Autumnal Equinox

While I'm still in the throes of a nine day modern interpretation (not my own) of the Eleusinian Mysteries, I was so uber excited for the opposition between the setting autumnal sun and the harvest moon last night to kick off the equinox celebrations. As I've mentioned before, I think it is incredibly important to keep my children in touch with the natural cycles of the planet they live on, so we try to celebrate the solstices and equinoxes outside. Alas! It rained here all day long!

A few cotton candy clouds are better than nothing, I suppose. We dashed all around town through a light sprinkling of rain for the last 10 minutes or so before the sun was supposed to set trying to find the ideal place for viewing, but the sun was never visible behind all the cloud cover. This picture was taken right at sunset, approximately 7:30pm for us.

There was no sign of the big, full harvest moon at all.

I have a get together with my (very young) apprentice on Saturday, and as he is currently very interested in crystal healing, I whipped up some small gem essences for him to try and charged them under the setting equinox sun.



Ghetto Pagan Mother of Four: Transports gem essences— crafted at sunset on the autumnal equinox and bottled in reused baby food jars— in her daughter’s Tinkerbell lunch box. And she can’t take a non-blurry picture to save her life these days. There’s a special ring of hell for this camera, I tell ya.

Today's Accidental Witchery

Today’s accidental witchery:

One of our family traditions is to make apple head dolls with the littles around the time of the autumnal equinox (it’s not an exact science, more like when the apples are ready and Mama has the energy). I use mine in ritual throughout the dark of the year, and the kids put on Samhain puppet shows with theirs. (‘Cause this mom doesn’t force her religion onto her children, but she does insist that they be aware of and take part in the seasonal changes of the planet they live on.) While making this year’s dolls today, the skewer from my oldest daughter’s went through the apple and into my hand. You cannot imagine the stupid amounts of clumsy that have been naturally bestowed upon me. Honest. A thick, glistening drop of ruby red welled up on my hand as I cursed, and when I yanked my hand away, said drop flew right into the mouth of my daughter’s doll. OH YES IT DID! See the picture? PROOF!

At which point she ran around the house screaming that she didn’t want a zombie apple head doll because it might try to eat her BRAAAAAAAAINS!

I think this mom may have to pull a switcheroo come Samhain.



The wound, clearly located on the Mound of Jupiter. That little bugger drank of the blood of my self-worth!

Birthday Tarot

Somehow I keep forgetting that I have this little blog, and now I'm very late in posting my birthday tarot spread. I'm lazy at best when it comes to tarot for myself. I prefer to keeps things as simple as possible, especially with something I am meant to track over a year. So, each year on the event of my solar return, I draw one card from the deck to represent my overall state of mind throughout the year and then draw one card for each month, laying them in a wheel around the first card. These were my results this year:

Center (self; mindset through the year)-- Ace of Swords reversed
September- VI of Pentacles reversed
October- IV of Cups
November- III of Cups
December- Knight of Cups reversed
January- Page of Wands
February- Empress
March- Emperor reversed
April- II of Wands reversed
May- VIII of Wands
June- Ace of Wands
July- Page of Pentacles reversed
August- Judgement

While I will reserve most of my personal interpretation for myself because it is, well, personal, I will say that it looks to be an interesting year. For one, this is the first time in many years that I have drawn any Major Arcana during my birthday spread. That in itself says a lot. It also seems that the spread is a bit Wand heavy, but that is not really unusual for me. Should be an interesting year...

I Stayed

There are days when it is so difficult to stay in this body. I don’t know what this “disorder” is that I have, or even if it is a disorder at all. (Ancestors say: What you lookin’ for a cure for? It’s a damn gift, girl. It’s a damn gift. Doctors shrug.) I know too that some would literally kill to be able to leave their physical being with the ease (ha!) with which I do so. Still, I have four children to care for and can’t just go AWOL whenever. I NEED to be present for them. You’d think, after all these years, that I’d be a little more adept at keeping myself from slip sliding into the Otherworlds at random moments, but if there’s been progress in that area, it’s slight. That frustrates the hell out of me.

It was only a matter of weeks for me to be able to trigger the OOBE’s on my own, but getting back? Staying here when the pull comes at an inopportune time? That’s been one hell of a different, far more complex story.

I stayed today though. I fought the pull tooth and fucking nail, and I stayed.