Viewing posts by Thexalon
The spring can be a deceptively pleasant time for modern people: We see the warmth coming back, plants and flowers returning, and hope for a coming summer. However, back when most people lived on local agriculture, it also was a bit of a nervous period, because that big pile of food you stored up in the fall is starting to get quite a bit smaller than it once was, and while you can probably make it through to the first bits of greenery coming up from the ground like spinach or asparagus, if you're going to have to go hungry this is the season where you might have to do it. And what's worse, you have to be really careful not to eat the seeds you're going to plant, which you'll be tempted to do when you're hungry, because if you do then the next harvest will be smaller just making things worse.
Normally around this time of year, I talk about the celebration of the holiday of Imbolg, which honors hearth and home as especially embodied by the Irish goddess Brighid. In my group's Imbolg ritual, we take that power of the hearth-fire that Brighid gives us to keep warm, develop the tools we need, and keep our inspiration and hope for a better future, and ritually take it into ourselves so it can become part of our own power. Which seemed to match the themes we needed this year: Not only is it extremely cold right now, but there are people who need the warmth of the good fire more than ever, those who are braving the cold and facing down bullies armed with the power of the state. And that all meant we need a protest song.
It's the season of Yuletide once again, a time of darkness and dreary weather, but also a time of partying inside every home. The harvest is gathered in, and the folk are mostly lounging around eating and staying warm and doing indoor tasks until it's time to get ready to head to the fields again. This song was inspired by the rune Manaz, which keeps on coming up a lot in my divination work and refers at least in my interpretation of it as the power of people working together. These neatly aligns with a point I've heard from excellent scientists who point out that humans are fundamentally social creatures whose main superpower is working as a team.
The late fall season is upon us. The last bit of crops have been brought in, I've been busily winterizing my house in preparation for the deep cold of winter, and there is a sense of the world dying as it turns towards darkness. As is typical for modern pagan types, this leads to a focus in this season on our beloved dead, as often expressed through a tradition of reading the names of those who are close to the membership who have passed in the last year. This led to me thinking about the phenomenon of how much you learn about somebody at their memorial service, in whatever form it takes, because the piece of them you knew always leaves out a lot of their story.
Fall equinox is upon us, and this enters my favorite season of the year. It's not too hot, it's not too cold, it's just right for humans to live. This year, as in many years' past, I'll be celebrating the season by focusing on Persephone and her journey to take up her throne in the Underworld at this time of the year, with some inspiration from the Eleusinian Mysteries of the past. I will also be honoring Dionysos, who both guides us in ecstatic trances and shows us our innermost selves, and Hekate as a guide on the journeys we take. And this presents a whole complex of visions of our ancestors and friends dwelling in the lands beyond.