Proper Samhain

Bribes might change our opinion of your numptiness.

Exactly one year ago, someone posted a post on one of the forums wishing everyone a Happy Proper Samhain--which made me aware of this particular issue that was silently bubbling in the magical community. So what the hell is "Proper Samhain"? According to some people, Samhain should be celebrated on the day that falls exactly between the Fall Equinox and Winter Solistice--or when the Sun is in the fifteenth degree of Scorpio (the "astronomical Samhain" or "astrological Samhain")--November 6 or 7 this particular year (depending upon where you live).

And my response to this idea that everyone, other than these enlightened armchair occultists, are doing Samhain on the wrong day? Poppycock!!!

Honestly, my opinion is that the "Proper Samhain" theory was created by a bunch of people who decided that they have to be smarter than practicing Wiccans and pagans, especially the sainted Gerald Gardner, the founder of Wicca. The theory sounds good on paper, but really does not hold water when it comes to actual practice? No, it does not.

For one thing, the "solar-astronomical" Sabbaths, the Equinoxes and Solstices, are known as "Lesser Sabbaths." The "Greater Sabbaths" are all planting/harvesting/fertility holidays. Therefore, a proper astrological correct Samhain instantly becomes a Lesser Sabbath, a mere point on the journey of the sun though the zodiac--in other words, something other than solar position makes Samhain what it is--a Greater Sabbath.

Secondly, the theory ignores the non-universality of the observance of the Sabbaths. The holidays that the Sabbaths are based on were not practiced everywhere; and more importantly, when they were practiced, they were based on local agricultural conditions...or some local religious observance.

In other words, local conditions trump (override) the astrological theory. Your first harvest ritual corresponds to when your first harvest actually happens in your local neighborhood--not when the sun is in a particular degree of the zodiac. Likewise, your last harvest (aka Samhain) occurs when your local growing conditions cease to be suitable to leave the majority of the crop out in the fields (please note that there are some winter crops that can be harvested or planted despite the drop in temperatures). In fact, last harvest can vary from year to year--last year, my own last harvest occurred in late November--this year, it was mid-October. The only reason that modern-day Wicca gets away with fixed dates for the Sabbaths is that most of us are not farmers or gardeners anymore--but that still does not make the astrological version more valid than the farming/fertility version of the Sabbaths.

And in the case of Samhain (All Hallows Eve--Halloween), it occurs on a day that several cultures (including the much-hated Catholic culture) consider preceding a feast day celebrating the honored dead. This is another form of local condition overriding the astrological theory. Then again, that may be the real reason that certain armchair occultists want to move the celebration to a different day--in their minds, we can't share anything in common with the hated oppressors of the pagan religions...despite the fact that the Church lifted that particular feast day directly from the pagans themselves with us merely reclaiming it as our own in modern times.

So Happy Proper Astrological Samhain! to all the armchair occultists. And stay out of my garden!

Fire season trumps gardening

Orbs are dust and smoke particles.

Given the heat wave (no surprise, right) and the hazy and smoke from the wild fires, my gardening season may be over with. *sigh* We will have to see, but I am going to be cautious. Heavy exercise (including clearing out large areas of weeds) is not good for the lungs while the air is full of smoke and haze.

Eighty dollars a pound for mugwort?!

Five pounds of mugwort for four hundred dollars--on eBay.

You know how I was shocked by how expensive catnip was--well, I just saw something on eBay that makes me think that catnip is cheap. I just ran across an eBay listing for five pounds of fresh cut mugwort selling for four hundred dollars.

Yep, that is eighty dollars a pound...

...for an invasive weed.

Yes, that is right--mugwort is an invasive weed by all definitions of the term. If you allow it to go to seed, it takes over an entire neighborhood. Of course, if you really can unload it for eighty dollars a pound, maybe that is not so bad. But still, eighty dollars...good thing that I have one of my own. Especially considering how much of it gets burned at my house (shamanic dream incense).

And before you ask, no, I have no mugwort to spare. Not a single leaf.

This mugwort is happy on my porch in its pot. So don't even think of moving it.

Yard Wards

Fierce Kitty thinks that the garden is just divine.

I have been working out in the yard and garden lately. Pulling weeds, redoing the brick walkway, transplanting flowers and herbs--the typical springtime stuff that one does when one has a yard that is not completely grass. I am not happy that Denver is already on drought (watering) restrictions; but then again, most of the plants that I really care about are border-line weeds (most herbs act as if they are weeds).

Another thing that I am doing is resetting my yard wards. It has been several years since I have done so; and last year, there was a couple of incidents that made me wish that they had been renewed sooner rather than later (I was finishing my second Bachelors, so I did not get them renewed in a timely fashion...with results that probably made someone who was upset with me happy). The problems (resulting from a small spite...I sided with a pagan woman in a fight rather than the Christian ceremonial using male...of course, I was wrong to do so in their mind) were minor, but still annoying.

Wards, for those who don't already know, are kind of like a magical electronic fence. Sort of like shields, but not quite. It is hard to explain the difference...if there is really a difference. The ones I use are based on Pennsylvania Dutch magic. I won't tell you what I buried beneath the brick walkway, but I did bury something there.

So yes, this year I am renewing my yard wards in a timely fashion, along with all the weeding, planting and mowing I have to do. Good times in the spring time. And if nothing else, it makes the cat happy that I am spending time outside with him.

Kitty says it is cold outside

Let me in--it is cold outside.

Before you declare that I am heartless and cruel, just remember that I have been trying to convince Fierce Kitty (also known as Studio Kitty) to come live inside for the last two or three years. But he refuses because my wife insists that the doors must be closed, and there are three bully cats living on the inside of the house.

And where is all this snow and cold coming from? Did some weather witch decide that they were tired of the drought? If so, I wish that they would have done their spellwork before the Denver Water Board declared this year's watering restrictions.

Winter drought in Colorado

What the neighbor's plum tree looks like before  the blizzard.

This is the third snow day post that I have done since the beginning of the calendar year. And why is snow in Denver, Colorado such big news?! Because Denver is already in a drought.

Yes, that is right. Denver Colorado is already suffering drought conditions. And Denver Water wants everyone to cut their water use by twenty percent. So much for trying to increase the size of my garden to try to cut down on the grocery bill.

I am thinking that I might create a three by three feet raised bed, and restrict my vegetable gardening to that. I find it annoying that the first garden season that I actually have time to work on the garden that I will not be able to because of drought conditions. Ahh, the joys of living in Colorado.

Of course, this particular snow storm came at a time, just designed to annoy me. The flowers were coming up. The mugwort was getting green. And the neighbor's plum tree was blooming (yes, I pick all the plums from the branches that overhang in my yard)...I guess no plums for me this fall.

Oh goody Purification

Hi and welcome to this stop on the Autumnal Equinox Tarot Bloghop. If you are a hopper, you probably came from Christiane's post. If you are one of my regular readers, you are probably coming here from the Big Bang Burger Bar where you nourished yourself on the veal burger...hey, it could be true.

Today's topic is purification...and to a lesser extent, the Tarot and alchemy.

On my property, there are currently three compost piles. And at least one of them is about to grow larger as I rake more leaves into it. This year was not a good year for my compost piles--it was just too darn hot and dry for them.

One of the things that non-gardeners may not realize is that a compost pile requires a delicate mixture of ingredients. It has to be the right temperature, the right moisture level, the right mixture of organic material, the right amount of circulation; otherwise it either burns or stinks to high heaven.

Even when it looks like it is going ok, things can still be wrong. For instance, I have a black walnut tree on my property; a black walnut tree produces a chemical that many other plants find toxic (for instance, rose bushes do not like black walnut trees), so I have to be careful where I use the results of the decomposing black walnut leaves.

Having a compost pile really puts you into direct contact with the process of purification. If you do it right, you end up with something that your garden will thrive on. Do it wrong, and all you made is a big old mess.

Now, in my profession--I am a writer by trade (woe be me)--there is a stage in the process (or at least, my personal process) where everything that one has written reads like pure sewage. One needs to leave the writing sit for awhile when it gets to that point to create some form of distance between oneself and the writing, especially if one is hoping to wrestle the good bits out of the rubbish of your latest draft.

While dealing with compost piles and my horrible drafts, I tend to think about the process of purification. Especially now that I am doing make-up work on the subject. It is the closest that I get to lab alchemy--I have cats and a god-daughter; I am not about to use dangerous chemicals around them.

Now, one of the modern things that occultists have done is attempt to associate alchemy with the Tarot. There are many ways to do this. But I am a Golden Dawn member, so I have to work with the Golden Dawn version of this arrangement. Now, the best known version of Tarot to alchemy is Pat Zalewski's version--perhaps merely because he actually published his version.

Now in his version of alchemy to Tarot correspondences, he uses a 3-7-12 system. Therefore, the process of alchemy is not assigned to a single card.

On the three scale, purification is assigned to Last Judgment. On the seven scale, it is assigned to the High Priestess.

The twelve scale is touch more complex--for purification is divided into three parts: Separation (Filtration and Distribution) assigned to the Lovers; Circulation and Digestion assigned to the Chariot; Fermentation and Corruption to Death.

So we end up with five Major Arcana that could indicate purification if they came up in a reading...more if we open the door to other assignment systems. Of course, given the fact that Tarot reading is such a personal art, I lean towards two cards over the rest--Judgment and Death. I might remember that the High Priestess is also involved, but I better have a muse whispering in my ear to remind me of that fact.

Then again, I need a muse to remind not to dump fresh cut grass into my compost pile, and not to shred my rubbish drafts.

(For the one person who will be curious--no, I do not have one of these composting barrels; I want one--I just can't afford one at the moment.)

For those of you who are continuing with the Mabon Tarot Bloghop, the next step is Joanne Sprott's blog.

Lost a black walnut tree to thousand cankers disease

I am kitty and my butt approves of this tree stump.

So yesterday, I woke up to the sounds of a chainsaw...in my own front yard. Mile High Tree Care had came out to cut down one of the black walnut trees that are in my yard.

The reason that it had to be cut down was that the tree had caught the thousand cankers disease (fungus) that is expected to kill off all the black walnut trees here in Colorado within five years.

Those brown leaves showing up is a sign that your tree is diseased.

The city of Denver is asking...and then issuing fines...to get people to remove their infected black walnut trees in a timely manner.

I am not happy about this disease. This tree was a nice tree, and fairly old (I am guessing that it was planted at the time this area was developed, so it was 60 to 70 years old I think).

The team work was amazing.

I will admit that I was impressed by the amount of time they needed to take down the entire tree. It was only a half hour to forty-five minutes before they were completely done.

The sad part is that I still have another black walnut tree...and I like it. As I said, I am not happy about the disease.

My other black walnut tree.

After Mile High Tree Care finished with my tree, they pulled across the street and cut down one in my neighbor's yard. I imagine that my neighbor is not any more happy than I am about the situation.

So now, I have a rahter large tree stump in the front of my yard. My wife thinks that she is going to use it to sit on while gardening, but I think that one of the cats has already claimed it.

It was a fairly large tree as you can see from this photo.

Pray for rain in Colorado

There is absolutely no evidence that my cat has a drug problem.

Well, it is official--Colorado is dry and burning up. Seems like a typical summer to me. I am not sure how many wildfires are currently burning in Colorado, but it is definitely one too many.

I meant to do some gardening this year, as in plant some vegetables that my wife would promptly refuse to eat. Unfortunately, my (hopefully last as an undergrad) semester dragged on and was a grueling nightmare clear up to the end, so I did not start to garden nearly as soon as I should have.

Now, I can leave the water on all night and still be working with bone-dry dirt when I attempt to do anything out in the garden. It might be the result of the hundred degree days we are having.

So I am just mainly transplanting a few of the herbs that have proven to do ok with droughts, and seem to have secret plots to take over the world, to different spots. One of which is the Persian Catnip, a plant that my favorite cat has absolutely no problem with.

On one of the news groups that I belong to, a bunch of Colorado pagans and witches are doing a joint project in weather magic to try to bring rain to Colorado. And yes, I am going to be rolling up my sleeves also. If rain comes soon enourgh, I can still get some squash in before winter hits.

Feel free to critize my use of weather magic in the comment section--just remember that part of my training is Pennslyvania Dutch. Weather magic is perfectly acceptable to those who grow up in farming country.

Preparing for June 2012 Open Full Moon ritual

Over the last couple of days, I have been making some preparations for the Open Full Moon ritual that I am doing on June 29th for Hearthstone Community Church. Much of the preparation is beating out the rough spots in the ritual outline, and trying to figure out what is going to work the best. I have yet to finish the large Death card that I plan on using for the ritual.

Besides the planning and partially work-thurs of the ritual, I have been working on the rough draft of a science fiction crime novel. The dead bodies are just piling up--today another dozen people died in the name of fiction. I am not quite sure where the rage at big business comes from, but it is sure showing up in this particular sci-fi story.

As a break between the two projects, I have been doing some gardening. Mainly transplanting the spearmint, lemon balm, and motherwort that has taken over the one corner of the herb garden.

[The late June OFM is June 29, 2012 at 7 pm (ritual starts at 7:30 pm) and will be held at the First Unitarian Church here in Denver, Colorado (1400 Lafayette)--the ritual is going to be about remembering the dead, both people and animals.]

Starting seeds using toliet paper rolls

Here is a neat idea that I have never thought of---using toliet paper rolls to create mini-pots for starting seeds. I am so going to have to try this idea.

31 Days of Halloween Kitties Day 23

Beware the invasion of the kitty snatchers.

Oh no, the alien pod invasion has begin---and they got to your cat! Poor kitty has been cloned by the insidious alien pod people from outer space. Now, the alien invaders will have a spy in your home, checking out all your closets, tasting your food (and perhaps you), and coughing up hairballs in your shoes. And there is nothing that you can do about it---because alien pod kitty is so cute, though he does look a little like a pumpkin.

31 Days of Halloween Kitties Day 22

Pumpkins, sunflowers, and a black cat. Oh my!

There is no costume on this black kitty, but they do not need one to prove that they are just full of halloween spirit. The cat kinda reminds me of one of ours---Anubis---who would do exactly this if we had a pile of pumpkins in the house. Anubis also like checking out all the plants that I bring into the house. He probably would love to go outside and play, but I don't want him getting eaten by the neighborhood foxes and coyotes.

How did Earth Day sneak up on me?

Somehow this year, Earth Day sneaked up on me. Wild guess how it did it---it enlisted the aid of evil university professors (ok, my professors are not evil...maybe). So do I feel any guilt about not realizing that is was Earth Day before turning on the computer and reading the internet headlines? Not really. I garden (in a drought zone scented by the smell of burning forests). I have a compost pile (actually I am trying to make a golem out of leaves---don't tell my neighbors). And I was the first person on the block to get a recycling bin from the city (my father would have been so proud of the fact that I was "bloody neighbor that cared" and caused several other neighbors to follow suit). So yes, Earth Day sneaked up on me this year---but in my universe, everyday is kind of an Earth Day.

Happy Equinox!

Happy Equinox!

Where has the summer gone?

And just in time for the equinox, cool weather. Or should I say cold---the next few nights, my tomatoes are in danger of freezing and I have only gotten one ripe one this year so far. Not to mention that the pumpkins are no where near being ready.

And the lesson? Only plant herbs. Especially catnip---it can be harvested even after a cold snap.

Remember: you can never have enough catnip. Or at least that is what the Secret Chiefs tell me.

Rainy day

Well, yesterday I managed to get four hours of gardening done. Transplanting some plants (the motherwort has gone wild), pulling some weeds and putting some plants into the ground.

During the same time, I managed to write the center call and the southern quarter call for the June 5th OFM.

I am probably not going to make any progress today. I am stuck inside because of the rain, and my wife is talking loudly on the phone, cleaning and just generally distrubing my thought processes. *sigh*

The First Family's Garden

A friend of mine just sent me a link to a story about the First Family's Garden: The Obamas to eat what they grow. I am pleased to see that they are doing this.

Now, personally, I don't grow a lot of my own food. I would like to grow more of my own food, but I have a few issues with my yard.

The first issue is that I am living in between two people who do not water their yards. Though that may change on the one side, unfortunately not the side that my garden is located on, thanks to the fact that the bank just foreclosed on their house.

(I could have sworn that their house was completely paid for when they inherited it from their father; given how the trash was piling up in the yard, I will not be able to say that I am going to miss them. And it makes my monetary situation look good in comparasion, but I digress...)

The second issue is that the house came with two black walnut trees. I have yet to compile a list of everything that dies in their presence; roses are one such plant that black walnuts kill off *sigh*.

The third issue is that me and my wife don't have the same vision for the yard. There have been a couple of occasions that I have worked an area and planted seeds, then she comes along and plants something else---so much for the work I just did.

So I have ended up growing mainly herbs, or weeds as any neighbor who like grass will refer to them. So far, it has not been an issue. But if I ever get neighbors who actually water their yards it might be.

My mugwort is coming back in, along with both types of catnip (catmint). The motherwort needs to be worked at; it was getting out of control last summer.

I am not sure what else I am going to try to start this year...but I have a dozen seed catalogs waiting for me. Maybe this year, I will attempt tomatoes again.

Anyway, if you can not tell, I am looking forward to spring and summer.