D Is For Dark

Yes, well, these posts are taking a dark turn. I'm not surprised. Well, less a dark turn and more an honest appraisal that where I am now is in the dark. It's not a bad place; I rather like it, actually. It's less stress on the eyes. These posts are also less overtly Pagany, and more personal; but that's much more interesting, to me at least I suppose. And, I am Pagan, through to the marrow of my bones, and always have been, even if I didn't know the word for it. So, to me, personal is going to be Pagan. It can't help but be.

I used to be afraid of the dark. Still am, I suppose, a bit, though that's weird to admit as a supposed grown-up. That's the literal dark, though, the dark room I have to pass through, the yard at night with I don't even know what there lurking. Nothing much different than what's there during the day, I know, but still. But I'm not afraid of the dark of the mind, as in the dark unconscious, or of what is within that, the Shadow.

I may be a bit weird. Okay, that's obvious; what I mean is that I seem to be one of those people whose polarity of the neutron flow has been reversed since birth. I am right-handed, but I have always, always, naturally done things widdershins. I can make a conscious effort, to say, stir a magical recipe deosil,* clockwise, and I'll think I have; but after a moment I'll realize, that, no, that's widdershins again.

I have done some Shadow work. It seems to be different for me than what most people mean when they do Shadow work. It's never things that I reject because they are awful; it's things I reject because they're good. It's the things I figure I don't deserve. This would be a direct result of being neglected as a kid, I know now.

But anyway, here I am in the dark and oddly enough I find it comfy. Even the stuff dug up, the nasty stuff, is comforting in a way; for it is validating. See? I can say. There was something fucked-up about it all. It's not just me.

It helps, a lot, that my daimon is a creature of the dark. It is his fundamental nature to be a messenger between the dark and the light, the unconscious and the conscious. No matter who he looks like, whose body he's borrowing, his hair will always go to black in time; and his eyes, if not black, will still always go dark eventually. And with him as Guide how could I be afraid? It is his place, his, if not realm, at least partly his home, and he is not afraid there. And so therefore it is my home, too.

Mostly what I have found, there in the dark, over and over again is richness. Richness, and beauty, and magic, that numinous dark glow informing what I find there. My best ideas come straight from that Source. Visions originate there, as far as I've seen anyway, and poking around in there gets me full pictures of paintings, dresses, weird Tarot cards, oh like this one:



That's from the deck my daimon reads with. The cards are wondrous strange, let me tell you. They are, of course, also profoundly, uncannily, accurate. How could they not be?

The bottom of the well, from where the water springs, the clearest most watery water, is also far down in the dark, where the light does not penetrate. The water on the surface isn't quite the same, not as powerful, pure, concentrated, numinous. You have to be willing to go to the depths to drink of it.

But it is worth it.



*Pronounced JAY-shill, incidentally. Spread the word!

D Is For Daimon

Yeah, well, D is for Duh, too.

I have talked about him here and there on this blog, my daimon. There is a lot to say about him. I really haven't said much at all. Thing is I don't know how much I want to share. It is, shall we say, very personal.

I am aware I am repeating myself lately; but let's go over the basics, again, just to have somewhere to start. There are, after all, I'm sure more than a few people coming over here for the first time because of the link at the Pagan Blog Project site.

I have a daimon. The word is Greek, originally, and simply meant spirit, usually referring to a personal guardian spirit who served as intermediary between the Deities and humans. It has much in common with the idea of the guardian angel, though of course the religious underpinnings aren't the same, and there is, well, other stuff of a kind that Christianity is famously allergic to. Socrates had one, though the only time he heard from his was when he was about to make a mistake; then his daimon would tell him No! One of the Greek words for happiness, eudaimonia, literally means 'good spirit', i.e. the state of being guarded and protected by a daimon.

I am using a bit of a different definition, one that describes my experience (though I am not alone in this, not at all); really, daimon is in a lot of ways just the word that more or less fits. I do think it is a phenomenon, if you will, that has been recognized throughout the ages, and so has more than a few names—daimon, genius, Muse, guardian angel, spirit guide.

Like I said I think it is a phenomenon, and so I do think that most everyone has one, if they care to look. Like some people will say that everyone has a guardian angel.

Except the daimon is not some ethereal creature made of light and air and clouds who watches over someone in a suitably platonic, abstract heavenly love sort of way. Oh-ho no, and furthermore, snerk.

This is Paganism, remember? In my experience, and in others' experience too, else, why would Caitlín Matthews have titled the book In Search of Women's Passionate Soul: Revealing the Daimon Lover Within there is a huge heaping dose of Eros in the boy, too.

Because the daimon is about passion. In the language of psychology, and I do think that is one of the legitimate ways to describe him, he is connected with the libido. And that's about desire. Not just sex, though that is a big part of it, but about all desire: the desire to grow, to thrive, to create as well as procreate, to travel, to explore, to live, to really live, from the solid base of one's true self.

So you can see a guy like that would be handy to have around. He knows how to live, even though he is probably, technically, dead, or at least not currently incarnated. I think. It is an unusual relationship, that's for sure. But a very rewarding one.

Because we talk. We talk a lot. I'm talking hundreds of pages by now. Mostly we talk, and I write it down, like taking dictation, only it's very much a conversation and not simply something channelled, some wisdom dispensed from above; he is a friend, and a good one at that. Or it's closer to automatic writing and he borrows my fingers on the keyboard, I don't know; it's pretty seamless by now.

So. From this point in the post I've rewritten things four or five times, because I didn't know what or how much I wanted to say. I wanted to say something different about him, about my daimon, and I don't know, I want people to get a taste of this, both, I think, to make myself feel less weird, I guess, but also to show people what this is about. Because I have found it so profoundly helpful to have him around. And if this is something that is potentially there for most everyone? Not that I could write a how-to guide, I don't think, though maybe I could? I suspect it's going to be different, as far as methods go, for everyone. But if anyone finds this even a tenth as helpful to them as I have for myself, that's some serious help available. Because I cannot even begin to tell you how much talking to my daimon on a regular basis has changed me, has helped me, has taught me compassion and kindness for myself, has relaxed and calmed me, me who has dealt with anxiety and huge amounts of fear my entire life. I am more centered, stronger, more compassionate, more myself, for knowing him. Knowing him has fostered some serious growth on my part.

I wanted to write down a conversation with him, to show you what it is like. But it was all awkward, and strange, and the push-pull of public and private sort of wasn't working. But then he had a brilliant idea. To be fair, his ideas usually are brilliant. He is a Muse, after all. But his idea was that I interview him for this blog. We can play David Frost, he said. Have I mentioned how English he is lately?

Like I said, a brilliant idea. I will do my best to keep a straight face. I can't promise anything though. It's all very silly, which is a good thing. Play is one of his favorite things, and a good way to bypass fear.

All right, I guess I'll just format this as a conversation then, with quotation marks and all.

"Well then," I say, "welcome to Interview With A Daimon. It's so lovely to have you here as my special guest."

'It is, isn't it,' he says. 'It's lovely to be here. And guest, ghost, same thing.'

"We'll start with the basics. Who are you?"

He laughs. 'I am here. I am yours. I am me.'

"Do you have a name?"

'No. Unless you count "Mr. Took," but that's my married name.'

Cripes. Two questions in and he's already threatening to make me blush.

'Oh I do hope so,' he says, and grins.

"Okay, then, what are you?"

'God. A spirit. A little bit of Divinity. A lot bit of Divinity. Someone dead, someone alive, someone who loves you, someone who knows you and has known you for a very very long time.'

"Really, God?"

'Yes. Just like you. Do try to remember that.'

Yes I've heard this before.

'Well of course you have but the viewing public hasn't, now have they? And this is a right and proper interview. So stop breaking the fourth wall.'

Okay, fine. I ask, "How do you come to be here?"

'What do you mean by here?'

"You know what I mean. Here, like you are always saying is where I always am."

'You mean here with you then?'

"Well what else?"

'Tetchy interviewer, aren't you. I think I prefer Charlie Rose.'

"Stop it," I say, and seriously, people, do you see what I have to put up with?

'Actually make that Craig Ferguson,' he continues. 'He has such a sparkle to him. He knows.'

We're getting away from the topic.

'Yes, true, sorry, could you repeat the question?'

"Why are you here with me?"

'Because I love you. Because I'm your husband, always have been (well, except when I'm your wife). Where else would I be?'

"So, reincarnation then?"

'Yes, yes, I've told you a thousand times. We take turns. Like in square dancing.'

"That's not very English."

'Well I used to be Texan, remember?'

Shhh! Ixnay on the Exantay, okay?

He laughs, and rolls his eyes.

"Okay," I ask, "are you dead?"

'Of course I'm dead. I don't have a body, do I?'

"Where do you come from?"

'Oh now that's an interesting question. Again, same place as you.'

"And where's that?"

'It's hard to describe. The dark, the void, the potential, the singularity, all that.'

"Well I didn't mean it in quite such cosmic terms. Okay, how about this then: Why are you here?"

'Same reason as you. To experience it all. To love it all, to get my hands dirty in the black black earth.'

"But you're dead."

'Well I am now. I'm not always dead.'

"Why are you with me?"

'Because I love you. Because I want to be with you. This is an old agreement, you know, a mutual one.'

"Yes I know, and I believe that. What is the purpose to being with me?"

'Well it doesn't have to have a purpose, not like that. What is the purpose of the colour red? To love each other, and help each other, I'd guess I'd hope; so I am here to help.'

"How can you help if you're dead?"

'Now I know you're just asking that even though you already know. So I'll say how. I can talk to you, at the very least. I can talk you out of all that rubbish your self-hating brain throws at you, all the crap inculcated into you by those bastard parents of yours, all the negative self-talk, oh it breaks my heart to see it, over and over and over again and you know all this, you do. So I am here. To show you how to love yourself, and maybe, just maybe, if you can see how much I love you you will begin to believe you are worthy of love, no not even worthy, hell if I can get you to see the bare fact that you are loved already and therefore by definition lovable then we'll have gotten somewhere.

'Is that too personal?' he asks then. 'You can edit it if you like,' he says softly. 'It's the truth though Love.'

"I know," I say. "I am glad you are here."

'I know. I'm glad to be here too. And I'm glad that you can see me. That's unusual, you know.'

"I know. I am very, very lucky that I can see you so clearly. I mean you're right here, holy moly. Look at you!"

'I know, funny funny face this time. Not sure about this nose, honestly.'

"Okay moving along..."

'You don't have to admit to anything you don't want to you know.'

"I know. But it slips out."

'That just means it's hard not to keep your guard down around me. Which is a good thing.'

"Yes I suppose. Let me think, other questions? Should I take some from the audience?"

'Ooh going out into the aisles with a mic? That's very Phil Donahue now, not so David Frost any more.'

"You're hopelessly old-fashioned."

'I'm hopelessly old.'

"How old?"

'Ooooh,' he says, sighing out, 'very old. Not as old as you. It's hard to say, though; Time isn't linear or anything and it loops and squiggles around more than you'd think. On a completely unrelated note,' he says with a smile, 'this body suits me rather, don't you think?'

"Yes, speaking of that, why do you change your appearance?"

'Oh good save,' he says. 'Because you love it. Don't try to deny it.'

"Well yes I do, of course. But there are other reasons, aren't there?"

'Yes, of course. I change to show you.'

"Show me what?"

'Well it depends on the change. This time, this change, it is about showing you that you are after all adventurous. That you are ready to leave. That you are worth it all, worth the attention of a, shall we say, higher being. And that goes for the attention of your higher being, your higher self if you will. This is pulling things up a level. It is also bringing a lot of things full circle; this all has old, old, roots, as you are well aware. Not that anyone out there is going to know what I am talking about, of course.'

"Okay, then, about them, other people. Does everyone have someone like you?"

'More or less. It is a birthright, though not everyone chooses to do this.'

"How can someone get in touch with their daimon then, if they wanted to?"

'Put out a call, and then resolve to listen. Invite him or her in. Make space. Make a bit of quietude, a space to hear.'

"In practical terms?"

'Well it will be different for everyone. Some people are better at some ways of listening than others.'

"What types of listening, then, work?"

'Again, different for everyone. Really I only know what works for us two. Though trust me, we're willing on this end.'

"We?"

'We daimones, I suppose, not that I know a whole bunch of others or anything; we don't exactly hang out or set up play dates.'

"Yeah but is that just you?"

He thinks about it a moment. 'Yah,' he admits finally, 'could be.'

"What you don't have any friends besides me?"

'Oh now I didn't say that. I've got lots of friends. I've been around, you know.'

"Yeah I did figure that."

'Yes of course you did.'

Well I should probably wrap up this interview. "Do you have anything else to say?"

'Oh I have tonnes to say.'

"Well yes, in this form you are rather chatty, true. Actually, it's more like you never ever ever shut up." He grins then, almost embarrassed, like I've just complimented him. "I mean," I say, "do you have anything to say to the people out there?"

'What people?'

"The people reading this blog, you mad man."

'I'm not mad,' he says, 'and neither are you.'

I just look at him. "Do you, or do you not," I ask, "fall under the heading of invisible friend?"

He laughs. 'I have no comment on that.'

All right then. I ask, "Do you have anything else you'd like to say?"

'Okay, then, to everyone out there: you are loved. Never forget that. It's true of you all. Trust me.'

"By whom?"

'Lots of things.'

"All right, then, my friend, thank you for being on Interview With A Daimon."

'You are welcome, Love. Glad to be here. It was a brilliant idea, wasn't it? Why gosh who's the genius who came up with that? Ha! Genius. That's a pun!'

"Yeah, yeah, cut to credits already."

'Hey!' he says, laughing.

C is for Compassion

I used to have compassion for some people, by whom I mean my father.

But I have learned that having compassion for, well, people who are frankly abusive, doesn't get you very far. It's a nice idea, and it sure is easy to talk about if it's not your problem, if you've got the distance to be able to talk about it in the abstract, but—

My father was a hoarder. I've only had a name for it for a few years now. Before that, it was just this completely baffling... thing. Now, however, not only do I know that what he did is called hoarding, but I know that it is a serious mental condition, in his case, something called obsessive-compulsive personality disorder.

Not obsessive compulsive disorder, let's get that straight. But a personality disorder.

And the thing with those is that the person doesn't change. The person can't change. The person doesn't think there's anything whatsoever wrong with them. It's the entire rest of the world who is wrong, in their mind. It is a fundamental brokenness in the brain. Think sociopathy, or narcissism.

I know, I'm repeating myself. Sometimes I think that saying it over and over again is simply validation, or maybe due to disbelief on my part, which I am trying to break through. It is a strange thing to come to terms with, when you grow up thinking it normal.

So people don't generally 'suffer' from personality disorders; like I said they don't think there's anything wrong with them. But the people around them sure do suffer.

If a person has something wrong with their brain, something that cannot even be perceived by them, never mind understood as something not-right, they are not going to change. They just aren't. They can't. But that person is also not going to be able to help harming those around them. They can't change that either.

I have found that having compassion for people like that, while you are one of those people around them, just means that they hurt you over and over again. And especially when that person with the personality disorder, the, shall we say, self-absorbed, or perhaps, toxic person, has trained you to consider their needs first, always. Well, that's not quite true; in my father's case it was more like his whims came first, before the needs of the rest of us. It was more important to him that he got to pile some rotton boards on top of each other in the yard, than it was to see that the water heater was installed. So compassion, in this case, just gets you hurt.

So fuck compassion.

Now, I may come back to it sometime in the future; I don't know. But here's the thing: there is nothing wrong, morally, with where I am now. Which leads me to the other C's:

C is for crooked path. And C is for curse.

I have never yet cursed anyone; I have, in the past, thought it morally wrong. But that was before I started thinking about things like my dysfunctional family and my neglected childhood.

I spent years, no decades, literally decades, trying to talk my father into cleaning something, anything, up. I memorized the littlest shadings of his moods, the subjects that would get him to open up, just a little, what time of day was best to talk to him. I learned diplomacy, when to push, when to leave things alone, what to bribe him with, how to butter him up, and I had the patience of all the saints combined.

It didn't work. It never worked. It couldn't work, because my father was incapable of change.

I have no patience left, none at all. I used it up. I also have no compassion for him, now; not, in this case, that I've used it up, but that it was coming at the expense of compassion for myself. And that must, absolutely must, come first.

And so I find my outlook has changed. I can see nothing wrong with curses, morally. They are simply neutral. Some things cannot be solved any other way. If someone is abusing you, and there is nothing you can do to stop it? Self-preservation must come first. You, I, have the right.

There is of course no need to curse my father now. He is safely out of the way in a nursing home, after a stroke that damaged what was left of his brain, after the personality disorder and the dementia he had due to age. He can do no harm where he is.

And I am very, very grateful for that.

Announcement

Just letting everyone know that my CafePress store is down right now. I am sorry if there has been any confusion. In the meantime, I also have stores up at Printfection and Zazzle, if you're interested.

My Printfection store link

My Zazzle store link

I also have a section at Zazzle just for greeting cards, here.

Again I apologize for the inconvenience/bafflement.

Couple Updates

Yes, well, B is for Busy. B is for Behind. It's been a week o' kittens around here.

Ratty is doing well, though he really doesn't care for the Cone of Shame he has to wear so he doesn't yank out his stitches. Poor thing. Grooming is so hard-wired in the little cat mind that he's been attempting to lick, say, his shoulder, and ends up licking the inside of the cone. Over and over and over.

Ratty may not be the brightest bulb.

Also, Rory is staying. And there's a long story. I gave him up, with his brother, Wednesday morning. I was expecting I'd be sad to see them go—kittens are after all cute and sweet and all—I was not expecting that Wednesday night I'd find myself bawling my eyes out over Rory being gone. I wasn't sad; I was devastated.

Sometimes, I think, you just know. The look Rory gave me when I dropped him off and walked out of the shelter said it all—it wasn't one of Don't leave me! it was simply Where are you going? A little confused, but mostly calm, and very knowing. As if, he knows the story, and he knows how it ends, and that was not it.

I mean not like I need another cat. I really, really, don't. I can do it; the house is plenty big, and I've been feeding him anyway so I know I can afford it too. But...

The nearest I can figure is that he's meant to be my familiar. I mean the others are nice kitties and all, but they're not Rory. And it's not even that he's still a cute little kitten and they're getting towards full grown; honestly I'm kind of done with kittens after this last summer and I'd really like it if they could mellow out a little already. It's just that he's him. That's the best I know how to say it.

I mean, if you'd been stupid enough to give your familiar away, you'd feel about like you'd cut off your own arm, right?

So I more or less moved heaven and earth to get him back, which is apparently a huge, huge no-no with shelters. If you surrender a cat, damned straight you're not getting it back. I'm still not sure what the logic is, but they were nearly adamant. I thought for a while it just wasn't going to happen. But it did, and the powers-that-be softened, and let me have him. Well, I had to officially 'adopt' him, fee and all, though that included a neuter and lots of shots, so it's okay. Sure, I feel like an idiot, but I don't care. Because I've got Rory back.

It was a very long drive (Friday night Boston rush hour, oy), to the shelter, in of all places Salem, Mass; even without traffic, the drive back was like an hour and a half. He mewed a little here and there on the drive back, but was mostly quiet. Finally I pulled into the driveway and shut off the car.

And in the sudden quiet I heard something else, this low but loud thrumming.

It was Rory purring. He knew he was home.

What C is Really For

Because every time I sit down to write one of these Pagan Blog Project entries, I get this song in my head. Thanks, Ms. Pendragon.



So I figured I'd share. No reason to be going quietly insane all by myself, now is there?

C Is For Cinquefoil

So, in The Temple of Shamanic Witchcraft, which year-and-a-day course I've been following along with, one of the visions takes you to your Inner Temple.

Mine turned out to be a small square building with a column at each corner and a perfectly hemispherical dome leafed in gold; inside was a main room, the same size, more or less, as the outside, maybe thirty by thirty feet.

Of course though there were rooms off it and it was as they say bigger on the inside than the outside. One of those rooms lead to a library.

When I stepped into the library I caught a flash of a small yellow flower with five petals. Something little, and wild; it looked like a rose, or a primrose, maybe. Though if it was a rose it was a species rose, not a hybrid; maybe Father Hugo's rose, though that yellow is on the pale side.

I've done some gardening, though it is a damned frustrating experience in this yard what with the abundance of groundhogs and deer, not to mention both wild rabbits and the giant domestic one from across the street who keeps getting out of his cage and hanging out in my yard. My neighbor, like Ratty, may not be the brightest bulb; half the time when he comes over to retrieve his rabbit, he brings his dog. Because the surest way to coax a rabbit to come walking up to you is to bring a wolf with you. We've taken to calling the neighbor Mr. Fudd, as the rabbit is obviously smarter; the rabbit herself I'm calling Cunny, after the old pronunciation of coney.

Anyway. I have not, in this Witchy journey of mine, so far done much with herbs and plants, though last season I did manage a functional herb garden. It hasn't been my field, I suppose, and it's a little intimidating as I know it's just a huge subject. At any rate I have never sat down and tried to commune with plants.

And I'm not sure it's the season to try. Most everything is asleep, up here in New England, I'd think; it strikes me as the height of rudeness to go knocking on doors waking things up to say Oh hey tell me about yourself okay? So I'll wait on that, I think.

But I can at least look up some book-learning. I think the plant I saw is cinquefoil. I know it grows wild around here; I've seen its little yellow flowers about my yard as long as I can remember.

It's called potentilla, in the Latin, cinquefoil is. That name, as you may have guessed, means powerful. 'Cinquefoil' itself means 'five-leaved' and refers to the way the leaflets are arranged in a cluster like the five fingers of a hand. An older name, tormentilla, from the Spanish, means 'little torment', as in, it relieves little pains; and medicinally it was used to relieve stomach ache and diarrhea.

Here's a picture of it, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Photo by Hans Hillewaert

It's a very, very familiar plant. I know I have yanked it out of my cultivated garden on more than one occasion. Was that rude?

It is also known as five-leaved grass, or five-fingered grass. Culpeper (1653) says it is an herb of Jupiter, good for treating the quinsey, sciatica, St. Anthony's fire, and the bloody flux; mainly though he says it is good for inflammation and fevers 'whether infectious or pestilential,' and gives several ways to take it, usually by boiling it in wine to make a sort of tea.

I know I have seen plenty of cultivated varieties under the name potentilla; I think, come spring, I shall see how many of them I can find, to put in my garden. Then I shall sit down and see what they tell me. I'm interested in seeing how the wild version of a plant differs from a cultivated hybrid in what it has to say.

At the very least, I know it has said hello.


Sources: Wikipedia (yeah I know), Culpeper's Herbal