People. What a bunch of bastards.

Brendan wrote a post criticizing deep ecologists and environmentalists for being misanthropes. Sigh. This was my response:

Thanks for this post, Brendan. I see where you're coming from, and you're definitely not the first person to accuse ecologists and environmentalists of being misanthropic or anti-human. But I do have a few problems with your characterization of the deep ecologist's position on this.

First of all, I've never heard any environmentalist or deep ecologist seriously propose killing or sterilizing individuals as a solution to the population crisis. (Except maybe out of frustration or despair, speaking in an emotional and intentionally hyperbolic way. Do you have any citations for where you've seen this claim being made as a serious proposal?) There's one very good reason for this: the study of population dynamics in the science of ecology clearly links population growth to resource availability. This applies to humans as well. In other words, the problem of human over-population is directly related to our ability to, and even our obsession with, extracting increasing value out of our available resources. An organized campaign to kill or sterilize humans in order to decrease our numbers would be just as ineffective as similar attempts to control animal and plant populations through limited hunting or harvesting (in other words, not very effective at all).

Second of all, as Naess says in his principles of deep ecology, the flourishing of human life and cultures is compatible with a substantial decrease of the human population. Since no one seriously believes that a society that sanctions organized killing or forced sterilization of individuals could be considered a flourishing culture in any respect (and, by definition, human life cannot flourish if it is prevented or prematurely ended), this to me immediately suggests that Naess has in mind some other solution than the one you ascribe to him. (In fact, your claim that he is a misanthrope is directly contradicted by his very first principle, which affirms that human life and well-being have value in and of themselves.) He talks at length about what this alternate solution is, namely a fundamental change in our worldview from one that sees resource extraction and endless growth as the primary goal of human society, to one that sees the natural world as valuable in its own right and emphasizes quality of life over quantitative measures of "progress." He is explicitly concerned for the quality of life for humans as well as nonhuman beings and believes that the quality of human life can be greatly improved by adopting principles of deep ecology; that by adopting these principles, the human population will naturally bring itself into proper balance with its supporting environments (just as happens with every other species on the planet). This does not sound like misanthropy to me, unless we assume that misanthropy means promoting a philosophy or worldview that happens to be at odds with the one that is currently held by the mainstream. In other words, if this is misanthropy, then we might as well say that refusing to let a child have ice cream every night for dinner is child abuse.

Thirdly, you rightly say that "the idea that curbing or reversing population growth, is all we have to do to fix global warming, species extinction, and climate change, is pure misanthropy." But you yourself point out that, among those ecologists and environmentalists you quote, over-population is only one concern among many and that curbing over-population is only one of several different suggested changes that need to be made. Naess, for instance, lists changes to "policies [that] affect basic economic, technological, and ideological structures" in his sixth principle. Foreman mentions the problem of over-population only once among his sixteen principles, and even when he does so he does not make any explicit suggestion about how this problem should be dealt with, only that it must be acknowledged to be a problem. So again, I am not sure who you are referring to, other than a straw man, when you argue that we can't reduce all environmental issues to the problem of over-population. I'm not aware of anyone who says that we can or should. Even your very first quote, from Ehrlich, does not suggest that all of these various problems, which can be traced back to over-population, therefore have only one single solution -- rather, he is pointing out what he sees as being a common cause. To use another emotionally charged metaphor, this would be like saying that because we can trace STDs, unwanted pregnancies and rape back to sex, that sex is therefore inherently bad and the "only solution" to all of these problems is abstinence-only education. We know that this kind of simplistic thinking does not work. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't acknowledge a common thread that runs through all of these related issues; in fact, acknowledging what these problems have in common can give us the perspective necessary to approach these related problems in more practical ways.

Fourthly, in general I think that the accusation that nature writers in the American tradition are "anti-civilization" is problematic because it takes for granted that American society is the prototype of civilization. It's important to place these writers in context and realize that they were critiquing the society in which they lived, and not necessarily "civilization" as a whole in all its possible forms. Many of them were in fact challenging their contemporaries to work towards new ways of living in society. Again, Naess explicitly points this out in his principles of deep ecology by stating that we need to rework the way we imagine human culture and that, if we are successful, society will look very different from how it does today. I tend to give these writers and thinkers at least enough credit to believe they are intelligent enough to recognize they are writing from a particular perspective and in a particular context. I also happen to agree with many of them that we should be critical of certain aspects of our current society. Again, this is only misanthropy if we assume that criticizing the way humans currently live in some cultures (namely, Western industrialized cultures) is equivalent to rejecting all possible forms of human society.

I agree with you that there are underlying class and race issues here, and that the problem is not how many of us there are, but how resources are distributed. I find it kind of weird that you are criticizing some of the very writers who have put principles of simple living and voluntary poverty at the center of their critiques of current society, for the very sake of emphasizing a better quality of life for everyone. (There are some people who would claim that simple living is itself misanthropic, because it represents a withdrawal from society and a refusal to engage in relationships of trade via the market economy that dominates most social interactions today. Needless to say, I think those people are full of shit.) There's plenty of evidence that principles of simple living, coupled with access to education and equal opportunities (especially for women) along with adequate medical care, play a very big role in decreasing population growth naturally. In fact, projections of population growth have repeatedly over-estimated -- back in the 1980s, for instance, it was believed that we were going to hit 10 billion people three years ago. It turns out that providing for the health and well-being of humans is a far more effective curb on population growth than any campaign of killing or sterilization. (And this is true among other animals as well -- for instance, the hunting of cougars in the Pacific Northwest in order to curb the population actually resulted in an increase in injuries and deaths during human-cougar encounters because such hunting destabilized familial and territorial relationships, whereas when the cougar population was left to regulate itself without the interference of human hunters, the result was an increase in the cougar population but a decrease in human-cougar encounters because there were fewer "rogue" young male cougars wandering into suburban neighborhoods in search of new territory.)

Jeff tells me that I really need to end this comment by emphasizing that I value our friendship and that your blog is one of the only ones I actually still read these days. :) Seriously. Sorry for the comment-dump. It's just, deep ecology has been a bit of an obsession for me over the past few years, and it seems to me that accusations of misanthropy leveled at environmentalists outnumber actual instances of misanthropy among environmentalists by at least 100 to 1 (but probably closer to 10,000 to 1 or maybe even 1 million to 1). So.... it made me a little sad to see you doing it. :( Again, I value our friendship. Please don't be mad at me.

Seriously, though. Who takes potshots at John Muir or Arne Naess? Naess spent the end of his life basically living in a hut on a mountain -- hardly an example of extravagant living at the expense of exploited developing countries. And Muir actively worked to establish a national parks system that would preserve natural wilderness environments all over the country and make them available for free (or almost free) to everyone. There are way better targets than these guys if you want to complain about classism and racism in modern Western society.

Nature Worship, Polytheism and the "Point" of Paganism

Sophia shared a link to Stifyn Emrys's post, "There's Far More to Paganism Than Worshipping Gods and Goddesses," in which Emrys responds to that post by P. Sufenas Virius Lupus on "bringing back the gods" that I linked to the other day but haven't had a chance to go back and read. If Emrys is being fair in his characterization of the main thrust of Lupus's argument, then I'm actually a bit concerned. I used to think of Lupus as a thoughtful, respectful writer — one of those reconstructionist polytheists (in company with folks like Erynn Rowan Laurie and some others) who can be intelligent and nuanced in their own theology and practice without feeling the need to tear down others or erect straw men to legitimize their own views.

Emrys's main point is that Paganism is (and I would add, always has been) much more complex than worship of "the old gods." This is so obvious, and to claim otherwise would be so contrary to historical fact — and we're talking recent history, here — that I find it disconcerting that someone like Lupus who supposedly takes his history very seriously could make a claim to the contrary. It seems that the claim that modern Paganism's "point" is to "bring back the gods" is a fabrication almost on par with the claim that it represents an unbroken lineage of the ancient Matriarchy, or that the Burning Times killed millions of women who were secretly priestesses of the Goddess. It just simply isn't true that this is the "point" of Paganism, and no serious scholar of modern Paganism as a New Religious Movement would ever make such a claim. Hell, my thesis on the influences of modern Paganism's development over the past fifty years — which I wrote not even ten years ago — examined polytheism as only one of many different theological strands, and not even the most influential one. Back when I was doing this research, there wasn't even such a thing as "hard polytheism" in the popular mindset of the average self-identifying Pagan. If anyone had tried to make the claim that modern Paganism's "point" was polytheism, you could easily have pointed to several different statistical studies and surveys of the actual beliefs and practices of people calling themselves Pagan/Neopagan that clearly showed this just wasn't the case.

In fact, the most recent general survey of Pagan practice and belief that came out in June 2012 (barely six motnhs ago) shows that more than 87% of self-identifying Pagans said "reverence for nature" was the most important element of Paganism, whereas only 10% chose "worship of the gods." And even though 56% of the Pagans surveyed identified as polytheist, when asked if worship of the gods was a fundamental aspect of Paganism, less than half of them said yes. Now I don't think this particular survey was necessarily all that scientific or carefully controlled.... but those numbers certainly seem to confirm my own impression of the breakdown.

So what the hell is Lupus talking about? I need to go back and actually read his post for myself. It might be that Emrys is exaggerating Lupus's claims (though from the brief skim I did the other day, I don't think he is).

What's the "point"?

Lupus opens by stating outright:

I feel the need to state once again that one of the "points" of modern Paganism is to bring back the gods. [...] their reality as actual beings with independence, volition, and power was disregarded, downplayed, or demonized in many cases.

So he does say "one of the 'points' of modern Paganism," and not the point... and he also puts the word "point" in scare quotes, though I'm not sure exactly what he's trying to communicate by doing that. I get nervous when I see a lot of furry writing, with scare quotes scattered throughout a text when it's not obvious that the person is either quoting someone else or trying to be deliberately ironic/sarcastic. I'm not sure how a "point" differs from a point.

He goes on:

What I am noticing more and more recently, however, is that modern Paganism is being purposefully defined so as to not include the gods. In recent weeks alone: Jonathan Korman has defined "the pagan sensibility" as not necessarily needing to include the gods; John Halstead has discussed the four centers of modern Paganism, but has portrayed the deity-centric forms of Paganism as inherently creedal; and here at Patheos' Pagan Portal, Yvonne Aburrow has defined "theology" as "reasoning about the Divine" rather than "reasoning about the gods," which is not remotely the same thing (on which more will be said in a moment). [emphasis added]

I've already noted why I think his qualms with Aburrow's definition of theology are somewhat silly ("biology is the study of life" vs. "biology is the study of lives), but I'll be interested to see what more he has to say on this. As for Korman's and Halstead's posts, I've read both of them, and they are both clearly working towards a definition of Paganism that is inclusive and nuanced, rather than a single, monolithic statement about a community that is inherently diverse and complex. Considering that all evidence suggests that not all Pagans see (hard) polytheism as essential to the community-identity of modern Paganism, I would say that the attempts of these two to come up with a description of the community is more accurate than Lupus's so far. Even Lupus seems to be contradicting himself — didn't he just say polytheism was only one of the "points"? It might have seemed at first that he was saying there are multiple aspects of Paganism that modern Pagans share more or less in common — and that holding to any or several of these aspects might be enough to identify oneself as Pagan. But now it seems pretty obvious that what he's actually saying is that "worship of the gods" is necessary but not sufficient to being Pagan. Most people who call themselves Pagan would disagree with him on this.

He says:

For a long time now, I've been hearing modern Paganism characterized as a "nature religion" or an "earth-based religion." [...] I suspect a huge reason that it is characterized that way—especially to non-Pagans—is because of fear of being thought foolish or "primitive" for recognizing the gods. [emphasis added]

What? No.

Considering the amount of shaming "tree-huggers" and "dirt-worshippers" receive from mainstream society for being foolish, sentimental, overly-romantic, and yes, "primitive" and "anti-progress" and even "anti-human".... I find it hard to believe that Pagans are just lying to everyone about their reverence for nature because it's easier than admitting you're a polytheist. That has certainly never been the case in my experience.

Lupus then recounts an incident when he was at a university in Ireland (attending as a student? he doesn't say), when he requested the use of the campus chapel for an important ritual. The chaplaincy council rejected his request, recommending that he hold the ritual outside because that would be "more appropriate." Lupus points out that not only would this be inappropriate because of the weather of late autumn, but that there were no examples of outdoor rituals in the history of the tradition he was reconstructing, but many examples of indoor temples and ritual spaces. He concludes:

Unfortunately, my preferences and information in this regard were considered irrelevant, because the chaplaincy council knew what was best and most appropriate for "my sort" of people. [original emphasis]

This sounds like a story of obvious prejudice and disrespect, but I'm not sure what it has to do with whether or not Pagans in general should or shouldn't be "earth-centered." I have attended several indoor group rituals hosted by Pagan or Druid groups that were explicitly "earth-centered," either because outdoor space was not available or because weather made outdoor ritual impractical. Lupus seems to be making the argument that because he encountered mainstream ignorance which hindered his religious freedom, that therefore somehow earth-centered Pagans are to blame. He says:

This is one instance in which public perception of modern Pagan identity and religiosity interfered with actual practice. The idea of Pagans as "nature worshippers" fits in perfectly with the Christian conception (and, as in my case, misconception) of ancient polytheists as unsophisticated bumpkins with no place in civilized society, and therefore no business doing their rituals indoors.

Here, he identifies the view of Pagans as "unsophisticated bumpkins with no place in civilized society" as a "misconception" when it's applied to him, but seems to be suggesting that he thinks it's a perfectly reasonable view of others who self-identify as "nature worshippers." Rather than arguing against such a prejudiced view as fundamentally ignorant no matter who it's applied to, he seems primarily upset that it was applied to him when it shouldn't have been.

I should point out that, just as I've attended indoor rituals during cold weather, I have also attended outdoor rituals (usually private or small group rituals) despite the weather being somewhat unpleasant. I also spent five or six hours this past weekend hiking around in near-freezing temperatures. I do not think that my willingness to go outside in various kinds of weather, or my ability to appreciate and celebrate the natural world in all kinds of conditions, makes me an "unsophisticated bumpkin." Nimue recently pointed out in a blog post, in fact, that our ability to go out in bad weather and then come back in and get dry and warm again is a mark of our civilized lifestyle — and I am not particularly inclined to balk at a civilized lifestyle that let's me go out to experience the outdoors in all sorts of conditions without risking life and limb. Huzzah for hiking boots and warm coats.

Moving on...

As Star Foster said many months back, polytheism is one of the few things that modern Paganism can be said to "own" almost exclusively; but, for too many, it seems like the funny old lamp inherited from our great-grandparents that we hide in the basement when the guests come over.

There go the scare quotes again. Maybe talking about Pagans "owning" polytheism makes it seem less ridiculous than actually staking your entire argument on the immature sense of ownership (sans scare quotes). The idea that certain groups can own (or "own") particular philosophical or theological concepts is itself deeply problematic. But instead of talking about that, let's just get snippy and sarcastic in the next paragraph...

Lupus then goes on to argue semantics, but at least he admits it. Turns out, he has nothing more intelligent to say about language usage than before, other than falling into the usual trap of thinking that some foreign term that he read in a book is therefore inherently more complex than a familiar English word:

As I've indicated already, polytheists are not monotheists, but, I would argue, neither are they monists. This is why I no longer use the phrase "the Divine" in talking about modern Paganism or polytheism. This may be more a question of semantics in many people's minds, and if that's the case that's fine. Still, the phrase "the Divine" does not, for me, describe the reality of the gods as I have come to know them, nor does it usefully and accurately translate the element theos in a term like "theology." Ancient Greek used theos as singular and plural (both "god" and "gods"), as masculine and feminine (both "god/s" and "goddess/es"), and as a noun or as an adjective (both "god" and "godly"), so one can choose whatever option fits the purpose when using this term.

For fun, let's look up the etymology of the word "divine":

From Latin divinus "of a god," from divus "a god," related to deus "god, deity" (see Zeus), from Greek, from PIE *dewos- "god" (cf. Latin deus "god," Old Persian daiva- "demon, evil god," Old Church Slavonic deivai, Sanskrit deva-), from root *dyeu- "to gleam, to shine;" also the root of words for "sky" and "day"

Oh noooooosss! It looks like the modern English word "divine" traces back to the ancient Greek! ::headdesk::

Anyway, then Lupus spends some time talking somewhat confusedly about how theos implies a complexity of language that is unique to polytheism, and is not reflected in monotheism or monism. So far as I can understand what he's trying to say, he is simply wrong about this because he is unfamiliar with the many different theological approaches to monotheism. As a great example, he ends this particular ramble by gleefully dangling the tantalizing possibility that polytheism might even be able to conceive of the gods as "verbs" — which means that he must at least be completely unfamiliar with the book God is a Verb, by David Cooper, which explores that very concept in a monotheistic context. ::headdesk again::

He continues:

Pagan or polytheist practice that emphasizes cultus presupposes a definite being with volition and consciousness on the other end of the interaction. (Cultus, for the present purpose, is active and deliberate interaction with divine beings.) Thus, when I hear Pagans being described or self-defining as "nature worshippers," I wonder how interaction can take place at all. "Nature" doesn't care if you make offerings, hold festivals, or sing its praises and dance and feast with your friends. Dancing at Lughnasadh will not avert global warming; singing a hymn won't stop an earthquake; pouring a libation won't prevent it from raining. The best way to "honor" nature is to do things like recycle, not drive, reduce one's carbon footprint, and so forth. [emphasis added]

Again, what?

Lupus "wonders how interaction [with nature] can take place at all" but then ends his paragraph by listing ways that we interact with nature. What's going on here is an obvious (maybe even deliberate?) confusion about the purpose of ritual. Lupus claims that he defines cultus as "active and deliberate interaction with divine beings" who are "definite being[s] with volition and consciousness." But his examples of what he actually considers "cultus" all include rituals in which people exert control over these divine beings — making offerings, singing hymns or dancing in order to exert influence over the gods. Arguably, if this is how he defines the purpose of ritual, then the evidence that he is interacting with "definite beings with volition and consciousness" is just as scanty as those people pouring libations to the earth itself. At least when I pour a libation to a tree, I know that the physical water will actually make a difference to that tree. Burning incense in order to please Zeus, on the other hand?

But the more important point is that not all ritual is propitiatory in nature. In fact, ritual is complex (I really can't believe I have to keep saying this). Sometimes ritual is celebratory, and celebratory ritual is still a way of interacting with the gods, or nature, or even the other people involved in the ritual. Do you take someone out to dinner because you want to get in their pants? Or do you enjoy the act of having dinner with them? And if they don't let you get in their pants, do you conclude that they "don't care" about having dinner with you, or that they might not even be real beings with volition and consciousness?

Lupus's argument here is either a deliberate straw man, or a profound ignorance about the nature and purpose of ritual in different contexts. It may also involve a deeply ingrained prejudice against seeing things other than humans as alive, conscious or possessing self-determination. It's taken scientists a while, but at least now, finally, it is an agreed-upon scientific fact that other animals most definitely are "beings with volition and consciousness." Ecologists acknowledge that even inanimate things (like rock formations, river systems, or chemical compounds) can participate in what are self-organizing, self-sustaining living systems. If it's not too big a leap of faith to believe that Zeus gives a shit about whether or not you burn incense, it shouldn't be so big a leap to believe that self-organizing, self-sustaining living systems in the natural world (of which we are a part) do have some stake in how we interact with them, both through ritual and through everyday life.

Lupus ends his post by repeating many of his previous points, and likewise repeating many of his earlier inaccurate assumptions and logical missteps, so there's not much point in going on with this step-by-step analysis. His main concern seems to be that "nature worship" in the modern sense is, well, modern, and should therefore be avoided because (to paraphrase) "our ancestors didn't do it." It's unclear if he actually thinks anyone really worships nature at all, since throughout his piece he accuses self-identifying "nature worshippers" as calling themselves that merely to hide the fact that they're polytheists. (This sounds to me a lot like monotheists who want to insist that self-describing polytheists are "really just confused monotheists.") His straw men are ridiculous enough that it wouldn't surprise me if he has trouble finding anyone who would agree with his characterization of nature worship. His last paragraph is pretty heavy-handed with "should"-loaded language, while lamenting that so few of our Pagan leaders and luminaries have seen the light and agree with him about the need to emphasize polytheism.

In general, it's mostly an oddly whiney and misinformed piece — at once trying to claim the authority to speak for the majority while complaining that the majority is too ignorant or foolish to agree with him. Safe to say, this is not a very good rhetorical approach to use in trying to win people over. But it might be very effective in preaching to the trollish choir.

PAGANS..... IN..... SPACE...

Someone on G+ this morning shared a link to this post on "Bringing Back the Gods," with the comment that if Pagans are "nature worshippers" that see the gods merely as extensions of natural forces, then when humans begin to travel extensively in space we'll have to leave our gods behind.

(a) I had no idea that there weren't any natural forces in space! I guess the astrophysicists are all going to have to get new jobs. ::headdesk::

(b) Contrary to what this commenter and another (who responded to him in agreement) seem to suggest, "culture" is not necessarily any more portable than "nature." Culture is not a purely human phenomenon but arises from our relationship with place, and it is to a certain extent inseparable from our sense of place. When our place in the world or the universe changes, our culture changes and adapts accordingly. Whether we want to admit it or not, traveling in space extensively is going to fundamentally change how we live as human beings and what our relationship with the universe is; it should be no surprise, then, that this would have an effect on our relationship with the gods. We may even feel a sense of exile or diaspora that far surpasses any experience of an immigrant who has moved from the homeland of their ancestors to a new country or continent.... And understanding the gods as aspects of nature (or at least as having natural aspects) may help us articulate and grapple with that reality far more than a simple insistence that if we can bring our portable cultural trappings with us, then everything must be the same.

This idea needs more unpacking. I'll have the chance to do that later this month, since we're doing an FF&C episode on "nature-centered spirituality in space," thanks to an awesome prompt from Finn:

Space! That is, can earth-centered spirituality transform into cosmos-centered spirituality? Also, what new myths will emerge now that we're even closer to finding similar Earth-like planets (I mean, think of all the stories we've told that take place in space since we landed on the moon)? And if you want more weird news, there's always crazy stuff happening in astrophysics and cosmology.

These are all really good questions, that deserve more thoughtful answers than "nature is, like, rain and shit, and humans are entirely separate and separable from it, right?"

Notes for following up:

• Several directions we could take this, some of which would require simply too much prep for an hour-long episode, but could provide some good jumping off places...
• Begin the discussion by looking at the effects on religion and culture more broadly of diasporic and nomadic communities here on this planet.
• What do we know of the effects on religion/culture of places that were largely insular until brought into contact with the rest of the world? (I'm thinking probably mostly of isolated tribal groups, but also Japan could be an example of this...)
• Look at the spirituality of the desert — what impact will the vast apparent emptiness of space have on the human psyche and our perception of the gods? Our relationship with "nothingness" and "emptiness" are themselves relationships with aspects of nature.

A few years ago, I got Jeff that book on "desert spirituality" because the desert has always been such a powerful place for him, so maybe I can get him to revisit that. Meanwhile, I might be able to look into the topic of diasporic/nomadic cultures a bit more. I've already started collecting resources on "religion in science fiction," since many sci-fi stories (whether books, TV or film) involve religious aspects, some of them even polytheistic. So looking at that subject might also help us think about how religion might be "out there," or at least think about how we think about it.

Mini-Subpost on Collective Nouns

I haven't read the P. Sufenas Virius Lupus post the G+er linked to, but I did skim the first page or so fairly quickly and it seems to be brimming with some weird oversimplifications (including the conclusion that those of us who are "nature-centered" Pagans are just trying to hide our polytheism because we're embarrassed by it.... wtf?). But one bit I did notice was his complaint about someone referring to theology as "reasoning about the Divine" instead of "reasoning about the gods."

I use terms like Divine and Spirit and Numinous, sometimes capitalized and sometimes not, often enough that I feel like I can at least address this issue. (Jeff probably has more expertise on this than I do, but these are my thoughts.)

It's perfectly possible to use a singular collective noun to refer to a collection of individuals.

See, for example:

"I love chickens."
vs.
"I love chicken."
vs.
"Scientists believe the chicken evolved from dinosaurs, coming before the egg."


Let's be clear here: The reasoning that "Christians have stolen everything but our polytheism; polytheism is now the only thing that makes us different, and therefore it defines us" is not a good reason to be a polytheist. There are lots of good reasons to be a polytheist (especially if you don't feel the need to let everyone know how "hard" your polytheism is — that's becoming as distasteful to me as the guy who's always going around asking people to feel how ripped his abs are — ew, no thanks). But I digress.

There are lots of good reasons to be polytheist. But that isn't one of them. That is a crappy, immature reason.

Salmon Stewardship and Thoughts on Spiritual Practice

Today was our final day of Salmon Stewarding, and our last official program for the Seattle Volunteer Naturalists for this year.

Carkeek was gray, misty and quiet today. Here and there, some carcasses are still rotting along the streambanks. Very few people were out in the park, except for some neighborhood dog-walkers and a few families with very small children earlier in the morning before lunch. Jeff and I spent a good hour or so in the wetlands in the rain, where even the crows were hushed. A male mallard perched on a branch that was half-sunk in water, his head hunched down as he tried to nap in the midst of the rain. In the creek, just above the weir right before the train tracks, a crow was pulling apart the flesh of a salmon carcass, gulping down the strips. All was very peaceful and relaxed, and even the smell of the fish was subdued, lost in the wafting scents of western red-cedar along the stream.

I am so glad we decided to volunteer. It's been a challenge to keep up with all of our required programs this year on top of the training, especially with the uncertainty of our schedules this first year in Seattle, but it was well worth it to have a commitment that forced us to show up and put the time in. I'm looking forward to the spring, when hopefully we'll have a chance to do some volunteer work with the salmon fry in the imprint pond before they're released, and signing up for stations as SVNs as well.

I have been working on incorporating more local naturalist knowledge into my spiritual practice, and I'd like to expand on that area. My column for Aontacht Magazine this coming issue is on building a relationship with keystone species in your local bioregion, and though I definitely have a working relationship with the salmon now and, arguably, the western red-cedar, I'd like to explore these (and a few others) beyond the ecological/natural history aspect and delve more into the "spiritual" side through meditation and ritual work.

I'm realizing that a great deal of my spiritual practice tends to center on direct, embodied encounters with nature -- and so the work with the salmon, for instance, has been really fulfilling for me. Sitting in my room with my eyes closed trying to imagine these sacred encounters is not something I've ever been very good at, even before I became a Pagan. Which is maybe why there's something to be said for rituals that bring you out into the natural world and expose you to the elements (quite literally). All of my most moving memories of Pagan spiritual practice have involved direct encounters of this kind -- especially those performed in bad weather, when I showed up despite rain or snow to kneel in the dirt and place my hands against the earth and light a candle in the darkness. I think maybe that's why my relationship with Artemis has been so strong these last few months. I can feel her presence when I'm out in the woods, with very little effort on my part to visualize and imagine and pray to evoke her presence on my own. I saw that Carl had shared a quote on Twitter today, something along the lines of, "Contemplative prayer is not something you achieve, it is a gift that you receive, given to you in silence, and you need only learn how to accept it." I think for me, this was why I struggled in my relationship with Brigid for a while, because my work with her was always so effortful, something I was working and striving at. It's just not my habit to pray to gods in order to remind myself they're around -- I'm much better at remembering to simply accept the gift of their presence when they make themselves known in my life.

Still, there's something to be said for effortful work, and that's the thing about ritual in bad weather and the commitment to show up to the work. Personally, I tend to think this has very little to do with competence, as Phaedra and others seem to emphasize. I'm not sure I could be much more competent at lighting candles or repeating simple prayers, and the more complicated the ritual (the more demanding of skill and practice an act is because of its many difficult parts), the more I find it to be a distraction rather than an aid in helping me make that connection. Instead, for me, showing up and doing the work has much more to do with commitment -- devotion or loyalty in a sense -- and creating through that commitment the opportunity for grace. That sounds very Christian, maybe, but by grace I just mean blessed synchronicity, the way sacred presence slips into a moment and draws your attention to a larger circle of life that you're a part of. I find it hard to imagine that this has much to do at all with how well I light candles or repeat memorized prayers, and almost everything to do with whether or not I just show up. For me, at least, it seems like putting too great an emphasis on competence becomes an excuse -- once I am meditating competently, it's easy to excuse a missed day or justify why there are so many other things in my life that require attention and practice, so many other skills I need to work at cultivating. Not to downplay the challenge of leading and performing moving and meaningful group rituals, but when it comes to my personal practice, I'd have to be pretty drunk or otherwise incapacitated not to be able to do it competently. It's just not that kind of practice.

But days like today remind me that it's not about how well I do something, but how open I am to what I can experience and learn. It was deeply satisfying and soul-nourishing to be in the woods and the wetlands today, spending time in the silence listening to the sound of rain falling through the mist. I've spent almost a year now studying the ecology of the Pacific Northwest and learning how to effectively engage others and teach them about natural history. But I've also learned that there's a reason we teach out in nature, out among the trees -- because no amount of knowledge or skill on my part will ever be able to recreate the experience of being present to the natural world. No books or lectures of slideshows can evoke that power. So as a naturalist guide and interpreter, my job is to be an excuse for people to slow down and listen and open themselves up to the presence that is already there anyway. Today, Jeff and I stopped and watched the ducks... perfectly ordinary, common ducks that you might see anywhere in the country. What made the experience meaningful and special for us was now our knowledge or skill as naturalists, but our willingness to slow down and listen. We are naturalists because we value this presence of the sacred in nature... not the other way around.

Happy Ali Is Happy

I have nothing of deep spiritual insight to add at the moment, but I did want to follow up with a post noting that, for the most part, I am exceedingly happy with my life right now. Like, not just "I realize intellectually that I should be happy because things are going well, but mostly I feel tired" kind of happy. Actually happy, the solid kind of happiness that can become a foundation, the kind of happiness that you can build on.

Partly I think this is due to my writing. NaNoWriMo has given me a legitimate excuse to spends hours every day writing creatively, something I haven't done in a very long time. I find that the energy it gives me spills over into my other work — on the podcast, on the blog — and so that work is also becoming easier, getting more "flow" to it.

Another part of this is that, because I start every writing session with a tarot reading and ten minute meditation, I have somehow tricked myself into re-establishing a daily practice. Because the meditation is not all that long, I have far fewer excuses for not doing it; and because it's main purpose is to quiet my mind in order to help me transition into "creative writing mode," I don't concern myself with making progress or accomplishing anything by it as a result. This is, of course, the best way to approach a daily meditative practice — at least, so I've heard over and over — releasing attachments to outcome and providing yourself with a pause in which to embrace silence as a path to the divine. But I am such a perfectionistic workaholic that I have always bent my whole intensely-wound will on being really awesome at non-attachment... which, obviously, somewhat defeats the purpose. (Gods, please do not let me jinx this practice by writing about it here and making myself aware of the trick I've played on my perfectionism!)

Likewise, the tarot reading is not a reading for myself, but for the next scene that I'm working on in the book. So I avoid the kind of spiraling navel-gazing self-obsession that my attempts at daily tarot reading has led me to in the past. In other words, I'm practicing non-attachment with my divination as well, and the only records of my readings are (instead of an obsessively kept journal) the creative writing that results, which is shaped not just by the divination but by the plot outline I'm working from and the characters who want to have their own say. (There is one character in particular who dominates every scene she's in and just will not shut up and let others talk... I will have to find something to do with her. Jeff suggests giving her a yappy dog to keep her busy and distracted.)

I am so deeply proud of the work we're doing with the podcast, engaging in topics that really interest me and giving me lots of opportunities to explore new ideas. I feel somewhat liberated from the pressures that blogging had brought with it, which means that when I do blog (on my own personal website), I enjoy it more.

Also, it's beautiful here. The weather is finally getting chilly, but it continues to be sunny on and off most days, and the same flock of pigeons hangs out on the roof of the condo across the street, and the same crow surfs the power line above the smoke tree, and I am finally (weirdly enough) feeling at home here. I am not sure when this started to happen, but I noticed it when the kids came to visit us in October — I finally feel grounded and centered in this place, I finally feel like I'm starting to understand the patterns and moods of the landscape here. I still spend far too much time inside during the week, between the writing and the podcast research and editing, but weekends are wonderful chances to go out exploring, and Jeff and I are still volunteering as naturalists, which is another of the reasons I feel grounded and connected and happy.

I feel too often this blog becomes a place for me to rant about the things that bother me when they're bothering me, and it can seem like they dominate my days when really they are passing concerns. I feel deeply happy and fulfilled in my life right now. Oddly enough, I am exactly where I wanted and hoped to be by this time in my life (child-free by choice, with an awesome man who loves me and just got an adorable new haircut, living in a beautiful city that doesn't dry my skin till it bleeds in the winter, doing creative work that I love and find meaningful...). I am so full of gratitude and amazement that this is my life. Sometimes I wonder if my minor freak-outs are largely due to the fact that, damn it, I want everyone to have such an awesome and fulfilling life and so many times it seems like instead people are engaged in senseless self-sabotage. Non-attachment, Alison, non-attachment. Lift them up into the light and let them work their own way out, since that is really the only way it works anyway.

My remaining goal is to finish this book manuscript by the winter solstice. Perhaps an arbitrary date, but it's a pretty big astronomical alignment that kind of nicely wraps up my Saturn Return years. It would be nice to go in to the dawning of a new year and its lengthening days knowing that a major life goal of mine (to write a novel) has been crossed off the list.

I guess that means I better get started, then...

**

Edited to add: Duh! Then there's my relationship with the gods, specifically Artemis (yeah, that's right, I said it!) and Brigid (yeah, that's right, I'm not so deity-dumped as I thought). Turns out that when Brigid suggested we see other people, she meant some sort of kinky holy threesome, and I feel a roundness and wildness to my relationships with deity now that astounds me and fills me with energy, inspiration and gratitude. So... rock on!

Naturalist Journal for the Pacific Northwest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Naturalist Journal for the Pacific Northwest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Diary - Naturalist Journal and Health

Tomorrow Jeff and I officially begin our work as volunteer naturalists with the Seattle Parks, attending a potluck welcoming party and introduction to the program. This Saturday is our first actual training class, and I'm hoping to be able to attend both the Saturday and the Thursday modules, both because I'm interested in getting as much out of this as I can and because I'd like to have the flexibility to teach both weekday school programs and the general public programs held on weekends. Plus, more time outside in the park - nothing wrong with that.

I've been keeping up with my naturalist journal that I started about a week and a half ago, sitting down to do some drawing and research every few days. It's been amazing how good drawing feels - quieting down to work, being able to focus and concentrate on just the details in front of me, and in the end somehow ending up with something that looks half-way decent. Unlike much of my writing these days, which just feels like a slog through a jungle of noisy details and half-formed ideas, sketching is refreshing and satisfying, helping me to focus without overwhelming me. Perhaps I've just burned myself out with writing recently, putting too much pressure on myself, and so I need some nonverbal form of creativity and self-expression to loosen things up again.

It's also been a fantastic way to learn more about the animals and plants in the area. I'm not doing all that intense research, but I have been slowly gathering sources on specific species and such. Reading the two books on naturalist journaling that I got was a huge help in giving me some direction on how to focus and what to note while out in the field - and there's something satisfying with being able to carefully observe a creature that you're unfamiliar with, and then come home and look them up in a field guide and be able to identify them and learn something more about them. I especially like the "thought experiments" recommended in the book I just finished (Tomlinson's How to Keep a Naturalist's Notebook), asking questions about what the evidence can tell you about a certain animal and its habits, for instance. (The example she uses is the fox scat she finds, which leads her to question what direction it was facing when it relieved itself, what was it looking at, why did it choose that particular spot, were there other foxes around, etc. All from a few scat droppings and never even seeing the fox itself.) I do sometimes feel overwhelmed by the idea of asking questions I don't have answers to, or not even knowing what questions to ask. For instance, I'd like to ask myself where the chickadees who frequent the trees in our front yard actually make their nests, or where the hummingbird who sometimes perches on top of the tree goes once he's done with the neighbor's feeder. But I don't even know where I'd start to find the answers to those questions or how I could track down those places even if I could find out. I'm sure there are other things I could ask - like how the males attract the females, and when the mating season starts and when nest building occurs and how could I go about locating a nest, etc. - but the number of things I don't know seems somewhat overwhelming.

I'm just getting my feet wet in this and I have a feeling a lot of my learning will involve doing the research first and then setting myself tasks, like a scavenger hunt, to seek out certain things I've read about. And of course, the volunteer naturalist training will help a lot, too. I'm very excited about taking notes and then hopefully following up on what I've learned over the course of the following week. Nervous, of course, as I always am before something like this - but also eager. Sometimes I think I really do love learning much more than I enjoy putting that learning to any kind of practical use. For me, the exploration and discovery is the real treat, the same way that learning the little details about the person you're falling in love with is a pleasure in itself and not just a means to getting into their pants or something so crude. There is joy in growing into that kind of intimacy, and that's what I'm hoping to cultivate with this work - an intimacy with the land and landscape that has become my new home.

~

I'm also feeling motivated to exercise more. I've put on three more pounds since Christmas, so that I'm pretty much the heaviest I've ever been in my life. Even that isn't so overweight, but it's still more than I'd like and I'm sure it affects my energy levels and such. I think the primary cause is simply stress, and the fact that I've allowed that stress to lead me into some rather bad habits (like dessert after dinner every night). But I want to live a long and healthy life, so nipping those bad habits in the bud right now is a fairly high priority.

It's also a point of pride, I suppose. My mother always used having kids as an excuse for her weight gain, and while I can understand that I also think it was more of an excuse than it needed to be. There are healthy ways to cope with stress, and there are unhealthy ways. And since I have chosen to be child-free by choice, even if I am a stepmother, I have to admit that I do somewhat resent putting on stress-related weight because of all this bullshit nonsense of dealing - not with the kids, but with Emily and her insanity. I'm not sure how I managed to get so far down the rabbit hole of guilt and expectation even while fighting all along against her warped belief that a woman's job is to be a mother and failure at that - or rejection of that - was a failure to be fully mature and responsible. I have to admit, I hold a lot of resentment towards that woman, not only for how she treats me (which is piss poor on the best of days, and she never had been able to bring herself to treat me as an adult), but especially for how she treats Jeff. I could strangle her for that - even now, I find myself getting angry simply thinking about it. But we've let the lawyers know we will no longer be working with them, since they misled us and overcharged us so completely, and now it's going to be on Emily's dime to file for a custody adjustment, and we can be the ones who sit back and say "no" while insisting we want to be amiable and fair. See how she likes it. And since the current custody arrangement states that Jeff has 50/50 joint physical and legal custody and that all he needs is a verbal agreement from Emily to change the specifics of times, etc. - a verbal agreement which he got from her, in front of five other witnesses - it doesn't matter how long she takes to file for a custody adjustment, he can show up and get the kids any time he wants until that point. So we're finally in a position where we're holding the cards and she won't be able to force us to spend any more money or make us miserable. She hasn't has the guts to actually enforce the incredibly limited schedule that she proposed for Jeff talking to the kids on Skype (though she insists he can only talk to them until 2:30 PM PST/5:30 PM EST because that's when they have to have dinner, she's never once ever actually had dinner ready on time, so he's been able to talk to them for longer). Since they've set up a regular schedule, she also doesn't have any excuse for "accidentally" scheduling things during that time and so cutting into Jeff's time to talk with them - if she does, everyone will know that it's her incompetence and not Jeff's neglectfulness that is fucking things up.

But I'm tired of writing about this and feeling stressed and angry about it. Obviously, my health and weight issues are deeply tied up with my anxiety and stress about the kids. I've been carrying around a sense of responsibility and thus guilt for a long time, even though really I have very little control over the situation and probably shouldn't be shouldering as much as I have. I'm finally feeling a free - or at least freer - to release some of that and give up this notion that I have to compensate for Emily's warped vision so that I make sure the kids still like me. If they can like Emily, they can like me - she's pretty awful, after all. And even if they don't.... well, maybe that's just how it has to be. But I was just hearing again recently about the study they did on the number of friends any one person can actually keep track of, and how those communities tend to be pretty small, around 150 people. I've spent too much time over the last couple years worrying about trying to please people that I don't particularly like or respect - whether they're ex-wives or editors and bloggers online - and it's a waste of my 150 people to put so much effort into that. I should fill my 150 quota with people who support and love me and help me to be a better person. People who drag me down and stress me out and make me feel unworthy - why spend time worrying about them?

Maybe it would be a good exercise to go through and list the people in my life I appreciate for their support and caring and inspiration, and consciously try to cultivate a "community" of friends and colleagues who affirm me in my work. Something to keep in mind, maybe.

~

I'm about done with journaling for now. It's a beautiful, sunny morning and it's supposed to get up near 50º F later this afternoon (and even warmer tomorrow), so I think I'll go for a walk a bit later. For now, sitting in front of the computer screen is giving me a bit of a headache (and hurting my wrists trying to type at the desk). That might be another reason why writing has been difficult for me lately - trying to find a comfortable way to do it. The physical discomfort of being stuck in front of a tiny screen at an uncomfortable desk can definitely wear on a person. (This is just me wanting an excuse to get a nice new desktop, I know.) It's interesting that sketching and drawing can leave me feeling so refreshed - I do wonder if it's not partly because I'm not squinting at a computer screen the whole time in order to do it. Going back to taking notes and drafting my writing pieces in an actual, physical notebook might help with this writer's block, if part of it is due to physical discomfort. We'll see, anyway.

~

This morning, after yoga, I did some meditation - a Three Realms working to connect to land, sea and sky. I prayed to Brighid and Manannan, who now appear fairly often as a pair of columns - one of fire on my right, and one of water on my left. The sense of their presence was powerful and uplifting. I feel such gratitude and joy for the presence of my gods in my life. One thing I really want to do - maybe even this morning! - is set up an altar for them somewhere. Although we're mostly unpacked, I've been putting off unpacking the box(es) of small decorative and ritual items, hoping that we'll first get the curtains up in the various rooms. But the curtains are turning out to be a pain in the ass and we haven't gotten them up yet, so the apartment is still lacking most of those personal touches and sacred items that are usually placed and arranged carefully throughout the space. I want to get to that soon, though.

I also want to spend some time outdoors meditating and connecting more directly to the land. But despite what we were promised, it's been rather ridiculously cold (okay, hovering around freezing, which compared to Pittsburgh's usual 10 - 20 º weather this time of year isn't so bad) and not conducive to spending much time outdoors. I'm still trying to do some walking and occasionally jogging, though. And hopefully the weather will be warming up soon. It's certainly been sunnier this week than the last several, anyway. Though I do also enjoy the rain (much more than snow, anyway).

Naturalist Journal for the Pacific Northwest

I've started a naturalist journal as a way of exploring and connecting more deeply to the Seattle area and the ecosystem(s) of the Pacific Northwest. I'm hoping it'll also come in handy as a way of taking notes and studying as part of my training as a volunteer/amateur naturalist for the Seattle Parks services.

In addition to my physical journal, I'm planning to use Pinterest as a kind of digital naturalist journal where I can share not only my own field notes, sketches and photography, but also images and notes that I find from online resources as supplemental material. The board that I'll be using is here (for now, I may reorganize later).

I'm drawing initially on three main books about how to go about keeping a nature journal and doing drawings and sketches outdoors in the field.

Source: amazon.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: amazon.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: amazon.com via Alison on Pinterest

And here are a few samples from the first few pages of my journal:

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Alison on Pinterest

I'll be sharing more here somewhat regularly, hopefully.

Diary - Druidry and Environmentalism

Days of Note: New Field Poppy Moon

Sun: cancer (cardinal water), 5:53 AM - 8:54 PM
Moon: new moon, cancer (cardinal water), VoC
Earth: gorgeous, sunny, not to hot, clear and bright day, gentle breeze, couldn't be more perfect, really

Below is a response I posted to a thread about Druidry and Environmentalism on the TC Neo-Druidry SIG.

Druidry seems to have the reputation of being a "green" religion, taking a special interest in the natural world and our place in it. From ancient harvests of mistletoe from oak trees to modern celebrations of the solstice at Stonehenge, nature often plays a special role in how Druids see the world today.

Does environmentalism play a role in your Druidic path? How do you relate to nature, to both the environment around you and greater planetary concerns? Would you agree or disagree with the perception that Druidry is a "green" religion? Has increased nature awareness/environmentalism inspired you to make certain changes in your life (in your diet, recycling, spontaneous tree hugging, etc)?

Love this and the community service thread! Thanks for starting them. :)

I think you're right on the mark about Druidry's relationship to environmentalism. The Druid Revival began, along with the Romantic Period of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, at least in part in response to the Industrial Revolution and its dehumanizing, world-devouring influences. The Romantics (artists, poets, intellectuals, philosophers, etc.) were responding to the kind of Cartesian dualism that split the mind/spirit from the physical body and the material world. Valuing the aesthetic and spiritual qualities of the natural world was a big part of how they countered this dualism and sought to overcome it. I think these days folks have a tendency to dismiss Revival Druidry as "romanticism" (lower-case) as though to suggest that it's naively idealistic or inaccurate. There are some inaccuracies in it, of course, but Romanticism (upper-case) was a hugely important philosophical movement in the evolution of Western civilization, and modern day environmentalism and conservation (not to mention ecosophy and deep ecology, and even the scientific study of ecosystems to some extent) owe their existence to ideas first explored by the Romantics. If you really wanted to get technical, you could probably argue that any person today who uses the name "Druid" owes at least some thanks to the Romantics for their part in the revival of that spiritual archetype.

But it's not just Druidry's connection with the Romantics that suggests it has some "green" tendencies. From my understanding of ancient Celtic culture, the Celts tended to be much more concerned with the earth and (what we would call) "nature spirits" than some of the other ancient religious traditions of the time. In fact, that was one of the arguments the Romans used in support of their belief that the Celts were mere uncivilized barbarians - that they held their rituals outside among the trees in sacred groves and seemed to worship nature, instead of worshipping "proper" gods in elaborate temples full of refined sculptures. A deep connection with and respect for the natural world runs deeply through Celtic spirituality in general - and actually, it seems to me that the Wiccan focus on the natural world might actually stem from its early relationship (via Gerald Gardner and Ross Nichols) to Revival Druidry and Celtic spirituality. I think it's kind of a shame that some Reconstructionists I've met and talked to these days try to distance themselves from Wicca by dropping this nature-focus and focusing instead on polytheism as of primary importance. (That was actually a discussion we had on another thread, so I don't want to rehash it here! ;))

Personally, the focus on the natural world and environmentalism is so central to my understanding of Druidry, it's fair to say that it's the primary (if not entire) reason I became a Pagan to begin with. I had struggled all my life with the ambivalent role that nature and the earth played in Christianity, looking to saints like Francis of Assisi to try to ease my discomfort with how often world-denying the Christian tradition could be. In the end, though, it just wasn't enough - and when I discovered Druidry, it came as such a relief that here was a religious path where my love of the earth could take a central role. My relationship with the natural world and its wildernesses had always been my main way of connecting with the sacred, and here was a community where that was not only tolerated, but supported and encouraged! Fantastic! :)

My environmentalism has remained a central aspect of my Druidry ever since. My partner and I live very frugally and simply, to lessen our impact on the earth in every way we can. We do all the small stuff - washing our clothes in cold water, refusing to use the car unless absolutely necessary, walking or biking most places, eating a vegetarian diet of mostly local, organic foods, reducing our plastic use to almost nothing, composting in the backyard, etc. We also participate in local environmental activism when we can, and we try to get away into the woods of the local state park to camp at least every few months during reasonable weather. We also both write regularly to advocate for environmental awareness (I'm the blog project coordinator for No Unsacred Place). And since we're getting married in two and a half months, we've spent the past year planning a "green" wedding and we're going for Platinum Certification for our wedding through the Live Green Live Smart Institute.

But maybe one of the most important ways that we blend our environmentalism with our spirituality is by actually trying to cultivate and nurture our relationship with the local landscape. I've been studying deep ecology and eco-philosophy for the past year or so, and slowly been learning more and more about our bioregion and its needs and moods. My spiritual practice challenges me to move away from an anthropocentric worldview and learn to see the world and all its beings as part of a "ecology of Spirit," all interconnected and valuable in their own right.

Wow! I didn't mean for this to get so long! But it's such a great topic, and a really important one, too. :) Thanks again for starting the thread!

DOTR Lesson 3: Awen and Creative Work

The Killing Blow

Call me the name of peace
as though it were a curse,
and I will bless you, saying,
Yes, and I will lift up
the white flower of cowardice
and trembling, I will lift up that blossom
the color of snow and ocean foam
and moonlight, cloud and empty wind
and bone. I will lift it up with these hands
worn and worried with bickering,
limp with the luxury of blood,
the hands I inherited from my ancestors
whose bones, too, are white beneath the mud.
The goddess of war climbs the mountain's peak,
the hard, pale sunlight like the whites of her eyes.
Wonder, too, is a kind of power.
What curse she lays on the wearied earth, saying,
Yes, and Peace, and other fearful things.
The hills grow soft, will not be rushed
as last year's dead lift up
the small, white blossoms of the spring.

Diary

Days of Note: first robin of spring

Sun: aquarius (air/fixed), 7:22am - 5:47pm
Moon: waxing crescent, aries (fire/cardinal)
Earth: snow overnight, layering a few inches this morning and still coming down in large, lazy flakes

This morning as I was getting dressed, I glanced out the bedroom window to spot the first robin of the still-so-new season of spring — in fact, a whole flock of them! Flitting and gliding between the neighbor's low bushes across the street, and the bare branches of the sycamore tree just downhill of our driveway. I counted at least fifteen of them, feathers ruffled and puffed out fat and fluffy against the cold, the unmistakably familiar red breast and dark wings. In among them was a single, brilliant red cardinal. I watched them for a good five minutes, dancing and weaving through the falling snow, dark creatures swinging through a dim white-and-gray landscape.

I could hardly contain my excitement about them. Playing through my mind again was the admonition of Brigid, from the Sassafras Grove Imbolc ritual three nights ago when the priestess drew the omen after our offerings had been made: "Spring comes through nature. Go out into nature to observe the real signs of spring coming." I took this to heart, as it echoed the advice I've been sensing from her for a while. The need to get back out there, ground in the woods and fields unrolling beneath the sky. I've allowed the winter's cold to intimidate me and keep me huddled in my home, feeling frustrated with the restless energy of cabin fever. The priestess interpreted the omen to be a gentle warning: do not sit in your warm, cozy homes and simply visualize spring coming — go out into the woods, go out to walk upon the earth, and see what is truly around us.

I can't help but think that this is also a plea for our attention and attending. That there are whole flocks of robins here and yet it seems so early.... It's been a long, unusually cold winter, yet already the robins are here. Part of me worries about the health of our planet, the extremes in season that seem to be increasing with every year. I think Brigid is not only asking us to attend to nature for our own good, but because the earth desperately needs us to be paying attention, to be listening for the signs of the dancing, turning seasons so that we can better recognize when that dance is out of balance or disrupted too drastically. In past years, sometimes I've felt spring hardly lasted — only a few weeks of mild, muddy weather before the heat of summer began to creep back in around the edges. Will that pattern repeat itself this year? I cannot know if I am not attending to the signs in the natural world around me, if I am too busy inside in front of a computer screen to notice the real world outside.

Still, a flock of robins is a blessing, and they were so beautiful! Spring cannot be so far away, when I can remember the fields bespeckled with dozens and dozens of robins hopping over muddy ground seeking out worms and bugs in the newly green grass. Just a little longer....

(I do intend to write about the Sassafras Grove Imbolc ritual. As soon as I have the chance!)