Georgi, it really isn't fair how swiftly your book gets consumed! Okay, sure I am feeling a bit like a dirt nap happened and have been reduced to altering my state of being with heavy drugs such as Robitussin and Nyquil, but really??? About three hundred pages were turned by my heavy and overworked mom eyeballs! I know I read several of those pages twice because I passed out with my book dropped over my chest and the rest of me falling off the couch it seems. The book was, thankfully, safe from any falling harm. Okay, I have to admit to one bibliophile sin: I spilled a couple of drops of hot water with honey and lemon on the part where you are discussing drawing down the moon. I know, horrors!
There were many things about this book that struck personal cords for me. On a very basic human level it revealed that there could be good reason for me to love the taste of basil and sourdough bread. It's much like the ham for Christmas thing from my Grandfather's side of the family. I can see that I am going to have to learn how to make sourdough bread. I can feel parts of my personal practice already shifting a little to make room for personal ancestry. I was always told that this would happen, but I think that I was very discouraged by the fact that much of my family's history is lost to war, hate, and ruin.
Your descriptions of Hecate in certain places confirm some dreams that I have had of Her. Many people see Hecate as the old Crone woman. I have seen her holding and caring for young ones, I have seen her running through the woods with very large wolf like hounds at her heels, I have seen her guarding the gates and guarding the hearth fire and none of these things could I explain and pin point as real images of Hecate until I started digging into where Her stories began: in my Grandmother's childhood home. Seeing your drawings of Her echo some of those dreams.
Obviously there are things that tradition is going to have to ignore, damn me or not. There is no Grandmother who can pass the knowledge of healing and magic that I have long worked to uncover to my daughter, so I am going to have to step up seeing as how she is interested in learning and I am seeing things 'catch.' I can see the wisdom of allowing a 'clean elderly woman' who has seen much of life do the training. However, that luxury has been denied, so I am making my own rules to a certain extent. That one has to go out the window. Sorry tradition.
I think I disagree with the ancients when they are talking about doing certain magics naked for them to be effective. I have done ritual dressed in every day clothing, ritual clothing and sans clothing. They were all effective. Stepping away from the social normal is a mindset for me, not a state of dress. Yes, the lack of clothes in beautiful weather can help establish this mindset, but it is not the end all be all. Besides, there is no way I am going outside next full moon with no clothes on to draw down the moon! And I AM going outside next full moon to draw down the moon.
I appreciated the discussion you had in the book about those of the faerie realm. I found it interesting that red threads were used heavily in this sort of magic as well. I had been using red threads, and fabrics, and yarns on an intuitive level and based upon what I have seen in my visitations to faerie. It is nice to see it in black and white so to speak. I am also getting the impression that I may have spoiled my wee folk with something a might more boozey than wine. * whistles and walks away*
I may have read and finished this book in a hazy stupor of cold medication, but I know this book is not done with me by two vital pieces of information. I still have not put it down. I find myself going back to places of intrigue to me. The songs, the spells, the rites all dance around in my minds eye like I may have witnessed this somewhere in my soul's memory. The other piece of information is that at about four in the morning, while the morning was still dark, I found myself being handed a feather broom and another tool I cannot remember. I didn't see the person handing them to me. It was very real much like a member of my family had come into the room to see how I was only all of those people were asleep and then I found myself awake and moving about. I jumped as I realized I had been given these objects and didn't want to crush them clumsily. Of course the objects were absent. All of this happened in the spaces in between.
Sorry Georgi, this book is doomed to ragged edges and a broken spine. There may also be ribbons of varying color and length hanging from it at some point or another. BTW, you may be interested to know the honey used in previously mentioned spilling blasphemy was local desert wildflower honey.
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