being honorable, just, and kind.

Frustration abounds.

 Dear Reader,

If it isn't some issue with my C-PTSD troubling me, then it's a migraine. If it isn't that, it is some kind of shenanigans. And then there's my cursed bipolar disorder. Depressive episodes pretty much destroy my brain. The confluence of all this leads to months of not writing. It leaves me head-blind and renders my psychic gifts the subject of bitter scrutiny. I lose faith in myself. I am exhausted all the time. It's hellish.

Now, as I claw my way out of the most recent depressive episode, I can feel the dead clamoring to be heard. I don't know what to do. Typically, they come to me for directions because they've gotten lost on their way to their next life or their spiritual place of rest. It doesn't usually happen to me that they want me to convey messages or listen to their story. I just point them in the direction they need to go and that's the extent of the interaction, typically.

There's so many waiting beyond the wall I put up spiritually around my home to keep the non-familial dead out during the pandemic. At the beginning, I was overwhelmed by the dead who were lost and confused about their deaths. So, under the direction of the All-Father, I put up a wall. Now there's something like a small army beyond it, crying out to be heard. I know that where I go, there's going to be the spirits of the dead looking for someone like me to guide them and possibly listen to them.

I don't know what to do in this situation. This has not happened before.

Godspousery Notes: Being Flooded With Ideas ...

Dear Reader,

When I am struggling with just my short 4 line prayers in Tumblr, being flooded with ideas for things to write is almost painful. Loki has been throwing ideas at me for Filianic texts. Freyr has been throwing at me ideas for book series that I have been working on. And then there's the ideas that pop up in the middle of the night as questions that I wrestle with for a spell before falling back to sleep.

It's maddening to have all these ideas weighing on my mind even as I am struggling to write anything. I know that I have two of my biggest cheerleaders in these two. They're super proud of anything I accomplish because they just know how hard it is. I just wish I wasn't so tired or dealing with fall out from my disabilities all the time. That's what really gets in my way.

But both Loki and Freyr are insisting I can do this despite my troubles. I just need more faith in myself. That's kinda the opposite of what I've been feeling because of my brain issues. But they assure me that it will get better.

Depressive episode induced writer's block is awful.

 Dear Reader,

Before I go on my rant, here's something pretty for you.

If you want the story behind the fan, just drop a comment on this post.

I've come to the conclusion that I've been depressed for a long time and over the last few months that's beginning to lift. I spent a month swinging between depressed and mixed episodes where I was Fighty McFightface. Obviously, during the mixed episodes, I stayed off social media and only did my off line writing.

Because my brain was scrambled eggs for most of this time, I wasn't sleeping well. That didn't help anything. I've been working with my care team to try to get this sorted out. Next step is seeing a sleep specialist. This, I'm pretty sure is going to suck.

I've been headblind most of the last while. Which lead to a crisis in confidence with  my abilities to do anything occult. My aunt A. talked me down out of my tree on that one. It was both relief and joy that when I finished the fan above last Saturday, I could feel my late paternal Grandmother's approval and delight in it.

Since the business with Covid, I've developed mild agoraphobia. It sucks. My gardens were the reason why I was getting out of the house. But, this year, I have new and pretty awful neighbors who have been throwing trash into the gardens and attempting to take them over. I said fuck it, I'm not doing a garden this year and I'm focusing on my indoor plants. So, now I'm trying to force myself into daily walks, but that's real hard to do because of my exhaustion during the day due to my night time difficulties sleeping.