They’re like, big scallions, right? But the national vegetable of Wales. So…
A pat of butter (because Butter Is Good)
A chopped, washed leek
…allow the leek to saute while preparing
A handful (about ten) baby carrots sliced longwise (slivers)
About 3 tablespoons of chicken broth
…cook covered over medium low heat for about seven minutes while preparing
Minced fresh rosemary, oregano, and dill
Continue to cook about another seven minutes and voila! Yummy sidedish.
Phew.
Back from a week (Tuesday through Sunday afternoon) at Free Spirit Gathering. FSG is a beautiful event. The camp is lovely, and the setup is easy; cabins, a swimming pool, a dining hall. Real luxurious compared to most camping events. The people are great. There’s a lot of vending, but not so much it becomes overwhelming. The program is pretty active, although I don’t usually have time to attend much. The music is a plus; Kiva performed Saturday night and that’s always a pleasure.
Tuesday was mostly catching up with people, seeing old friends, making connections, and relaxing. There was getting settled and all that, but I do love a cabin; makes it so easy.
Wednesday night I led a healing ritual for Orien Rose. I have to say, it was absolutely beautiful. We had about fifty people. I never wear black in ritual, I always have colorful robes, but this time I ended up in black, and my partner Dave, to my left, was also in black, and to my right was Arthur all in white, and to Dave’s left was Abraham, also in white. So the altar and those of us leading the ritual created a hot visual impression.
Roberta held the space for the first part of the healing, and she totally channeled eight year-old girl energy, and danced around the circle gathering energy into her. Then Abe led the second part, creating all of us as parents of an injured child, and then creating hope and strength and peace in each of us as those parents. Finally, I had Arthur, representing the Pagan kids, holding the pictures of Orien Rose to charge and send home with people. Abraham and Gordon also led the fundraising effort, which was wonderfully successful.
The love and energy poured out to Orien Rose was amazing. The Amber Rose School, which does classes for the Free Spirit kids, sent energy to her every day, and sent us home with gifts for her. (This is the first year that Orien Rose hasn’t attended Amber Rose school. I cried like a baby at the graduation ceremony.) Just about all of the eighty photos I brought with me were taken by people who wanted to continue to pray for her at home.
After the ritual Abe did my new tattoo, and also touched up my Kali tattoo from last year. It was weird shifting from the love energy of the first tattoo to the hot spiritual energy of the second, but it was wonderful.
Thursday night I led (facilitated) a Group Leaders Conclave, which had about 25–30 people. It was a lot of fun to form connections with other group leaders, and I emphasized that people needed to look around, know who other leaders are, because that is your support group.
Was it Wednesday or Thursday that the huge thunderstorm blew through? That was exciting. Also wet. The weather got cool and stayed cool for most of the event, and I discovered that I really hadn’t brought appropriate cool weather wear, so I was annoyed with myself. You wrap yourself up in layers you end up looking like a Pagan bag lady. Pagan because of the purple and velvet, but still.
Friday I taught “The Way of Four,” and I love teaching that one. It is always different, and I am confident of the material.
Saturday was my first time teaching “Pain Management for Pagans.” I was nervous about how well my material would be organized, and I screwed up one of my exercises, but I got a lot of positive feedback. I had envisioned it as primarily addressing brief-term pain, like tattooing, body modificiation, wound healing, and childbirth, but just about everyone who showed up (about a dozen people) had a chronic pain condition they were living with. So I had to shift focus.
Also on Saturday, I attended the “Young Magick” workshop. It was for Pagans in their teens and twenties, but since my new book is written for that audience, I got permission to attend. And I have to say it was grounding to be with real, in-person young Pagans rather than just talking to them online.
Sunday it was pack up and go, and of course that’s when we got the ninety degree weather. Phew, that was tough. The drive, wow. Normally three hours, traffic and construction stretched it to five and a half.
Volcanic Ridge, a spur off the Ritter Range, Ansel Adams Wilderness.
Found a nice Solstice meditation here:
Close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and relax.
At this time of greatest light, we meditate on light as a symbol of spiritual energy. Breathe now gently and deeply and with each breath become aware of the light that surrounds you and the light that is within you — the light that is the energy of Our Great Mother.
The light can be any color. It is often imagined as white — like bright sunlight. But it can be any color, any intensity, that is best for you. Blue, green, yellow, purple, rose; we know that light can also be black. The light may stay the same color for you during this meditation or it may change from color to color, or become a blend of many colors.
See the light now in your mind’s eye. This light is all around us, we are bathed in its brightness, energy, and warmth.
(Pause)
blue lightFocus on the light until you sense that you and the light are one. This will be your signal that you can now bring the light inside you.
(Pause)
When you bring the light inside you, one way is to let it stream in through your crown chakra at the top of your head. (If it’s already entered another way, that’s okay.)
The light — this healing energy — flows through you now, from your crown, down to your third eye (between your eyebrows) to your throat, your shoulders and your arms, and your hands, to your heart, your stomach, shining brightly at your solar plexus just above your navel, to your sex organs, shining too at your tailbone. The healing light travels down through your legs, your knees, your ankles and your feet. Feel the warmth of this healing energy now as it travels all through your body.
(Pause)
Now sense the one part of your body where the light can shine the brightest and imagine the light there. See it shine.
(Pause)
blue lightNow send the light out from that part of your body where it shines the brightest. Send it out a few inches from your body.
(Pause)
Now extend your light out from your body just a little more, then a little more, until your light extends a few feet from your body. Now, if you like, extend your light to reach your sisters. Our lights meet and we are connected by this great light, connected by our renewed knowledge of Our Great Mother. Take a few minutes now to sense this energy and this connectedness.
(Pause)
Now take from this light the energy that you need, and know that there is plenty for all. For the Source of this light is endless and ever abundant. Take a moment to experience Her abundance, and know that as you partake of Her light and Her love, so do you give your light and your love. And as you give energy, so do you receive it. And thus does the circle of life continue.
(Pause)
And as we come back now to this time and place, let us give thanks for the return of Our Great Mother, and for our return unto Her.
From She Lives! The Return of Our Great Mother, 10th Anniversary Edition. Copyright 1999 by Judith Laura.
I had a conversation with my son about abortion.
Actually, I’ve had more than one. We talk about politics, about blogging, about feminism, about all these things. And at some point I knew I had to make the personal political, and the political personal. What he didn’t have, what our intellectual conversations weren’t providing, was a face on the issue, a human, real face.
So I told him. I had an abortion.
And here’s what I said: “I was twenty years old. I had left my first husband and was living in my mother’s basement.”
And he jumped in and said “…you had no choice.”
In that moment, I saw what the face of abortion was to him: It was compassionate to the point of pathetic. And that’s what we do, isn’t it? If we don’t slut-shame, we patronize. Poor sad girls with no choice, nowhere to go, no money. Tut tut we should support their right to make this sad tut tut choice.
And sometimes that’s true. Sometimes it’s the very end of an unraveling rope. Sometimes a life is at stake. Sometimes there’s just no other way.
But what I said was, “No. I did have a choice. I could have had that baby and scraped by somehow. But it wasn’t the life I wanted. I didn’t want to be a girl in a basement with a baby and a shitty job. So I made a choice.”
And see, that face isn’t much there in the abortion conversation. The face of a smart young woman who sees her life shriveling up and says NO WAY. Not going to happen. Not to me. Because I have a choice.
I think my son learned something from that conversation. I know I did.
The Inglehart-Welzel Cultural Map of the World
This site is awesome. The maps posted there range from the thought–provoking to the crackpot to the historical to the fanciful to the just plain fun, but what they have in common is that they make you look at the world just a little bit differently.
…so here’s a picture. Velvet Stickseed (Hackelia velutina), Kibbie Ridge, Yosemite National Park.
Shiltone has the details.
So if you don’t blog, let me tell you about comment spam. A year ago, most of it was just a paragraph of links. Some of it was smarter. It would be a fake blog post with a neutral phrase like “Hi” or “I agree with you” or “Great blog” and then the spam link would be in the signature. Some of those are actually pretty clever and you have to read closely to determine they’re spam.
I assume, from the point of view of the spammer, that having to read closely is desireable.
But then these other spammers started appearing. They send you thousands of links in a single spam. Seriously. Thousands. When I open my spam filter, one spam comment will fill two or three screens. Or more.
What this does is allow me to scroll through all my spam very, very fast. And the other spam, the stuff I’d have to read closely, gets scrolled past just as fast. Because it’s all too much.
So you’d think that one of the groups that would be interested in stopping the crazy screen-stuffing spam would be the normal spammers. You’d think they’d step in or something.
But you’d be wrong.
My favorite passage in Insurgent Mexico is this one, in which John Reed argues the Woman Question with Pancho Villa:
Once I asked him if women would vote in the new Republic. He was sprawled out on his bed, with his coat unbuttoned. “Why, I don’t think so,” he said, startled, suddenly sitting up. “What do you mean–vote? Do you mean elect a government and make laws?” I said I did and that women already were doing it in the United States. “Well,” he said, scratching his head: “if they do it up there I don’t see that they shouldn’t do it down here.” The idea seemed to amuse him enormously. He rolled it over and over in his mind, looking at me and away again. “It may be as you say,” he said; “but I have never thought about it. Women seem to me to be things to protect, to love. They have no sternness of mind. They can’t consider anything for its right or wrong. They are full of pity and softness. Why,” he said, “a woman would not give an order to execute a traitor.”
“I am not so sure of that, mi General,” I said. “Women can be crueller and harder than men.”
He stared at me, pulling his mustache. And then he began to grin. He looked slowly to where his wife was setting the table for lunch. “Oiga,” he said, “come here. Listen. Last night I caught three traitors crossing the river to blow up the railroad. What shall I do with them? Shall I shoot them or not?” » Read more..
