- Sat. Mar. 1
- Paul and Donna have a Mardi Gras party at their house. I get very drunk and get into drumming ecstasy! Got really cool Bachaus Mardi Grais
necklace. One highlight was the brandy-filled Cherub dispenser that pisses into your glass (or mouth, depending on how late in the evening it is!) Much sacrament, much ecstasy!
- Sat Mar. 8
- Potluck and Party at Ann's to raise money for the Bardic Guild. The Bards perform their repertoire which is very well recieved. I especially enjoy
Battle for Evermore with Paul doing a baratone Robert Plant and The Circle Song (Round and round and round and round...) Have a lot of fun
with Nola, who is now old enough to respond to the music and mimic the clapping of those present. This later element is funny because there is a about a five
second delay for her to start clapping when the crowd does. Even though she can't walk yet she moves her legs and body in response to the music.
I observe an interesting interplay between her and one ot the women at the party. The tenderness and focused love that she expresses for Nola moves me
greatly and I find myself very attracted to her. This is a strangely and distinctly un-filial attraction!
- Fri Mar 14
- Attend funeral service for my father's second wife. My friend, rather than step-mother. She was very troubled by emotional problems and they caused
her violent death in a manner which we will probably never be quite sure about. The service is held at the cemetery very close to my home. It is very strange to
see my father so overcome with emotion. I can't recall even seeing him cry before. This has a powerful emotional effect on my brother and I. After the service we
go to my home and hang out for a long time and talk. The service is given by a Christian minister and she does a good job in stressing the positive aspects of Bonnie's
life. I am intrigued by the huge stained-glass windows in the building which is called the Ceders of Lebanon Chapel, a Biblical allusion to a dream that King David has of the
magnificent Temple city that his son Soloman will build. One of the windows has a masonic square and level (eye in the pyramid) symbol at the apex where one would expect
to see a symbol for God's grace or love like a Dove, Sun, etc. Very interesting.
- Sat Mar 15
- Psychic Faire. I am annoyed by the fees and decide not to attend and donate the entry fee to Green Dome instead. It is however a very sucessful event
for Green Dome and The Bardic Guild. We are invited back to the next Faire and the Bards are asked to arrange all the musical entertainment for the entire weekend.
- Fri Mar 21
- Little Elk speaks at UC. Consort and I are very moved by his presentation which is a cross between a lecture and first-person account of his life. There is a
fairly good crowd for the last day of exam week right before Spring Break.
- Sat Mar 22
- Ritual plans are run aground by distinctly indiscreet talk. We discuss this problem within our community. It seems that many folks have an imprecise understanding of
the magickal maxim "To Keep Silent". A related problem is that there is a lack of awareness about ritual decorum. Not every rite is an open public one. After all, our community
is composed of many small working groups, each following their own current and agenda.
Work at the festival site. Rick and I go to the Ancestor Shrine which has suffered greatly over the winter. We offer tobbacco and water as I have forgotten to bring food for myself or the
ancestors. I had bought a large candle in a glass jar with a glass stoppered top. I thought this would keep the candle dry and allow for usage at visits to the shrine. Apparently, over the
cold winter months, water seeped into the candle and froze and broke it. I will have to replace this. We are not able to light it on this visit. I ask the other ancestoral spirits to help bonnie find
her way in the new land. After a year has past, I will bring her some of the things that I know she liked.
Dave and I go to the main circle. As a part of my role as clergy and a member of the guardian guild I perform a Norse based ritual to link myself to the land. Dave performs the hammer rite
and I cast a runic circle. Then I invoke the landspirits and form the contractual bond with them in the Asatru manner while Dave acts as a witness. I agree to nurture, feed and protect them in
reurn for same for our community. I feel a tremendous drain of energy that staggers me as the land sucks the energy that it needs from me. I feel very light-headed as we leave the ritual space.
There is much Gebo Rune in this working.
- Sun May 23
- Ostara Ritual for Kindred Spirits Fellowship. Consort plans and executes this rite. The women of the Kindred each light a candle representing the threefold aspect of the Goddess and then we
each indivually call upon our personal Disir as we envision her. Rite goes well and has good energy. Meeting is marred by unpleasantness caused by behavior of folk who are not welcome at ritual.
This is very strange as it came up the nite before in discussion. I am personally troubled by this as it illustrates some aspects of my clergy role that I am uncertain about. I figure that we all have to
get along at greater community rites and activities but for the small working groups there are folks that I simply can't work with. I will not step into sacred space with someone I consider to be psychotic
and certainly am not going to feel like I can share intimate personal details with them. After the rite we discuss this in the context of the Kindred and the mechanics of our group. We agree that for regular
discussion meetings, it is alright for a person to use their judgement in bringing a visitor, but that rites will require the consensus of the group for attendance. Thus even regular meetings are not open in
any public sense. I remove the link on the web page that could be misconstrued to imply this.
After the rite M. expresses some personal distress over the Maiden, Mother, Crone aspect of the GDT Beltane
rite that is in the planning. She feels a great sense of loss for her own maidenhood since she was married and had children at an early age. I am cogitating on this and planning a way that we can provide
her with a chance to experience this in a healing manner. (I say "we" in the widest of senses here as this will be something that the women of the community will have to do for her." ) I am thinking that The
Star of the Sea would be the person to manifest this, if she would put aside her antipathy to me to consider it objectively. Maegdylnn may be the key to making this happen!
- Mon May 24
- Private Full moon rite with consort. This goes well. Galdor is vibrant and we feel rejuvenated after the rite.
- Tue Mar 25
- Dave and Bob and I wash bottles in preparation for bottling the brew at Wed study group the next day. We have a good time and the work goes well with three people taking part. We watch Joe's Apartment and
drink Tequela shots. I am finally developing a tolerance for Tequela and drink about five shots, have a pleasant buzz and go to work the next day with no hangover. Earlier in the evening, we discuss some of the Norse
language projects and net recourses that I am investigating in the hope of using for my MS thesis next year.
Saw my Aett today. We have a great conversation about the community and various aspects of things. He has found out
that his head deity is Chango, which is cool. We discuss how this coincides with the idea of HGA in Thelemic work. He mentioned that each head deity can manifest in a multitude of forms, they are not all the same for each person with
that particular deity.
- Wed Mar 26
- It is Spring Break and even though I am working full time, I am able to attend Wed study group for the first time in months. It is the second part of Dave's presentation on brewing and we bottle the stout
that they started at the previous meeting two weeks before. I am very pleased, there are only a few people present and they are folks that I am very confortable with. I use Rick's large 10 pound hammer Geldis
to cast sacred space. After we have siphoned off the wort and mixed in the bottling sugar, we perform the ALU galdor formula, adding our energy to the brew. This is the first time that I have done galThe dor with folks
that don't normally do so and it works very well. There is a very pronounced vibration when we perform the galdor. The brew should be excellent1
- Sun Mar 30
- Norse Fellowship decided that since April 1st is Loki day (if any day
is..) that we would watch the film The Mask with Jim Carey. I had
not seen it before and it was a fun movie. As a metaphor for the way that
the same Godform can manifest differently in different people it was quite
interesting. For the most part, Jim's character is a benevolent person
and the godform mainly brings out the suppressed aspects of his psyche
while it amplifies the darker side of the criminal who dons it.
- Mon Mar 31
- Tried another Stout recipe: Kushlamacree Stout. Cooked up the wort
and recited the ALU galdor formula over it at the various critical phases
of the brewing process. Galdor seemed very resonate and I have a feeling
that this will be a good batch of beer.