Writers Block

So as this year is drawing to a close I seem to have an extreme case of writers block (actually it would be more like blogger's block wouldn't it) but I digress... As I mentioned earlier this week we have had an illness in my family, well its bad, palliative illness actually. We have been at the hospital every day for two weeks with her, my mother in law. It has been very hard on all of us, but especially my husband, who in addition to seeing his mother deteriorate, has been taking on the burden of being the contact person between the hospital and the family. I have been trying hard to support him, but fear I may be falling short.

I really have no excuse to be falling short in this case, my mother passed away years ago and I know how hard it is to loose your mom. There are no other words for it, it sucks. I am not the one having to make all the phone calls to the various family members. I am not the one who has to get all the final instructions from her, nor am I the one who has to talk to the doctors and nurses regarding her condition. I have the easier side of this, I am with him as much as I can be, holding his hand, hugging him, and telling him that I love him and am at his side, whatever he needs.

So again, no excuse. But I find my emotions have been fluctuating lately. I am finding myself with an overwhelming sense of sorrow at this. I get along well with her, she is a very nice, down to earth woman. I know it must have been hard on her to hear her son was getting divorced, and then shortly afterwards that he was dating a woman younger than he was. She did not have to welcome me into the home or the family, but she did. She treated me like one of the brood right from day one. At a time when I was feeling very insecure about my place in this family she made me one of them and put my fears aside within minutes of the first family get together I attended.

I find myself feeling resentful, resentful that this is happening to her, and not to some other individual I know who has been much less kind and compassionate to me and my loved ones. I resent that my husband has to shoulder such an enormous burden, and that it hurts him so. That resentment ties heavily into my anger, anger at the doctors for not being able to cure her illness, anger at her genetics since this disease has taken many other family members. I am angry at her body for betraying her (its funny how one can not be angry at the person, but can be very angry at their physical form. I am not angry at her as I know this is not what she wanted, but I am angry at her body for allowing this disease to happen). I am angry at myself for all this anger.

Nobody can help what has happened, and nothing I can do or say will change it. I have prayed much in the past few months since we found out she was ill, asking for it to go away, asking for the cure to be found, but I cannot pray this away. I am at a point, as we all are, that I have to accept this course, and I do not like it. I just want to yell and to scream, punch somebody in the face (although who I do not know). I want to shake the doctors over and over again and yell at them that its not fair. Although it would do me no good, for they are as saddened by this as I am.

The doctors and nurses have all been angels of compassion from day one. They took the time to get to know my mother in law, what she wanted as treatment options, what she needed. They have been there every step of the way, holding her hand, explaining things in a manner that somebody as simple as I am can understand. They have been fighting this illness with her from day one for over 20 years with her. And when we had to admit her to the hospital, they took every step that they could, did everything that was within their power to help her. Even now, while I sit warm in bed there are nurses checking in with her, making sure she is not in pain, holding her hand when she needs it.

Throughout the past few weeks I have had lots of thoughts going through my mind, lots of things I have been mulling over. I have been thinking a lot about my views on death and dying these past few weeks. And about how scared I am for my husband, his father passed on two and a half years ago from this illness, now it is waiting to claim his mother. I am feeling sorry for myself, thinking about how much I will miss her, and feeling sad that my husband has such pain and sorrow on his hands.  Between that and feeling stressed I have not been the most pleasant person to be around, and my poor husband, who already has the weight of the world on his shoulders, has had to put up with a moody me. At a time when he needs me to be there for him, I am afraid I am falling short.

So with all that going on, I am afraid I have hit a case of bloggers block. The ideas I have jotted down on notebooks and on half typed on this blog have been left sitting there, I just cannot seem to get them finished at this time. For now my attention is focused on being the person my husband needs at his side, and supporting the family to the very best of my abilities.

Wishing you all a Blessed Holiday Season and a Happy New Year.

Yours Humbly

The Redneck Pagan

 

An Apology

 Just to give a small update: I apologize for the lack of recent posts. We have had an illness in the family and my time has been redirected to caring for my family. I am chipping away at a few ideas and hope to have something soon.

Thank you.

Yours Humbly

The Redneck Pagan

Welcoming the Winter… Begrudgingly.

Well it is very much official that winter is here in Alberta! The season has been making itself known for a while here. We were blessed with a long and lazy summer. Even by mid September we had bright sunny days, and the leaves had barely shifted colour. Some had started the process by early October, when over the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend we had some snow flurries and a few chilly days. Things warmed up again for a while, then the week before Samhain we got hit with snow, freezing  rains here and there, a full week of ice fog and freezing cold nights. Then on Samhain itself it snowed, and it really snowed, at my house I had at least two inches to shovel through. My newly purchased winter tires (with many thanks and love to my husband who made sure I had them) got a real workout the same day they were put on my car!

It felt like we did not have a fall at all. The leaves on my Rowan and apple trees have now turned brown and are being blown off when the wind decides to give us a good blast, but they never really turned. I had not had the chance to get the fallen crabapples up off the ground from where they fell, my garden was nowhere near ready for this sudden dump of snow, and I have to be honest, neither was I! Being sick with a nasty cold this past week I have been keeping myself thoroughly buried under the blankets and trying my best to do that “lalalala, if I can’t see you, then you don’t exist” routine. I also was rather miserable at having only a week or two of my favorite season (Autumn) to enjoy. However, no matter how hard I tried, winter is not going to go away for a while (especially here in Central Alberta).

A few days ago we were blessed with a bright day where the temperature made it as high as 5 degrees Celsius! (Some people from warmer climates are probably going to think I am crazy for calling that a high temperature!) I had the day off work and decided not to waste the day. I opened all our windows to air out the house before we had to “batten down the hatches” again. I did some housework (actually a lot of housework, after being sick for a week it really piled up!) sweeping, vacuuming and mopping the floors. For wedding present my husband and I used a gift card to buy a steam mop, what a blessed invention that is!!! Two cups of water with in it and the floors are beautify clean and sanitized without any heavy chemicals! I used peppermint oil in my oil lamp and moved it in each room as I cleaned, for protection and purification! Between that and the sunshine beaming into the house I could feel the entire energy of the house, and my own, lift!

When the sun had softened up the snow I tackled our driveway with a shovel. While taking one of my many breathers (snow is heavy and I really need to get in shape!) I looked across into the fields near my house and watched two foxes playing a game of chase and evade in the field. They ran after one another, jumping onto each other, rolling in the snow and bounding around! It was an absolute delight to see. I then moved to our uncovered deck to get the snow off. As I shoveled and rested I looked into the yard and saw our puppy engaging in a new game, our puppy (well she is now a year old, but it takes almost two years for dogs to grow out of the puppy brain) was having a treasure hunt in the snow. Digging down and finding the crabapples that I had not been able to gather under the snow. She pulled them up, throwing them in the air and chasing to where they landed. She then raced around the yard with it; diving head first into larger snow drifts every chance she got! She rolled in the snow and when she got tired she would gobble a mouthful of snow, and eat her apple.

As the sun began to slip out of the sky the temperature dropped, reminding me that even though it was a warm sunny day, we are in the dark half of the year. Taking a reluctant puppy inside with me I tackled making some supper and placed it in the oven to finish cooking. I went to the fireplace and lit a fire with some nice cedar firewood my husband’s mom had let us take from her backyard. I threw in a pinch of salt and a few sage leaves and then sat, enjoying the warmth of the fire while waiting for my husband to come home. As I sat I reflect how nice it was to have a day at home to get caught up.

I then began to think of the past few weeks, of the cold and the snow, and the nasty roads we had to endure! I then thought of the foxes playing in the snow, and the puppy’s mad cap sport through the yard. I let my tired muscles relax as I rested and thought of all the farmland around my house, resting like I was after all the activity of the summer. The fields that had been tilled, seeded, supported the growth of their crops and then harvested are now silent and still. The earth, the creatures in the earth such as the earthworms, soil nutrients and bacteria’s, all granted a respite brought on by the snow.

I also began to think of my garden, all the great things that came out of it… and the long hours of backbreaking work I put into it! Since harvesting (thank Goddess I got that done before the snow flew) I have not done any gardening asides from keeping my poor houseplants alive. I thought about how it was nice to not have to weed, or mow the lawn anymore. I thought of long nights cuddling by the fire with the pets and my husband, about all the reading I want to get done over the winter, the big Yule dinner I am planning on hosting (our first Yule in the new house and first time hosting!!!!). I also planned a few changes in my pagan room, and the sorting and organizing and clearing out of clutter I plan on undertaking while the snow flies.

I also noticed how much my thoughts have been turning within. Examining myself, my motivations, and actions. Not always a pretty sight when one reflects on the times one has lost her temper, or not been as kind as she could have been. I looked a bit at some of my reactions to things, at some of the anger I have been holding onto that has not made me the most pleasant person to be around (and how lucky I am that my husband puts up with the moodiness I sometimes toss out). I planned out the basic bones of some cleansing and releasing rituals I want to work on over the next few weeks and some changes I want to make within.

Sitting there, beside the glow of the fire, with content puppies snoozing at my feet and my cat purring in my lap, I began to understand the need for winter, the need for the cold. I understood the blessings that the winter has bestowed upon me and the opportunities that the dark time of year has granted me. I am still not thrilled at the shoveling, or having to scrape the windshield every day. And I am not liking the taking extra time to drive home, and having to bundle up just to look out the door. But I welcome the winter… begrudgingly.

 Yours Humbly

The Redneck Pagan

Service

A while ago I was watching a television show with my husband. In this show there was a society that was divided into Castes. The Worker Caste, the Warrior Caste and the Religious Caste. Each Caste had their own leaders, and the leaders from each Caste came together in a council to guide the society as a whole.  In this part of the television show the Council of the Castes had been broken, and the Castes had been embroiled in a Civil war, with the Warrior Caste attacking the Religious Caste. The Religious Caste, being unable to withstand the forces of the Warrior Caste Surrendered. A trial of strength between the leader of the Religious Caste and the leader of the Warrior Caste ensued to determine the new leaders and at the end the Religious Caste came out as the winning Caste.

The winning leader set up a new council in which the previously ignored Worker Caste held the majority of the seats on the council. The leader explained her choice: “You had forgotten the worker caste, hadn't you? When our two sides fight, they're the ones caught in the middle, forgotten that it's their time to serve, to build, and to die. They built the temples we pray in, the ships you fight in. They look to us to guide their hands. But prayers are fleeting and wars forgotten. What is built endures. They do not wish to conquer or convert, only to build the future. And now, they will have that chance. The religious caste and the warrior caste will advise and council. We will serve, as is proper. Religion and war must act in the service of the people, not the other way around.”  The last line really struck a chord with me: “Religion (...) must act in service of the people.” It’s a powerful statement that was made there. It’s one of those moments where something hits you like a ton of bricks, at least I know it did for me.

I like to think of myself as a very spiritual person, I think most pagans do. We watch the seasons change, keep tabs on the moon phases, most of us have altars and shrines in our homes as daily reminders of the divine. I pray often and think about the Gods often. I try very hard to treat people as the God and Goddess within I know they have (i.e. I try and be nice, respectful and kind. I don't always succeed, but I try). I perform rituals and cast spells from time to time. In our house alone we have one large wall Shrine to the gods, an Ancestor Shrine, a small shrine on the bookcase beside my bed and in my pagan room I have a wall shrine and my main altar. So I have really worked hard at having spiritual spots spread throughout our home. At work I have spiritual pictures (for me that includes stone circles, angels and pictures of Gods and Goddesses I follow) with me and I try to surround myself with beautiful natural items such as shells, pine cones or go outside in nature.

I am very good at taking care of my spiritual needs and try to be good at cultivating a daily spiritual practice. I must say that my spiritual practice has served me well. I draw strength and comfort from my practices and from the Gods. I feel it has made a much better person, has made me stronger and more compassionate. Some of the spells I have worked have been very successful such as the spell I cast to find a good job and the spell my husband and I cast to find our house. (Obviously we paired it with a heck of a lot of work such as resumes, job hunting, keeping a good credit rating etc.) So again I say, my religious practices has served myself and my family exceptionally well.

Then I began to ask myself the question... What do I do to serve my Gods? I am definitely not a priestess! Although I have been practicing for nine years I still truly believe I am more of a novice than anything else. I have no real formal training and do not belong to a coven, circle or grove. My own personal studies are very sporadic and tend not to have any real discipline to them. I tend to float from topic to topic and up until very recently would read a book, go to the next, trying to get that next spiritual high (as you know). I have recently started trying to cultivate discipline in my practices but I am not very far long and certainly am not an expert!

Ok so I do not serve in a group, nor am I really experienced enough to be clergy. So what do I do? Well one of the ways that I serve is through my job. I am an administrative assistant in a hospital. I work for three managers and under them are a bunch of therapists who directly treat our clients. We treat the elderly, stroke victims, accident victims, people with strain injuries and many others. My work tends to be very boring and repetitive at times. I do a lot of typing, data entry and a lot of phone calls. However, by doing my job well I free up our therapists to treat the clients rather than chasing paperwork, and I free up the managers to help create new programs that will address the needs of our clients better. Although I am not directly helping the clients, my work is vital to them getting the care they need, and through that I feel I serve the Gods by helping ensure my fellow humans get the care they need.

So I serve with my job, that's great (well I think so anyway) but is this the only way I serve the Gods. Well actually no, it's not. Two nights and a day out of the week I work with a local youth organization. This youth organization is free for teenagers and has no other requirements besides the minimum and maximum age ranges. So any young person who wants to join can. From there they get to go camping, go flying (right up to and including getting a pilots license), go on trips around the province and possible even overseas. We teach them map and compass, have a band they can join and teach them how to safely use a firearm.

I volunteered with the group for five years and in the past four years I have been paid a little for my work (I make enough to cover the gas to and from our activities). I spend a lot of time with these young people, sometimes they talk to me about problems in their lives, sometimes they share with me their interests, their ups and downs. I do the best I can to comfort them, reassure them, share their joys and be there. Some of the kids come to us from bad backgrounds, some of them have no where else where they feel safe and accepted. We strive to create an environment that they can feel loved, accepted. We also teach them leadership skills and citizenship, to help them grow to become productive young adults and give them the confidence that they can accomplish anything in life.

The work is stressful, as a rule teenagers are impulsive! Their hormones are going a little crazy, their brains are changing and developing and they are still trying to figure out who they are. They have days where they are brilliant... and days when you can only shake your head at the strange feat they have attempted. There are long hours, preparing training plans, lessons, full weekend activities and as with anything... paperwork! It's enough to make anybody want to pull their hair out, but I do love it. I love having the opportunity to watch them grow, discover who they are and where they can go! By making them better people today, I can ensure a better future for them, for all they encounter, for my country and for the world.

To me the work I do with the young people in the youth program, and even the work I do in my day to day job part of my service to the Gods. While I am not the mighty High Priestess, or lead a coven, or conduct rituals for starry eyed admirers, I still work with what I am good at to create a better world. Some may argue that this is not service to the Gods, and I have to respectfully disagree with them.

Yours Humbly

The Redneck Pagan

The Perfect Athame

As some of you may recall I have recently decided to go back to the basics of my knowledge and experience and begin a process of going deeper. And for those of you who are scratching their heads and wondering if I spent too much time with the glue cap off here is an excerpt from an earlier blog post to explain:

“I am beginning to realize how little I actually know (…)I mean I have read probably over a hundred books, but rarely stopped to really read them. I would do one or two exercises and then go to the next. I skimmed over the material without properly allowing myself the time and effort to go deeper.

With that little epiphany in mind I do believe it is time for me to go back to the basics! (…) I am finding myself digging out those 101 books that have been collecting dust, and have started re-reading them. My next goal is to start doing the exercises, and really documenting my results. Not just the half fast skimming I did before, but really seeking the experiences and knowledge. How successful I will be, I don’t yet know. We shall find out how much determination, discipline and dedication I have. “

So with that primer in hand forwards we go!

In going over the basics I have discovered something of note… the stuff that used to make my heart race with excitement, the books I spent hours reading and much time and money locating and acquiring… are getting rather boring! This has been a far more difficult task than I initially gave it credit for. Now before the fingers start wagging and people start saying “you said you were going deeper”, I have been doing the work (my mother would be shocked at how well I have been doing my “homework”). I have diligently gone through all of the exercises in the first third of one of my basic books. Having said that the first third of the book was a primer on craft history and some basic jargon. Very important stuff for anybody with an interest in Witchcraft and Paganism. However I recently read Doreen Valiente’s “The Rebirth of Witchcraft”, and after reading about craft history from a Lady who was present for much of it, well the 101 stuff is boring.

So after the history of the Craft, the Jargon, types of witchcraft. One of my 101 books  then covers magical tools. There is the basic correspondences of the tools, Athame and the Wand represents the God, Cauldron and Chalice the Goddess. And of course the four elements: Cauldron/Chalice for Water, Pentacle for Earth, Wand for Fire, Athame for Air (or depending on your tradition Athame for Fire and Wand for Air). I decided to review some material on the different tools, being nine years away from my first introduction I felt it was important to review and check up on newest teachings and theories.

I stumbled across the usual descriptions: the Athame is a black handled, double edge knife used by Witches to direct energy. Witches typically use it to charge items, cast their circle, cutting astral cords. It is never used to cut anything on the physical plane, and some argue that it looses its power if it ever draws blood. I then read about how it is supposed to be made. Made? Uh oh!

According one author a witch should always try to make their own Athame! I give this author full credit, he goes into great detail on how one should go about it. He explains the equipment needed, ways to get it done, the proper metals to use, wood in the fire, symbols you can carve onto the blade or the handle and even how to consecrate it. And I have to agree with his reasoning: when a witch takes the time, effort and intention on the creation of the Athame it becomes part of them, it becomes part of their power. I can see that and understand that, I just have a problem… I am not what you would call handy!

 

When I was younger and living with my parents we bought a bunch of Ikea furniture for the house. My mother and I shopped and brought it home, and then my father and I put it together. The reason my father and I had to put it together is because my mother and brother refused to work with us. My dad is a brilliant man, he’s been a teacher for over 30 years now, he has helped revamp parts of the elementary school curriculum and I hate playing Trivial Pursuit with the man because I always get my assets handed to me! But for the love of the Gods… DO NOT give that man a hammer. (When I first brought my husband home to meet my father he was a little hesitant as my husband is a bit older than I am. My husband proceeded to fix his sink trap and tap and realign some closets on their track. My father turned to me and said “I love him, keep him!”) I have inherited some of my father’s difficulty with tools.

I can recall one day when my husband and I had first moved in together. He was watching a documentary on TV and I was in the bedroom hanging pictures. There was a picture I wanted hung up that was out of my reach. He said he would come hang it up at the next commercial break. I, being the soul of patience, decided to take matters into my own hands. I stacked some towels on the edge of the bed and standing with one foot on the towels and one braced against the wall I prepared to hammer the nail. Well the hammer was on the floor (and my perch felt a bit precarious), so I grabbed the closest thing I had, a high heeled shoe. As I was about to hammer the nail in when I heard “What the hell are you doing!` My husband lifted me off my perch (he is six foot three inches and I am five feet two inches, he lifted me under the one arm like a rag doll, I am sure it was an amusing sight for the dogs) and took care of the picture for me.

Ok, so having said that.. I really don’t think having me playing with a forge and other blacksmiths materials is the best idea. The life I save could be my own, and I think the fire department does not want to have to stop the inevitable fire. So what should I do? Well the next option is receiving one as a gift from another magical person… Well I live in Central Alberta, not exactly the place you will find a lot of practicing Pagans.. and my first years I was very much a solitary practitioner. So receiving one as a gift would have been ideal... but not exactly practical.

Being eager to begin my practice (and being too new to fully understand where the power lay) I began to scour the city for the Perfect Athame. Dollar stores, Wal-Mart, Zellers and second hand stores became my playground. I bought several different types of knives (ranging in price from 50 cents to five bucks). Nothing seemed to be working and I was getting very discouraged. I was too new to truly understand the idea of magic within and was worried that if I was unable to find a real and proper Athame that I would never be a proper witch (silly sounding now, but a huge fear at the time).

I had settled on using one of the knives I had picked up at Wal-Mart, it had the best feel in the handle and wasn't very sharp. I was having decent success with the knife, but it never felt right. My subconscious was not satisfied with the toy I was using! This was of course 9 years ago, before the Internet had really took off, sites like eBay were in their infancy and specialty websites were few and far between. I had tried to find Athame's online but they were well out of a college student's budget.

One day I was digging through some of my old treasure boxes (you know, the boxes you keep under your bed, filled with what other people might call junk). While digging through the box I came across a knife. This particular type of knife is known as a Sgian Dubh (pronounced Skin-Doo), they are a type of Scottish small knife they kept next to the calf in their socks. I received it years ago from Grandfather. He had bought it for me years ago when he was visiting his brother in Dublin. When he had bought it for me I was playing in a pipe band and was a Highland Dancer.

I wore it for two years in the pipe band and another year and a half as a Highland Dancer. I took it out anytime I did a performance of a Sword Dance or Highland Fling for an additional two years after that, and then when I no longer danced I put it away and had not thought of it for years until I found it again. When I picked it up I felt like it almost sang in my hand! I began to toy with the notion of using it as my Athame.

It had many positive characteristics, it was double edged but was blunted so as not to hurt me. It was in a sheath, so I could put it in a bag and take it with me to outdoor rituals if I wanted. The handle was black and was made of a solid moulded plastic. It was a gift from my Irish Grandfather (incidentally my path is most closely related to Irish Reconstructionalism and it was my Irish roots and the mythology of my people that first got me interested in paganism). It came from my family's homeland and so had a connection to the land of my ancestors. And I had worn it during high energy activities that I loved!

I gave it a try for the first time at a Sabbat (I think it was Samhain, but it might have been Mabon, my Magical Record keeping is a skill I lack). It just seemed to click. It felt perfect in my hand, I felt powerful with it, mysterious and magical. In recent years I have seen some beautiful Athames, many of which have been "properly made" and most at a very reasonable price. But I have never had a desire to get a new one, as I have found my Perfect Athame.

Yours Humbly

The Readneck Pagan
 

The Garden

This year I have discovered that I have a much deeper respect for my ancestors!

For the past couple of years I have been dying to have a garden!  When we lived in the city a garden was limited to the little stretch of dirt directly in front of the house with the front porch cutting it in half. I tried to talk my landlord into letting us take a small patch pf the backyard and create a raised garden bed. He refused and so I had to try and learn to be creative. I tried my hand at container garden, with mixed results. Sometimes container gardening can be a bit more fussy than open air gardening. You don't have insects churning the soil for you, you have to give it lots of water, ensure it gets plant food etc. Some plants I had grew fairly well, but others I just did not have enough container space for them.

When we were looking to move we stumbled upon the home we have now and the first thing my husband told me was the size of the garden. He had already seen many features of the house and really wanted to convince me to come and look at the property so he knew the word Garden would catch my interest.  I have to confess that at the sight of the 30x30 garden plot and two mature apple trees I was sold! We moved in February and so I had to wait!

Week after week I watched the weather forecast, waiting with baited breath for spring to arrive. I remember one day we had a terrific snow storm in March. All around me people were grumbling about having to shovel their walks, drive in the wretched conditions and disparaging the cold. I could not stop grumbling about how long it was taking for my garden to thaw out! Weekly I cruised by the hardware store and picked up packages of seeds! Slowly our Canadian winter melted into spring!

With the snow melted we could see that it had been a few years since somebody had tended the garden. It was over run with weeds and I had to hack a bunch of dead weed stalks in order just to see the dirt. We did not have a tiller so we attacked the soil with shovels and a weed weasel. The sun was already gathering its force and was making it warm enough that I was uncomfortably sticky, and that was only 15 minutes into it! My husband was a trooper and was turning the soil at the back of the garden where things were packed in rather tight. After an hour of slugging away at it we took a rest break in the shade when a neighbour came by and offered us the use of a tiller.

Our neighbour and my husband then took the tiller and after another half an hour they were able to get the garden tilled. We were all exhausted and filthy. I only smoothed over the soil on the top and called it a night. We barbecued and I sorted my seeds., the next week we had rain non stop. I was sick for the next week and then had more rain. By the time I was able to get to planting I was well behind the rest of the province. Not wanting to waste time I planted all my seeds in one day. Take my advice... don`t do that! My back was killing me for days after that!

After the planting came the tending! What a tedious task that is! Pulling the weeds, watching the weather for appropriate rain levels, keeping harmful insects away, weeding, watching the weather again, and weeding again! I also had to make sure that I was making sure that I wasn`t pulling out the new shoots of my plants. I  had to put some mesh fencing up to help the beans grow upwards and am going to have to put more up for the peas soon. I am in the garden several times a week working away at it when time and weather allows.

The work has been far more than I can even begin to adequatly express in words. Sometimes when I come in after pulling weeds my hands are raw (mainly because I don`t wear gloves as much as I should). My back aches and I sometimes feel a touch of sunstroke after a while in the sun. Or I am soaking wet from fighting our hose to get the garden watered in a heat wave. My arms are often tense and sore after dragging a hoe through all the weeds and around the plants. And the harvesting has been no picnic either, bending and stooping, checking the plants for readiness. All of this work and pain for a hobby!!! However I do enjoy eating the fresh food and sharing it with my family and friends.

So how does this make me appreciate my ancestors you may ask? Well I was picking some raspberries and munching on them and I dropped one. I was a little bummed out because it looked rather juicy and delicious but figured "ah well, that's what a supermarket is for". My own ignorance and arrogance came back and kicked me square in the assets! Here I was holding a gift from the very land that holds my home on it, that has nourished the seeds that I had placed into the ground, that kept the trees I was planning on making apple pies with growing strong. Land that embraced me as I sat upon it to watch the sunsets and had offered healthy nourishment.

This ignorance and arrogance made me realise just how disconnected that I had become from the land. Me, a pagan, a follower of an Earth Religion, who considers the earth to be divine, who follows the seasons and makes a point of learning about the plants in my area. Who watches the migrations of birds and the way a tree shifts in the seasons. Who tries to meditate and get in touch with the earth! It seems almost ludicrous, but it is true, and very embarassing. It made me think.

I thought about all the produce in a supermarket, how many times I let something rot in the fridge because I didn't want to bother cooking. I thought of the person who took the time to watch the weather, plant his seeds with care. The time and work he put into keeping the earth healthy, the plants healthy and strong. And then all the work he put into gathering the ripe vegitables and fruits and getting them ready to be packaged and sent to market.

I then thought about the beef I had cooked the night before. I am surrounded by cows, we live smack dab in the middle of cow country! I can count at least three herds during the 20 minute drive to town, and if I go any direction from my house I will see cows! But for the first time I really thought about it. In the early spring, early February for that matter, ranchers are out int heir fields, calving in the cold night. Ensuring that the cows deliver their calves well, keeping the coyotes away from the herds and taking care of the new calves. After that they ensure that the calves are healthy, staying up with the sick ones to see if they can recover, calling the Vet to keep the heard safe from disease. They are their with the calves from birth until they send them to market.

Countless hours, money and hard backbreaking work is done by farmers to ensure that there is always produce and meat in our supermarkets. Although I do not live near the sea I have seen some television programs about living on fishing boats, the dangers and wor that goes into the catching and preparing of the food that graces my plate. Even with my 30x30 garden plot I could not feed my husband and I for a full year off of the food I will grow.

My ancestors lived in Ireland, they were farmers and ranchers. They worked day and night to feed their clans, to ensure that they were healthy and had enough left over to barter for household goods they could not produce. Later in the years they moved to the cities and opened shops. But for centuries, mileniums even they were farmers. They had no supermarkets, no refridgeration. They had to rely on the earth every second of the day to keep themselves alive. The toils and tasks that are my hobby, were once the difference between life and death.

Yours Humbly

The Readneck Pagan

Coming Full Circle

The only thing life I have learned with certainty, if the fact that there is still so much for me to learn!

(I am sure that’s a quote from somewhere but I have no idea from where. So if somebody knows where on earth that one came from please give that person credit in the comments section. )

And so this brings me to my next topic to rant about: going back to the basics. I personally started peeking into the beautiful world of Paganism and Witchcraft about nine years ago. As most people, I had been raised in a “conventional household”, Mom, Dad, Brother, Dog and Bird. My grandparents on my father’s side are very devout Catholics. I can find no fault in them for their faith. They are wonderful people! My Grandmother is part of a group of Married Nuns (I cannot remember what they call themselves), she is at the Church daily, cooking meals for seniors, knitting hats and mitts for less fortunate children, singing in the choir, and helping everybody who crosses her path. My Grandfather helped with repairs around the Church and his neighbor’s homes, went to senior living facilities and hospitals to give comfort, pray and deliver the Communion the priest had blessed. They do not quote bible passages endlessly; I have never been forced to go to church with them, the most they did was when I was over for Easter my Grandfather prayed aloud before the meal.

My parents were less religious than my grandparents were and so religion was not a huge part of my life. On Christmas Eve my father read from the family bible the story of Jesus birth (a tradition in his family) and then went right into “T’was the Night Before Christmas”.  We had a manger beside the tree, but I played with them just like they were dolls and my mother never objected. When I was in Grade 5 my parents found a nice little school that was completely French (they had put me in French Immersion when I was four) so I transferred over to the Catholic School System. I still never went to church and did well enough in the religion classes to pass. In High School I went back into the public system. Graduated and still had never been forced into a religion.

I do not blame my parents at all for this. My Dad took me to several churches whenever I asked him to, answered my questions as I asked them, and told me it was important for me to decide things for myself. As such in high school I started reading up on different religions, I started with Buddhism, read a bit into Judaism, read on some different branches of Christianity, Fell in love with Aboriginal Spirituality (although I never practiced it as I did not want to usurp the culture of another) I even studied Hinduism, Sikh faith and read a little into Islam. I never did stay long on one topic, I learned enough to satisfy curiosity, and then moved on. I never practiced their rites and rituals, so I just kept hop scotching along. I finished High School, got a Job, got another job, got fired from one job (topic for another blog post), got another job the day after I got fired and was grateful for that since the day before I got fired I had been accepted into College for full time studies (even though I had only applied as part time).

My first few weeks of College would be the catalyst for launching me into Paganism. I met two young ladies who were themselves Witches. They lent me books, taught me the lingo, and let me follow them like a lost puppy into New Age stores and the Occult section of the local Library. I was hooked! I read every book I could get my hands on, collected crystals at an alarming rate (I’m still guilty of this one), jumped into online forums and Facebook Groups. Over time I learned a great deal and integrated much of what I had learned into my life. I cast spells, drummed to the moon, chanted to the Gods, read on the mythologies of our ancestors, collected all the cool “Witchy tools” I could get my hands on (and afford).

Slowly I grew into the world of Witchcraft. I slowed down enough to start thinking about what I was reading and being told. I questioned the “experts” I met online, my friends who had introduced me to Witchcraft and I had long discussions (and as we moved away after College we exchanged letters). I met and fell in love with my husband (a solitary Druid) and we bought our home together. It has now been almost Nine years since I had first set my eyes upon this world. Nine years (3X3, a rather sacred and magical number, especially for a Celt like myself) I have been learning, thinking, sharing and working on making magic. Nine years, and I realize I have come full circle. (And in writing this out I have discovered I am long winded...)

Don’t get me wrong. I love being Pagan, and being a Witch! I would have jumped over to something new by now if I didn’t. And many of my spiritual needs are being met through this path. Bu I am beginning to realize how little I actually know. I’m not talking about the memorization hoey that is regurgitated time and time again (such as Green is the colour of fertility, prosperity and earth), I mean I have read probably over a hundred books, but rarely stopped to really read them. I would do one or two exercises and then go to the next. I skimmed over the material without properly allowing myself the time and effort to go deeper.

With that little epiphany in mind I do believe it is time for me to go back to the basics! I have already gone through the first stage of development (in my opinion), we all get overly excited, rushing to see what is next, thirsting for what is new, hungering for something else to sink our teeth into. Whether it is the newest and greatest meditation, book, spell, magical item or chant. I believe I am not the only one guilty of this phase. Let’s face it, Paganism is exciting! Its eye opening and introduces us to world of magic and beauty beyond belief. There is so much to see and learn one cannot blame us for running topic to topic, devouring whatever we can lay our hands on. The problem is that we all, and I am guilty of this, get greedy for that rush. We get addicted to that superficial high that this brings us, we think of ourselves as being learned, intelligent witches, with great open minds along our piles and piles of books, with notes scribbled in our little notebooks. We clutter our lives with these magical tools, and clutter our minds with all this jargon, spells, chants and books.

But at some point in time we must grow past that phase. We need to stop, and ask ourselves “What the hell am I doing? What is it I am really looking for?” Once we have answered these questions satisfactorily (and by that I mean being brutally honest. My answers were “Looking for the next spiritual high” and “To free my soul, find deeper meanings in life and connect to the Gods. And then to take this knowledge and use it to help others.” Notice that what I was doing and what I wanted were totally different things?)  Then we can begin to really move forwards and go deeper. And in essence, this is taking us back to the beginning. I am finding myself digging out those 101 books that have been collecting dust, and have started re-reading them. My next goal is to start doing the exercises, and really documenting my results. Not just the half fast skimming I did before, but really seeking the experiences and knowledge. How successful I will be, I don’t yet know. We shall find out how much determination, discipline and dedication I have.  And I hope that more people stop and receive the epiphany I have, so that they to, may dive deeper as I am about to attempt to.

I’ll keep you posted from time to time during my mental wanderings.

Humbly yours

The Redneck Pagan

Are you my Familiar?

Well, I seem to be on a roll, three posts in two days! Mind you it is the weekend. I have a full time job in the city where I am on the computer for 8 hours a day, so I suspect weekdays will be rather slow for posts and the weekend I will yammer your ears off. Anyways, onto my next brilliant flash of inspiration (I say this with my tongue firmly planted in my cheek). I have discovered that the idea of a familiar is a rather popular topic of conversation in the Pagan realm, and so this morning while making breakfast and drinking the magical elixir that allows me to function like a normal human being (aka Coffee) I mulled it over.

I currently live with four animals, yes my house is a zoo and no I am not counting my husband amongst them. I have three dogs and a cat. The two older dogs are small breeds, one is 13 the other is 12. The other dog is still a puppy, she is 10 months old and is a larger breed dog. She still has a ton of the rambunctious puppy energy that causes her to get into everything and drive me completely crazy at least once a day. The other two are much more sedate, preferring the comfort of the couch or the foot of the bed to madcap laps around the house. They are still rather active, but are considerable less so than the puppy. I got the two small ones as a teenager when they were puppies and we just got the puppy this year (I know, if she`s only 10 months old DUH!). The cat is the newest addition to our family and proof that my husband loves me, he is not a cat person whatsoever and has already had to rescue her from trees and cupboards when she gets stuck. Did I mention my husband is a saint, I really should. Anyway, she is a rescue, we think she is about two years old.

Now I have four animals and as a witch one must be my familiar, right? I mean it is the pinnacle of witchyness to have a familiar? Every witch I have read about has one. Well let us examine these pets one by one, starting with the puppy. She loves to be wherever I am, curled up at my side, she loves coming outside with me while I garden and she eats grass until she makes herself sick (a habit I wish she would stop). So does that make her my familiar? Probably not, that makes her a puppy! Her breed is a very family oriented one (Border Collie, Golden Retriever and Irish Setter), they like to stick close to their pack and after we brought her home I took over the "mom role" for her.

So onto the second one, lets look at the 13 year old. I got her when I was sixteen, she was just a ball of white fluff when I got her and I slept beside her box in a sleeping bag for the first few days, and always woke up to find the box tipped over and the puppy in my sleeping bag. So I brought the puppy downstairs to my bedroom and left her box beside my bed. And yet in the am, there she was, curled up on my pillow next to me. Even after 13 years she is still always curled up next to me. She too likes to know where I am at all times, although she does not always have to be right next to me. She has also taken a shine to my husband, she will follow him everywhere, behave beautifully for him and will sit at the door every time he leaves and wait for him to come back. Hmmm, again seems like a loyal and good dog to me, but not a familiar, she will be around me when I cast spells, create an altar etc, but that is more because she has always done so.

Ok third dog then, my little suck. He is the smallest of the three dogs and is actually the son of my 12 year old dog. When she had a litter of puppies he was the runt of the litter, kept getting pushed out of the basket by the bigger and stronger puppies. I was so scared he was going to die that I bought a bottle of puppy formula and fed him three times a day myself, just to make sure he would grow. I played with him and cuddled him non stop and when the time came to sell the puppies we ended up keeping him because I was so attached (actually I can thank my brother because he got to choose which two puppies we kept and my boy was one of the ones chosen). He is still a total Mommy's boy, he has to sleep curled up next to me, follows me wherever I go (more than the puppy does) and I can flip him onto his back and rub his belly with no warning. Actually the stuff that dog lets me get away with is astounding. Again is he a familiar? I don't think so. He is very intuitive, knows my moods exceptionally well and when I am upset he won't leave my side (or when I am sick). He is a very faithful companion, but I don't think that makes him a familiar. So none of the dogs are familiars, and yet they are still and integral part of my life. I would be poorer for not having their companionship and love.

So the last one, the Cat. Well she is a good choice for familiar, the connection between Witches and Cats go back through the centuries. And she is a beautiful long haired black cat! Well that is a promising start isn't it! This cat has to know where everybody is in the house at all times, if she cannot find you she meows non stop until you identify where you are. In our house we have quite a few rooms, one of which has been set aside as my pagan room. This is one of the cat's favorite places to go. Whenever the door is open she is in there like a dirty shirt, sniffing everything, she jumps onto the altar, paws at the books, and has to be there whenever I am doing a working.

Aha! You say, she is totally your familiar, the interest n the the altar and magical workings proves it! Well maybe it does, or maybe it does not. First of all the room I speak of is normally a closed door room, pets are not allowed to wander through it. Anybody who owns a cat can tell you that a closed door is a severe annoyance to any cat. The second that any closed door is opened my cat, who normally has the speed of molasses poured from the carton, suddenly develops the magical abilities of "The Flash" and will actually materialize in the room before you have stepped in the door. So its not just the pagan room, the same thing happens irregardless of what closed door it is. Second, she is a rescue cat. She was found in a house with 70 other cats, with her litter of kittens. She was only 4 pounds when they found her and were unable to save her litter. She was adopted and then abandoned two weeks afterwards in -40 weather. She then spent another month in the shelter, waiting for a home. When we got her she was very clingy, and especially after two weeks, which to be honest I cannot blame her.

So what conclusions can we come to about this:
1) It would appear that I do not have a familiar, there are some indicators that I might have one, but equally enough indicators that I do not.
2) It can be incredibly easy to jump to conclusions that would lead you to the answer you want. Had I desperately wanted a familiar, any of the examples above could lead me to delude myself into believing that one of my pets is a familiar.

It is easy to convince oneself of anything when you want it badly enough, even if that is not necessarily the truth. To be brutally honest, I don't know if any of my pets are my familiars, perhaps one is, perhaps not, at the end of the day does it really matter? I honour my pets and their contribution to my life daily. I feed and water them, give them shelter from the elements. I give them love and attention, and spoil them rotten with toys. I make sure their medical needs are taken care of. In return I get tons of slobbery kisses, lots of purrs and mountains of cuddles! So what if they are not my familiars, it does not make me any less of a witch, nor does it diminish the impact they have in my life.

Yours humbly

The Redneck Pagan

The Meteor Shower

So tonight is the night of the Perseid Meteor shower. My husband and I spent over an hour on our deck watching them streak across the sky. Its the first real astronomical event we have watched since we moved out here. I remember last year we were sitting in the backyard of the place we were renting. We had a little fire bowl (the poor thing only held two split logs at a time). We had spent an hour explaining to three separate neighbours what we were doing outside at that hour (it was only 11pm), then we got to breath some second hand smoke from bad cigarettes as three of our neighbours lit up on their deck. A siren from a police car shattered the tranquility of the night. We could hear the people four doors down having a party. But the worst part of all, was that there were so many streetlights that we only got to see the brightest of meteors. We got rather disheartened and went inside and instead looked up meteor shower photographs on the internet.

This year it was a totally different experience! We went out at about the same time this year, 11pm (2300hrs) and sat out on the deck to enjoy the show. There was not a sound to be heard. No cars, no sirens, no parties. Quiet, the only interruption to the silence was the occasional tap of claws on the deck as our dogs wandered around, wondering why on earth we are not curled up in the nice comfy bed. I could hear my husbands light breathing beside me. The second thing I noticed was how dark it was, we have an industrial plant near the town, but its soft lights only lit up a section of the sky south of us. In the North, East and West the sky was filled with thousands of stars! Far more than I had ever seen in the city. I breathed deeply and commented about the difference to my husband, who agreed with me on how different things were out there. We relished the quiet and the amazing view our new home offered us.

We sat out there, watching as red and white and green meteors shot across the sky, leaving the trail of light behind them before vanishing into the darkness again. While we looked he pointed out several stars to me. In his earlier days he had been an avid star watcher and has a significant knowledge base. He showed me above a set a bright stars a light that seemed to move slightly, it was a moon! We watched the light from the international space station slip through the sky, along with several satellites. Around Cassiopeia he showed me where you could just make out some binary stars. When he mentioned that they were two stars devouring each other I asked him if they were still there (seeing as the lights we see in the sky are millions of years old). He said they were not.

Its amazing to think that the light that shines upon us tonight is no longer in existence, that one day the stars we know, have named and make up our various constellations are only a memory of what once was. Its incredibly difficult for me to wrap my head around how immense the universe is! I can understand how my ancestors saw the stars as Gods, and dwelling places of great heroes! And even in this modern age, where science and technology has helped to explain what the stars are, what creates meteor showers, I find them no less magical than our distant relatives did thousands of years ago.

Yours humbly

The Redneck Pagan.

Welcome to The Redneck Pagan

So I suppose the best way to start is a brief introduction to this blog and me. I live in a small community in central Alberta. In my town there are often more cows around the outskirts then there are people. The people are out here are friendly, they will introduce themselves to you on the street when you are new, wave at you across the road and offer to lend you a hand when they see you struggling. They will keep their nose out of your business and let you live your life your way, provided you don't bother them living their life their way. We recently moved out here and I have found the slower pace has been very agreeable for my husband to be and myself. In the bigger city we came from we were living in a fishbowl, everybody stared at you, compared their material goods to their neighbour, and were full of flash and short on substance. We live with a few dogs and a cat, who all provide enough entertainment to last a lifetime!

This blog is going to be about the stuff that interests me, pisses me off, makes me laugh or stuff that I just find weired. It might have some PG language, possible some PG examples. I'm not very good at being diplomatic or politically correct. That often gets in the way of what you are trying to say, so I tend to "tell it as it is". Hence you are probably going to find something in these pages, at some point in time, that is going to royally piss you off. My answer to that is: good! I only hope that before you get angry that you really think about what in the post has made you angry! Was it my idea, opinion, something I said, or did you just get mad because of a social programming or prejudice? For the most part I will try to stick to Pagan related topics (since they are what got me started on this), or talk about things from a Pagan perspective.

Well I suppose that's enough blabbering about the basics. Thank you for reading!

Yours humbly

The Redneck Pagan